Career
Röttiger joined the Imperial German Army in 1914 and served from 1915 as a Leutnant in the 20th Artillery Regiment. After World War I he served in the Reichswehr as a battery officer, adjutant, and battery chief He then served as an officer on the General Staff of the Wehrmacht.
At the beginning of World World War II Röttiger was an Oberstleutnant and he served as from 1939–1940 as the Chief of Operations for VI Corps.
He then became the Chief of Staff of Army Group C in Italy under Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring. On 30 January 1945 he was promoted to General der Panzertruppe.
Röttiger was a prisoner of war of the British and Americans from the end of the war until 1948. In 1950 he was a participant at the meeting to discuss the establishment of a new German defence force.
The result of the meeting was the Himmerod memorandum.
Röttiger was accepted into the Bundeswehr in 1956 at the rank of Generalleutnant. On 21 September 1957 he became the first Inspector of the Army and was instrumental in its early development. Röttiger was diagnosed with cancer in the late 1950s and spent his last years undergoing treatment.
In the morning of 15 April 1960 he died in office, one day before his 64th birthday.