"Admiral Scheer" then sailed northwards, breaking through the Denmark Strait on 26–27 March and evading the cruisers and . She reached Bergen, Norway on 30 March, where she spent a day in the Grimstadfjord. A destroyer escort joined the ship for the voyage to Kiel, which they reached on 1 April. In the course of her raiding operation, she had steamed over and sunk seventeen merchant ships for a total of . She was by far the most successful German capital ship commerce raider of the entire war. After returning to Germany, Krancke left the ship and was replaced by "KzS" Wilhelm Meendsen-Bohlken in June 1941. The loss of the battleship in May 1941, and more importantly, the Royal Navy's destruction of the German supply ship network in the aftermath of the "Bismarck" operation forced a planned Atlantic raiding operation for "Admiral Scheer" and her sister "Lützow" at the end of 1941 to be abandoned. On 4–8 September, "Admiral Scheer" was briefly moved to Oslo. There, on 5 and 8 September, No. 90 Squadron RAF, equipped with Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombers, mounted a pair of unsuccessful attacks on the ship. On 8 September, the ship left Oslo and returned to Swinemünde.