1939, she was one of the destroyers that escorted the heavily armed cruiser , which was transporting Adolf Hitler to announce the occupation of Memel. She participated in the spring fleet exercise in the western Mediterranean and made several visits to Spanish and Moroccan ports in April and May. When World War II began, Georg Thiele was initially deployed in the Baltic to operate against the Polish Navy and to enforce a blockade of Poland, but she was soon transferred to the German Bight where she joined her sisters in laying defensive minefields. The ship began a refit in late 1939 that was completed in early April 1940. Norwegian Campaign Georg Thiele was allocated to Group 1 for the Norwegian portion of Operation Weserübung in April 1940. The group's task was to transport the 139th Mountain Infantry Regiment (139. Gebirgsjäger Regiment) and the headquarters of the 3rd Mountain Division (3. Gebirgs-Division) to seize Narvik. The ships began loading troops on 6 April and set sail the next day. The German destroyers reached the Ofotfjord on the morning of 9 April and Commodore Friedrich Bonte took his flagship Wilhelm Heidkamp, Georg Thiele and Z11 Bernd von Arnim down the fjord to Narvik. A heavy snowstorm allowed Thiele and von Arnim to enter the harbor without challenge and tie up at a pier. The mountain troops immediately began disembarking, but the ships were spotted by the coast defense ship a few minutes later. The latter ship immediately opened fire and was able to fire approximately thirteen shells at a range of before von Arnim sank the Norwegian ship with torpedoes. In the darkness and falling snow, none of the Norwegian shells hit either of the two destroyers, despite the short range. Thiele and von Arnim were the first ships to refuel from the single tanker that had made it safely to Narvik and later moved to the Ballangenfjord, a southern arm of the Ofotfjord, closer to the entrance. Shortly before dawn on 10 April, the five destroyers of the British 2nd Destroyer Flotilla, HMS Hardy, HMS Havock, HMS Hunter, HMS Hotspur, and HMS Hero, surprised the five German destroyers in Narvik harbor. They torpedoed two destroyers and badly damaged the other three while suffering only minor damage themselves. As they were beginning to withdraw they encountered the three destroyers of the 4th Flotilla which had been alerted in the Herjangsfjord when the