Carl Adolf Maximilian Hoffmann was a German military strategist. As a staff officer at the beginning of World War I, he was Deputy Chief of Staff of the 8th Army. He masterminded the defeat of the Russian armies at Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes. At the end of 1917, he negotiated with Russia to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. He is remembered for breaching protocol when a Japanese general refused to allow him on to a hill to watch a battle.