Werner Eduard Fritz von Blomberg was a German General Staff officer and the first Minister of War of Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime. After serving at the Western Front in World War I, he was appointed chief of the German Troop Office in the Weimar Republic. Following the Nazis' rise to power, he was named Minister of War and Commander-in-Chief of the German Armed Forces. In this capacity, Blomberg played a central role in Germany's military build-up during the years leading to World War II. However, on 20 January 1938, he was ultimately forced to resign after his rivals, Hermann Göring and Heinrich Himmler, presented Hitler with evidence that his wife had posed in the past for pornographic photos.