Forget Lend Lease-Was This More Vital on the East Front?

[db_zero]

As I was perusing the net I came across this:

http://www.amazon.com/Wehrmacht-SS and Wehrmacht -Caucasian-Muslim-Troops/dp/2840482193/ref=sr_1_58?ie=UTF8&qid=1402780029&sr=8-58&keywords=heimdal

1 Million non Germanic troops fighting for the SS. That's a lot of men, especially considering the manpower shortage the Germans face. Percentage wise that's a large number.

You can argue about the actual combat effectiveness, but even so it allowed other units to fight without having to be tied down to protecting the rear areas, flanks and other duties that would inhibit "regular" combat units.

If I'm not mistaken much of the final fighting in Berlin in 45 was done by non-germanic troops who had nowhere to go and nothing to lose by fighting to the bitter end.

Oftentimes so much of what gets documented is "scrubbed" to be palatable to the home front and present a nice, clean sterile image.

[JonS]

I don't think 'scrubbed' is quite the right word. The information has been widely and publicly available for many many years now - if you have an interest it's long been at the stage where you'd have to be actively avoiding the information to remain ignorant.

Invariably when speaking to some 'teh SS wuz kewl' nobbit it is abundantly clear that they think the SS consisted of, in it's entirety, of 1SS, 2SS, 3SS, 9SS, 10SS, and 12SS Pz Divs. Oh, and Otto. "Florian Geyer - who's he? Handschar - what's that?" It seems like a case of people simply not looking beneath the admired veneer to the cheap ply underneath. Sometimes it's because they only ever read Leo Kessler and Kurt Meyer. Sometimes they've progressed from Kessler/Meyer on to Max Hastings and Mike Reynolds. Very rarely have they gone any further than that.

So, now, whenever I come across someone of that ilk I take it as a mark of their ignorance, probably wilful, rather than evidence of some vast conspiracy of scrubbing.

[db_zero]

I don't think 'scrubbed' is quite the right word. The information has been widely and publicly available for many many years now - in some ways, if you have an interest, it's long been at the stage where you'd have to be actively avoiding the information to remain ignorant.

Invariably when speaking to some 'teh SS wuz kewl' nobbit it is abundantly clear that they think the SS consisted of, in it's entirety, of 1SS, 2SS, 3SS, 9SS, 10SS, and 12SS Pz Divs. Oh, and Otto. "Florian Geyer? Who's he?" It seems like a case of people simply not looking beneath the admired veneer to the cheap ply underneath. Sometimes it's because they only ever read Leo Kessler and Kurt Meyer. Sometimes they've progressed from Kessler/Meyer on to Max Hastings and Mike Reynolds. Very rarely have they gone any further than that.

So, now, whenever I come across someone of that ilk I take it as a mark of their ignorance, probably wilful, rather than evidence of some vast conspiracy of scrubbing.

When I said scrubbed I was referring to the image presented to the German homefront during the war. I was not referring to after the war.

My impression right or wrong is the German people were fed a scrubbed image of what was going on-just like every other nation tended to do during that time period, so I was under the assumption they really didn't know the real extent or maybe they did. If they did know it would be interesting to see how it was presented to them.

I casually knew some of the SS Divisions were non Germanic, I just didn't realize it was potentially this extensive. I'm not a huge Eastern Front expert to begin with. I've read some books, but not a whole lot. Pretty amazing when you think about it considering how much time, effort and money America has recently devoted to training the Iraqi and Afghanistan army and there apparent lack of effectiveness. I guess you really can't compare the 2 situations as there are differences.

[MikeyD]

If you troll the internet looking for WWII propaganda poster you come up with a fair number of recruitment posters for the SS in Dutch, French, Italian, I even saw one in Belorussian! All of them talking about joining the fight against the 'red menace'.

Both sides had a reason for minimizing the significance of this. For the allies your victory looks all that greater if you're able to claim to have outfought an army of virtual supermen. To the Germans their dreams of Aryan purity become a bit tarnished when your most elite formations are manned by recruited Croat and Netherlander prison inmates.

[Talespin Jim]

Yes, that is a staggering number of foreigners in the SS. However, I might suppose that foreigners would include Austrians, Chzechs, Denmark, etc. Also, there were a lot of Scandinavians who came to help them. And then as you probably know, they were taking for years prior to the war, as all nations did and America continues to rely heavily upon today, volunteers from all over the world. They specifically amended their whole Aryan Nation nonsense to include those adopted in so they could try to attract more people to the armed forces. They even used POW's to fight for them, though they usually didn't fight hard. The reality was that the SS was built on a multinational force that was not ethnically pure except in the propaganda. Unfortunately, the only people who have ever really believed that propaganda were not so much the German citizens it was aimed at, but rather a sect of really stupid, ill-informed American thugs.

[db_zero]

Pretty ironic. You hear the Nazi propaganda calling the Russians subhuman mongoloids then employ mongols into fighting units.

I always thought the non Germanic Panzer units were integrated, but sounds like that really wasn't the case.

I always knew non Germanics were in the SS and regular army. I didn't realize it was a million men. I figured it was in the low hundred thousands at most.

[ASL Veteran]

A good intro to the topic would probably be 'The Unknown Eastern Front: The Wehrmacht and Hitler's Foreign Soldiers" by Rolf-Dieter Muller. Spain had an entire Wehrmacht division up until about 1943 or thereabouts so not all foreign volunteers were in the SS. The French also initially served in the Wehrmacht as well. You should also count the Hungarian, Romanian, Finnish, and Italian national armies.

[JasonC]

A lot - well, no, not really.

There were all of 7 SS divisions al war that were elite panzer formations, and lots of second rate formations, and then lots more third rate to useless propaganda exercises and rear area security formations that fell apart or deserted as soon as they actually faced an enemy army. Most of the non-German SS fell into the third category, with some in the second.

The western and northern countries that figured most heavily in German propaganda only provided 100,000 men over the whole war - half of them Dutch. Another 20% of the were Belgian; the Scandinavian countries contributed next to nothing. In theory the 5th SS was to be two thirds foreign volunteers, half from the west and half from the north, but that didn't actually happen. A few thousand fit the plan, Germans filled in the rest.

Of the 7 panzer formations, 3 only formed in 1944. Second rates formed from green foreigners mixed with young German conscripts in a few mire divisions that year, drawn from French Vichy and collapsing Romanian fascists who both retreated with the Germans they had collaborated with, rather than face hostile nationals when their countries were liberated. Those fought but they didn't perform particularly well.

The bulk of the remaining non German SS were recruited in the east and southeast on the basis of anti communism or nationalist sentiment directed against the Soviets, rather than in favor of Germany. Some of those fought OK for their homelands - in the Baltic states - but most were barely capable of facing partisans, and evaporated on contact when facing an actual army of actual Russians. The aggregate combat power of those formations was probably less than a single infantry corps of late war German VG, for example.

FWIW...

[db_zero]

A lot - well, no, not really.

There were all of 7 SS divisions al war that were elite panzer formations, and lots of second rate formations, and then lots more third rate to useless propaganda exercises and rear area security formations that fell apart or deserted as soon as they actually faced an enemy army. Most of the non-German SS fell into the third category, with some in the second.

The western and northern countries that figured most heavily in German propaganda only provided 100,000 men over the whole war - half of them Dutch. Another 20% of the were Belgian; the Scandinavian countries contributed next to nothing. In theory the 5th SS was to be two thirds foreign volunteers, half from the west and half from the north, but that didn't actually happen. A few thousand fit the plan, Germans filled in the rest.

Of the 7 panzer formations, 3 only formed in 1944. Second rates formed from green foreigners mixed with young German conscripts in a few mire divisions that year, drawn from French Vichy and collapsing Romanian fascists who both retreated with the Germans they had collaborated with, rather than face hostile nationals when their countries were liberated. Those fought but they didn't perform particularly well.

The bulk of the remaining non German SS were recruited in the east and southeast on the basis of anti communism or nationalist sentiment directed against the Soviets, rather than in favor of Germany. Some of those fought OK for their homelands - in the Baltic states - but most were barely capable of facing partisans, and evaporated on contact when facing an actual army of actual Russians. The aggregate combat power of those formations was probably less than a single infantry corps of late war German VG, for example.

FWIW...

I would tend to agree with most of this, however I would like to throw out this for consideration.

The ARVN when it was in existence had a reputation for being combat ineffective, with a few exceptions. However so long as the American military was in country and provided the backbone, morale, air and logistical support the ARVN remained in existence and if nothing else could police areas, use local terrain, customs and language knowledge to help enable some sort of stability to exist. No doubt when push came to shove against the NVA, without American backing-in the form of boots on the ground or air power a smart betting man wouldn't put chips on the ARVN.

The same sort of thing appears to be happening in Iraq. I suspect of we had boots on the ground and/or air power in play we probably wouldn't be seeing what we're now seeing. I'm not advocating any return to the past or arguing for or against intervention. Truth be told I always believed the Iraq invasion and the premises behind it was a fools errand-but that is my opinion and nothing more. Sometimes all options suck equally. As one once said-behind the tip of the spear there's always a shaft...

The point I'm trying to make is like Viet-Nam so long as the American military was in country the "infective" ARVN and Iraqi military didn't dissolve and provided much useful service-if nothing else helping police large areas. I suspect the German army in Russia, like the US military in the Middle East has discovered, that conquering a large country in a military campaign is one thing, but administering it once you've conquered it is another and local knowledge and linguistic skills are vital. You wouldn't count on the locals forces to stand up to a determined military force who possess that critical moral and motivation belief, but in less than a all out fight they could prove very useful in day to day policing and administrative duties, so vital when you've occupied a foreign area-just don't expect much when you leave them to do it on their own without backing.

So yes I could agree that most of the million men who served under the Nazi flag were not capable of doing well in a stand up fight against the Russian Army. On the other hand they probably served a very useful enabling purpose that suited the Germans needs. In essence they were a force multiplier. Every non Germanic soldier doing a menial task freed up a German soldier for the front.

[JasonC]

If you instead said every 100 non German (not "non Germanic", whatever that means) soldiers used up weapons and rations for 100 men and required 1-2 German officers and NCOs, then fought like 4 or 5 German soldiers - that would probably be more accurate.

They really didn't matter very much.

Also, there were 3 million men in the German replacement army back in Germany - including the whole training pipeline - at moments they were losing campaigns in Russia because the field trench strength of actual infantry for an entire army group had fallen to 50,000 men. My point being, the German army was not exactly realistic or great at getting men to the highest priority points and roles when they were needed most. It was, instead, full of rear echelon you know what-ers seeking and finding safer positions, in which they did their military service but stayed as far from a Russian submachinegun as humanly possible, for a man in uniform in wartime. Great gobs of them. Who tried to substitute the pretence of ideological conformity, professions of loyalty, willingness to do dirty deeds, and enthusiastic tail kissing of higher ups, for their non existent bravery, in the face of men as well armed as themselves, or better.

And the "volunteer" formations were filled to overflowing with that type of person, with those motives...

Which was in fact more reasonable than it sounds, since most of these men did not have the slightest interest in German victory - a remote enough possibility to start with - just one in surviving the calamity of the whole war, if they could...

[John Kettler]

db_zero,

I can't speak to the macro issue you raised, but I can speak to the issue of hiding the foreign SS units. They weren't hidden. To the contrary, they received direct laudatory coverage in the German official newsreels. Here are some examples:

Latvian Legion SS

13th SS Division Handschar

33rd SS Division Charlemagne

Regards,

John Kettler

[JasonC]

Quite. It is necessary to understand both German propaganda and the difference between the nationalist German message and the more advanced SS racial message, and further the political groupings on top of or in addition to both (fascist ideology in other countries, anti communism, specific grievances with the Soviets, etc). The SS recruited on the basis of all of the above, often with very little attention to the actual opinions of those recruited or conscripted. The men were thought to be malliable, and if ideology said they were allies they were expected to act that way, whether they personally bought any of it or not.

So you get volksdeutsch, meaning German speaking minorities from outside prewar Germany. In Czechoslovakia, in Poland, in Hungary, in Yugoslavia, in the western Ukraine, even deeper inside Russia there were such people. Often committed nationalists loyal to their actual states, not to Germany. Who cared? They were recruited and conscripted and expected to have or develop loyalty to Germany. Many didn't and deserted at the first practical moment.

The SS racial ideology believed that not Germans but Aryans were the unit of loyalty, defined not by language and heritage or any state, but by biological race. This amounted in practice to expecting blond people with blue eyes to be loyal to the German cause in the war, and extended to expecting that of men who merely lived in countries where those biological markers were more common. So they recruited in the Netherlands (with language affinity for a bonus), Denmark, Norway - but also blond Poles, blond Ukrainians. It was crazy enough to expect all Danes to support Germany, but expecting fiercely nationalistic Poles to do so on the basis of their hair color was more than slightly cracked. Battalions of them serving in the west surrendered to the allies at the first possible moment, having gone along to avoid punishment until then.

Then there were political fascists from entirely un German countries without any racial affinity, or where that was at most an occasional delusional supplement by either or both sides. Fascist parties were in every country before the war, and were ruling parties in half of Europe. They also provided collaborators everywhere, who expected ruin from defeat. Understand, many of these had been as nationalistic about their own countries as Germans were about Germany - but first occupation and then defeat pushed them into German arms.

Thus there were Vichy French recruits, there were Italians who sided with Mussolini after his fall from power, there were Romanian fascists who ran when the Russians overran the place, there were Hungarians in the same situation, the Slovaks had been promoted to independence from the Czechs by occupation and had their puppet government supporters. The SS recruited from them all. They didn't care that they weren't Aryans or that the nationalism they espoused was not German - it was enough that they were political fascists and already implicated as collaborators, so they couldn't easily go over to the allies.

Then there were the easterners specifically oppressed by the Soviets, who were expected to be loyal to German victory merely as sharing an enemy. This included all the Baltic states, ethnic minorities inside Russia like the Crimean Tartars, anti-communists in the civil war in Yugoslavia, the Finns, and some Poles and Ukrainian nationalists who had been Soviet subjects either before the whole war, or who became such due to the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact and the Soviet annexations that followed. It also included Russian nationals recruited out of the POW pens or in occupied Russia on the basis of anti-communism or willingness to support Germany against Stalin, at any time and for any reason. Some had real reasons to fight, others were looking to improve their immediate situation by collaborating and were just blowing with the wind.

The huge variety of reasons swept up hundreds of thousands of people, and formed a wide variety of tolerably capable to simply hopeless military formations. The blond Poles were completely hopeless. A Vichy or Italian fascist who expected to be shot if captured would at least try to fight, most likely. A Latvian would fight for Latvia, but when that was lost probably just wanted to survive the war, and aspired to stateless refugee not dead Siegfried status.

Above all, it was an unholy mess...

[Yeknodathon]

Er, small correction, think we must include the blonde-scaled, blue-eyed extra-terrestrial Reptilian divisions that were highly effective Nazi scum that trampled across the galaxy and laid waste to whole swathes of somewhere. And continue to do so!

1st SS Freakin' Planet System Draco

[Cymru]

They were pretty liberal in interpreting the 'blue eyed, blond hair' aspect since they also formed the Legion Freies Indien, largely from captured members of the British Indian army. Granted these were probably 'Aryan', but most certainly not Germanic.

[Erwin]

Don't forget the Handschar Islamic Div and the others of similar ilk:

http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/747153/posts

[JasonC]

The Indians were just a British version of the "expected to be loyal to Germany by sharing an enemy" criterion, based on Indian nationalism and resistance to British colonial rule. Aryan mythology was an irrelevant bonus in that, like a French Vichy-supporter fascist occasionally being blond.

With the Muslim connection there was ideological Jew hatred, a shared dislike of both communism and Slavic nationalist movements in the Balkans, some anti British anti colonialism, and a more than healthy dose of simple shared fascist politics. The Muslim world had its own fascist movements in the 20s and 30s, forming parties committed to ending foreign rule on nationalist and socialist platforms - that is what the Baath party was, for example.

Looking for one coherent ideological stance in any of it is silly - it was an opportunistic gathering of all conceivable anti-Allied political factions - including some that were entirely imaginary.

[db_zero]

db_zero,

I can't speak to the macro issue you raised, but I can speak to the issue of hiding the foreign SS units. They weren't hidden. To the contrary, they received direct laudatory coverage in the German official newsreels. Here are some examples:

Latvian Legion SS

13th SS Division Handschar

33rd SS Division Charlemagne

Regards,

John Kettler

Where would we be without You Tube

[John Kettler]

db_zero,

Indeed. Wiki is also helpful in such research, which is how I learned there were 15-20 Americans in the Waffen SS. Definitely news to me!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waffen-SS_foreign_volunteers_and_conscripts

"United States of America: 15 to 20[26] in the

SS-Standarte Kurt Eggers and also in

various SS-Volunteer-Divisions (there was not an American Legion)"

"(26) At least eight American volunteers are known to have been killed during their service in the Waffen-SS. They were Francesco Mattedi, a soldier in the Italian SS Division who was killed in Nettunia, 30 April 1944; Charles MacDonald, KIA near Johvi/Estonia, 14 March 1944; Raymond George Rommelspacher, died in Normandy/France, 6 October 1944, Edwin/Erwin Peter, KIA in Latvia, 2 July 1941; Andreas Hauser, died in Welikij in Ukraine, 18 January 1945; Lucas Diel, died on 9 December 1944 in Hungary; and Andy Beneschan, KIA in Bosnia, 16 April 1945. There were also numerous German-Americans who served in the Wehrmacht and as Waffen-SS officers during World War II. Among others were SS-Hauptsturmführer Josef Awender, a medical doctor in the SS ‘Frundsberg’ Division who was born in Philadelphia in 1913; SS-Untersturmführer Robert Beimes, a signal officer in the SS ‘Hitlerjugend’ Division, born in San Francisco in 1919. His father was a translator in the SD; SS-Hauptsturmführer Eldon Walli, born in New York City in 1913 in the SS-Kriegsberichter Abteilung (war reporters); and SS-Hauptsturmführer Paul Winckler-Theede, born in New York City in 1912 and served as a military judge in the SS ‘Das Reich’ Division.[citation needed]"

Regards,

[RMC]

Spain had an entire Wehrmacht division up until about 1943 or thereabouts so not all foreign volunteers were in the SS.

Many of the foreign volunteer units started outside the SS. The Spanish Legion is one example. The Estonian Legion another. By 1944 as part of the deal between the Army and the SS, the Army got a bigger share of the german recruits and the SS picked up all the foreigners.

[Erwin]

IIRC there was a legal issue in that only German nationals could serve in the Wehrmacht, whereas anyone could be in the SS hence the latter's rapid increase in numbers - esp foreigners.