Bundeswehr University Munich Bundeswehr University Munich ( German : Universität der Bundeswehr München , UniBw München ) is one of only two federal research universities in Germany that both were founded in 1973 as part of the German Armed Forces ( " Bundeswehr " ) . Originally called " Hochschule der Bundeswehr München " the institution was supposed to offer civilian academic education for military officers . Today , the university has an increasing number of civilian and international students . The academic year at the university is structured in " trimesters " and not the usual semesters , to offer intensive studies with more credit points per year . Very capable students can therefore achieve a Bachelor ' s and a Master ' s degree within less than four years , while this would usually require five years . Universität der Bundeswehr München has well - established scientific research and forms part of two excellence clusters of the German government ' s university excellence initiative . Bundeswehr University is one of only very few campus universities in Germany . History . In 1970 the then minister of defence Helmut Schmidt decided that the education of military officers in Germany had to be reviewed and had to include full academic studies . After one year the " Ellwein commission " presented its proposal for the creation of two civilian colleges within the armed forces . Students should get fully recognised civilian degrees independent of their military profession , to have a higher qualified officer corps and more incentives to join the military . The idea was that students would have better conditions than at normal universities so that they could cope with a higher workload and study faster . After almost two years of discussions and the necessary legislative procedures , both universities could open . University education normally being a responsibility of the German states , Universität der Bundeswehr München and Helmut Schmidt University are the only federal universities in Germany . With their innovative concepts Helmut Schmidt University and Universität der Bundeswehr München quickly became widely known as reform universities within the very traditional German university landscape . In the following years the universities had to establish their image and reputation and finally were accepted as full universities with the rights to award doctorate degrees as well as Habilitation s to qualify university professors in the 80s . In the 90s and 2000s the university has started to open its teaching towards civilian students and to extend its international relations . While the researchers and doctorate students always used to be mainly civilians , the student body still had been purely military in the 90s . Today , Universität der Bundeswehr München has concluded partnership contracts with different major financial and industrial companies , which send students to Universität der Bundeswehr München . In the past few years different federal agencies have started to qualify their employees at the university . Since 2007 Universität der Bundeswehr München has changed its degree to the harmonized Bologna system . It has completely restructed its curriculums and awards Bachelor ' s and Master ' s degrees instead of the former German Diplom . Campus and student life . The university is located in Neubiberg in the south of Munich , Bavaria . There are S - Bahn and U - Bahn connections to Neuperlach Süd as well as three bus connections available . In addition to that , there are motorway exits at Neubiberg and Neuperlach , permitting fast access by car . The large campus used to host the Air Force officer school before , and also included a military airport . Former runways are still used for scientific testing of vehicles . Since the 1970s a large number of buildings has been built for teaching , scientific research and student housing . Most of the students live in modern individual student dormitories on the campus and next to the university buildings . There is currently a large renovation process ongoing on the campus : within the next years about € 220m will be spent on building activities . On campus students have access to different sports facilities like gyms , tennis courts and golf ranges . Different multinational engineering companies have their headquarters or important industrial facilities directly next to the campus , most notably Siemens , Infineon Technologies , Bosch and Siemens Household Appliances ( BSH ) , and EADS facilitating frequent cooperation in research . On campus all students ( also the military ones ) usually wear civilian clothes . Students can organize their activities as they want and attendance to lectures is mostly voluntary . On Wednesday afternoons there is regularly military or language training for soldiers . There are many possibilities for extracurricular activities within student initiatives and associations . International initiatives like the German - American , German - Israeli or German - Hispanic clubs as well as the Model United Nations Society play an important role on the campus . The students of each student dormitory usually organize a large party every year . As a large part of the student body consists of military officers and officer candidates , sport is considered important on the campus . The sports center provides a variety of free courses for students - e . g . for different martial arts . There are a lot of sports facilities like gyms , different sports halls , a golf course , a large climbing wall , an indoor swimming pool , several tennis courts and other sports grounds . Furthermore the university has a large military obstacle course which was used for the CISM world cup in 2009 . There are different sports teams on the campus which also take part in the university championships . Every student as well as the public has access to the more than one million volumes in the university library . The library is linked to the academic library network of Bavaria which allows interlibrary loan s . Administration and organization . The organization of Universität der Bundeswehr München is similar to a usual university . 1 , 100 ( non - military ) employees , among them 163 full professors , serve the approximately 3 , 400 students . The university is led by a civilian president and three vice presidents . The incumbent president , Merith Niehuß , is the only female university president in Bavaria . The administration is headed by the Chancellor . A difference to most other universities is that the structure of education and research is split up between normal university part with seven university faculties and a " Fachhochschule " ( College of Applied Sciences ) part with three more faculties . Furthermore the structure contains central services like the computing center , the large university library , a media center with state - of - the - art technology , a language service and the sport services . In addition to that the university has two further research institutes . The department for special services includes the " Studium + " institute for interdisciplinary studies , the CASC center for postgraduate studies as well as some further services . Another difference to other universities is the military division which is responsible for the administration and training of military students . Decisions are made by the board , the extended board and the administration council ( Senate and University Council ) . The university has about 850 non - scientific employees in addition to the about 570 scientific employees as well as additional military personnel . Academics . Similar to some other military run universities like the École Polytechnique the university only offers civilian study courses . The contents generally have no relation to the military and correspond to courses at regular German universities . Bachelor´s and Master´s studies in total consist of 400 ECTS credit points . Due to this there also is a small number of highly gifted civilian students who are sponsored by industrial and financial companies like Allianz , Bosch or Munich Re . In addition to that other German ministries and federal institutions like Bundesnachrichtendienst also educate some of their employees at the university . In cooperation with George C . Marshall European Center for Security Studies a course of studies for senior leaders ( International Strategic Studies ) has been introduced . The university also has international students and offers individual mentoring and tutoring programmes . Universität der Bundeswehr has concluded partnership contracts with an increasing number of international universities . Furthermore it is possible for civilians to receive a doctorate or to qualify as a university lecturer ( " Habilitation " ) . All of the professors are civilians and the number of professors per student is significantly higher than at normal German universities . Thus in general the conditions for teaching are better . In autumn 2009 the university introduced the first military related engineering course of study called " Defence Engineering " , which is solely dedicated to civilian students from industrial companies and federal institutions . Military students of the university usually only have a maximum of 4 years to pass their Master ' s within the intensive studies with more content . If they do not finish their Bachelor ' s after 2 1 / 4 years with the necessary grades they cannot proceed . As the studies have to be finished in a shorter time than at common German universities the " academic year " consists of three trimesters instead of the normal two semesters . Study courses . The university has restructured its courses of study according to the Bologna treaty and offers Bachelor ' s and Master ' s degrees as well as doctoral and postdoctoral studies . Universität der Bundeswehr offers normal university courses of studies as well as a few more practical oriented " Fachhochschule " ( University of Applied Sciences ) study courses . Research . The university is very successful and well - established in different fields of research , especially when it comes to aeronautical engineering ( e . g . participation in the GALILEO satellite program and development of different parts of space probes ) or computer - driven cars . Bundeswehr University has the largest aviation and aerospace faculty in Germany . A main focus of the university are also all kinds of security technology . The university is part of two excellence clusters of the German government universities excellence initiative ( " Cognition for Technical Systems " and " Munich - Centre for Advanced Photonics " ) . The university hosts the ESA Summer School on Global Navigation Satellite Systems and the Munich Satellite Navigation Summit . Bundeswehr University forms part of the joint research and academic center " Munich Aerospace " , founded in 2010 and the " Bavarian International Campus Aerospace & Security " , founded in 2012 . The university also has a number of partner companies which rely on the universities research expertise and support the university with products and facilities for testing and research . To strengthen its research profile and enhance cooperation between the faculties , Bundeswehr University Munich has created four interdisciplinary research centers : MOVE ( Modern Vehicles ) , MIRA ( Munich Integrated Research on Aerospace ) , RISK ( Risk , Infrastructure , Security and Conflict ) , CODE ( Cyber Defence ) . International collaboration . Universität der Bundeswehr München has partner universities worldwide . The following list shows some examples :