the First World War, the Jäger units of the Imperial German Army were disbanded, but infantry regiments of the 100,000-man Reichswehr of the Weimar Republic carried their traditions. After the Nazis came to power in 1933 and the rearmament of Germany began, the new Wehrmacht revived the name Jäger for various types of units:
- In 1935, the first specialized mountain infantry units were formed; their regiments and battalions were designated Gebirgsjäger(“mountain infantry” – Gebirge is German for “mountain range”). More specialized units, such as the Hochgebirgs-Jäger-Bataillone, were also developed for use in high-Alpine conditions. The Waffen SS raised a “Karstjäger” Division.
- When the Luftwaffebegan forming parachute units in the late 1930s, the first parachute regiment was designated Fallschirm-Jäger-Regiment 1. German paratroopers became known as Fallschirmjäger (Fallschirm is German for “parachute”). At first, Fallschirmjäger was applied only to genuine airborne-qualified troops, but the term was retained for Fallschirmjäger regiments and divisions even after they began operating as regular infantry. A number of Luftwaffen Feld-Divisionen (“field divisions”), regular ground combat units raised by the Luftwaffe, also used the term Luftwaffen-Jäger-Regiment for their infantry regiments. The army later took over many of these and retained the name Jäger-Regiment.
- Two Skijägerregiments were formed in 1943 as part of Skijäger-Brigade (later a Skijäger-Division).
- Certain infantry divisions were raised as “light infantry divisions” (leichte Infanterie-Divisionen) in late 1940. They were raised to operate in rough terrain, especially in southeastern Europe. Their infantry regiments were called Jäger-Regimenter, and in 1942, the light and light infantry divisions were renamed Jäger
- The antitank units of German divisions, originally called Panzer-Abwehr-Abteilungen(“anti-tank battalions”), began in 1940 to be redesignated as Panzerjäger-Abteilungen, (literally “tank hunter battalions”). These were equipped with towed or self-propelled guns (often the ad hoc mounting of an antitank gun on a captured or obsolete tank chassis). As the war progressed, some Panzerjäger-Abteilungen were fully equipped with specialized tank destroyers, initially known as Panzerjäger (tank hunters), and later by 1943 as Jagdpanzer (“hunting tank”) with enclosed, armored casemate
- The military police of the Wehrmacht was known as the Feldgendarmerie. In December 1943, a new military police force, directly subordinate to the Armed Forces High Command, was formed. Its units were designated Feldjäger-Kommandoswith subordinated Feldjäger battalions and regiments. These were known collectively as the Feldjägerkorps. The name was taken from the Reitendes Feldjägerkorps, a Prussian Army military police-type unit directly under the General Staff.
