[2] From June to August 1935 he was adjutant to Hans-Adolf Prützmann, the commander of the SS-Oberabschnitt (Main District) "Southwest," based in Stuttgart.

[4] After the outbreak of the Second World War, Thier served as Chief of Staff to the Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF) in Danzig-West Prussia from October 1939 to June 1941.

From June to the end of November 1941 he served on the special task force under Paul Wegener in Norway, advising and directing the Quisling government.

[5] Thier was appointed the SS and Police Leader (SSPF) "Kaukasien-Kuban" in southern Russia between August 1942 to November 1942, under his former patron, Prützmann.

After brief assignments in Leipzig and Danzig for a few months, he returned to southern Russia as the SSPF "Kerch-Taman Peninsula" from early May through July 1943.

During this time, as the Nazis continued to be pushed back by the Red Army on the eastern front, Thier was involved in implementing the Enterdungsaktion (Exhumation Action) in which Nazi police and Security Service officers sought to obliterate the evidence of their genocide by exhuming mass graves and destroying the corpses.