The Waffen-SS in Combat

Bob Carruthers

• Publisher: Pen & Sword Military
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781473857582
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World War II
• Index: History

"A photographic history of some of the most elite of Germany's armed forces as they fought on all fronts during World War II... Highly recommended."— Scale Military Modeller This is the photographic history of the Waffen-SS in combat on all fronts. The short six-year history of the Waffen-SS spanned triumph and disaster, and their story can be traced through these powerful images, which clearly document the reality of combat from 1940 to 1945. These rare images span the combat history of the Waffen-SS from the optimism of the opening phases of the war in the west through to the challenges of Barbarossa and the long and bloody retreat against a numerically far superior enemy in both the east and the west. The powerful photographic record is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the course of the war from the German perspective and clearly demonstrated the scale of the task undertaken by the Waffen-SS on all fronts. "This collection of b&w historical photos from WWII showcases photos taken by the Germans for propaganda purposes and published in newspapers, magazines, and books between 1940 and 1945. Many of the photos come from the SS-Kriegsberichter-Kompanie (Waffen-SS War Reporters Company), led by Gunter d'Alquen, which recorded actions of platoons. The photos are grouped in three sections on the activities of the Waffen-SS in the west in 1940, in the east in 1941-1943, and in combat and defeat 1943-1945. Each section begins with an introduction giving context on the origins of the photos and the photographers and crews involved. There is also background on the units, platoons, and divisions photographed."— ProtoView

Chapter One

The Waffen-SS in the West 1940

The photographs appearing in the first part of this book were originally published in the spring of 1941. These images were created under the direction of Hauptsturmführer Gunter d’Alquen, commander of the SS Propaganda Kompanie and editor of the official SS paper, Das Schwarze Korps.

In January of 1940 an SS-Kriegsberichter-Kompanie (Waffen-SS war reporters company) was established, and its züge (platoons) were attached to the four main Waffen-SS combat formations that fought in the Western Campaign of May and June, 1940. These platoons also remained with their respective divisions for the Balkans Campaign in the spring of 1941. D’Alquen himself was a distinguished SS war reporter and served in the front lines during 1939 and 1940. In 1944 he was appointed by Himmler as head of the entire Wehrmacht propaganda department. Among the books he published was an official history of the SS, and a volume originally entitled ‘Waffen-SS im Westen’ (1941), the photographs from Chapter 1 of this book appeared in that volume.

Gunter d’Alquen commanded the SS-Kriegsberichter unit throughout the war. By 1940 he had attained the Allgemeine-SS rank of Standartenführer, but began his Waffen-SS command in 1940 as a Waffen-SS Hauptsturmführer der Reserve. During the course of the war, he rose through the ranks until he became a Waffen-SS Standartenführer der Reserve and exercised the equivalent of regimental command. D’Alquen was responsible for a large back room staff, which processed the incoming material, as well as the front line photographers, movie cameramen, writers, broadcaster and recorders, who served in the front lines. The Kreigsberichte in the field were assigned to the various platoons for variable periods of service. Where possible, non-Germans served with their own national formations, but were sometimes detached to cover a particular campaign and report specifically for their own domestic press.

After the war d’Alquen found it difficult to escape his past. In July 1955 he was fined DM 60,000 by a Berlin denazification court and deprived of all civic rights for a period of three years and debarred from drawing an allowance or pension from public funds. The court found him guilty of having played an important role in the Third Reich, of war propaganda, incitement against the churches, the Jews and foreign countries, and incitement to murder. He was judged to have glorified the Waffen-SS, the Nazi State and reinforced the legend of Hitler’s infallibility, he was also adjudged to bring democracy into contempt and encouraged anti-Semitism. After a further investigation into his earnings from Nazi propaganda, d’Alquen was fined another DM 28,000 by the Berlin denazification court on 7 January, 1958. He died in 1998.

Many of the photographs featured here feature the men of Waffen-SS Standarte Germania. In 1940 the men who bore the word Germania on their cuff bands were fighting as a motorised regiment under the command of SS-Standartenführer Karl-Maria Demelhuber.

Originally Germania was formed in August 1934, as SS-Standarte III. It was soon renamed SS-Standarte II when Hitler ordered that SS-Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler would not be included in the SS numbering sequence. At the 1936 Nürnberg Rally, SS-Standarte II was officially granted the honour title Germania where it received the unit colours and authority to wear the cuff band bearing the unit title. It subsequently took a part in the annexation of Austria and was responsible for security during the Italian leader Benito Mussolini’s visit to Germany. Germania also took part in the annexation of Sudetenland. It later served as a guard regiment in Prague, as Wach-Regiment des Reichsprotektors von Böhmen und Mähren, until July 1939.

In August 1939 Adolf Hitler, in preparation for Fall Weiss, placed the SS-VT under the operational command of the OKW. At the outbreak of hostilities in Poland, there were four SS armed regiments in existence Leibstandarte, Deutschland, Germania and the new regiment from Austria named Der Führer, however Der Führer was not yet combat-ready and played no part in the Polish campaign. Events during the Invasion of Poland raised a political furore with OKW expressing doubts over the combat effectiveness of the SS-VT. Their courage and willingness to fight was never in any doubt; but at times they were almost too eager for action and this naïve enthusiasm led to disproportionately high casualties. The OKW reported that the SS-VT had unnecessarily exposed themselves to risks and acted recklessly, incurring far heavier losses than Army troops and endangering the achievement of operational mission objectives as a result. It was also strongly argued by OKW that the SS-VT was poorly trained and many of its officers were unsuitable for command. In retaliation the SS-VT argued strongly that it had been mishandled and was hampered by its deployment as sub-units intermixed with regular Wehrmacht forces. Himmler took issue with the fact that SS-VT units were fighting piecemeal with the mixed Wehrmacht/SS Panzer Division Kempf instead of as one SS-VT formation. The SS-VT he argued was also improperly equipped to carry out some of the tasks, which had been allocated of it.

As a result of the controve...