[3] He was promoted to major and was made an Abteilungsleiter, or department manager, at the Reich Defense Ministry (Reichswehrministerium), the governmental organ that determined the overarching policy of the Reichswehr in relation to the Weimar Republic.

[8] Jodl reported in his diary that Hitler "became furious" and yelled at Wietersheim: "I say to you Herr General...[the West Wall] will be held not only for three weeks but for three years!

[6] In June 1941, the unit under Wietersheim participated in Operation Barbarossa, where, as part of the First Panzer Group, it served with Army Group South on the southern sector of the eastern front, advancing via Lvov, Tarnopol and Zhitomir to Kremenchug and Mirgorod, and south to Marfinskaya in the Mius sector.

[6] Early in the Battle of Stalingrad, Wietersheim used his tanks to protect the advance from the Don River to the Volga, which was criticized for being an inappropriate use of an armored formation.

Deemed acts of incompetence and defeatism, he was relieved of command on 14 September by the head of the German Sixth Army, Friedrich Paulus, and subsequently dismissed by Hitler.

Historian Alan Clark reported that Wietersheim returned to Germany after his dismissal, only reappearing in any military context in 1945 as a private in a Pomeranian Volkssturm unit.