Hitler's Brandenburgers
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11. Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess greeting Knight’s Cross holders who had been members of the National Socialist German Student Union on its fifteenth anniversary, 27 January 1941, in Munich. Walther stands at the far end of the line.
12. Not all bridges were captured intact; this one over the Drava River was successfully destroyed by retreating Yugoslavian troops, 1941.
13. Uwe-Wilhelm Walther, pictured here in Greece during 1943. Walther was a superb soldier and gifted leader who was wounded several times and ended the war as part of Skorzeny’s SS Jagdverbände.
14. The raising of the flag over the Acropolis in Athens by Brandenburgers led by Rittmeister Dr Paul Jacobi on 27 April 1941.
15. Oberstleutnant Paul Haehling von Lanzenauer, commander of the Brandenburg Regiment (left), and Major Friedrich Wilhelm Heinz (middle), commander of I Battalion.
16. Ukrainian troops of the Nachtigall Battalion in training at Neuhammer. They came under Brandenburger command for Operation ‘Barbarossa’, attached to Heinz’s I Battalion.
17. Operation ‘Barbarossa’. A destroyed Brandenburger vehicle next to a disabled Soviet BT7 light tank. Note the new regimental insignia painted on the fender. The men on foot all appear to be wearing the jäger arm badge, possibly the vehicle’s former occupants.
18. Brandenburger troops in Soviet uniform during the opening day of Operation ‘Barbarossa’.
19. The sheer volume of Soviet prisoners taken during ‘Barbarossa’ was staggering. From these masses of men, the Brandenburgers would find valuable intelligence agents, interpreters and combat recruits.
20. Feldwebel Willi Hein (left) and Leutnant Oskar Schatz of 2nd Company in full Soviet disguise during Operation ‘Barbarossa’. Schatz was later killed on 22 August 1942 near the Terek River, 100km from the Grozny oilfields.
21. Casualties within the regiment were relatively heavy, not only through their employment as assault troops but also the complicating factor of friendly fire incidents as many units went into combat in disguise, thereby running the risk of misidentification by other Wehrmacht spearheads. To compound these dangers, Brandenburger infiltration units frequently used German artillery fire to cover their penetration of enemy lines.
22. A Fallschirmjäger photographed wearing an early pattern army belt buckle, possibly identifying him as a member of the Brandenburger Fallschirmjäger platoon that made its first combat drop in an attack on two bridges near Bogdanow on 25 June 1941.
23. The grave of the Fallschirmjäger platoon commander Leutnant Hermann Lütke and his fellow Fallschirmjäger killed in Operation ‘Bogdanow’.
24. Oberleutnant Hans-Wolfram Knaak photographed near Dünaberg, Lithuania, where he was killed on 26 June 1941.
25. The grave of Knaak and four of his men killed in the capture of the bridge over the Daugava River.
26. Nachtigall troops on the streets of Lviv at the end of June, enthusiastically greeted by the population. Though some members took part in the hideous pogroms that followed, the unit as a whole was not involved. The battalion was dissolved in October 1941
27. Checking a dusty Russian road for mines. The early Brandenburger recruits were trained in the handling of explosives both offensively and defensively.
28. An officer of the ‘Azad Hid Fauj’ (Free India Army) at Regenwurmlager.
29. The Free India Army, otherwise designated Infanterie-Regiment 950 (Indisches) and later transferred to the Waffen SS (Indische Freiwilligen Legion der Waffen-SS), was raised in Germany and trained as part of the Brandenburgers, primarily for Operation ‘Bajadere’. One hundred legionnaires were dropped by parachute in Eastern Persia and ordered to infiltrate into Baluchistan Province to undertake sabotage operations in preparation for an anticipated national revolt against British rule. Abwehr reports from Kabul received in Berlin indicated success, but to no discernible effect.
30. Friedrich ‘Fritz’ von Koenen, commander of the 13th (Tropical) Company; the first Brandenburger unit deployed to North Africa.
31. Brandenburgers of the 13th Company using captured Allied vehicles.
32. Rittmeister Conrad von Leipzig, the one-legged officer who would serve in North Africa and later form the Küstenjäger Abteilung.
33. Brandenburger troops in North Africa. Their speciality of lightly equipped, fast moving operations suited warfare within this theatre of action perfectly and they ranged far to the south on deep-penetration reconnaissance missions.
34. An LWSI of the Tropical Company during rehearsals with Kampfgruppe Hecker for the amphibious landing at Gabr Si. Hameida that was cancelled at the last moment.
35. Tobruk finally fell to Rommel’s forces in June 1942, with Brandenburg troops involved in the German advance and also security duties around the captured port.
36. Hauptmann Count László Almásy (left) and Major Nikolaus Ritter discuss plans to land agents behind enemy lines in Egypt.
37. Ritter (at right with arm outstretched) and Almásy brief Luftwaffe pilots for the disastrous flight into Egypt during June 1941.
38. Brandenburger troops returning to German lines with flag stretched out to aid aerial recognition.
39. Odo Wilscher, Koenen’s adjutant and later member of the Brandenburger Fallschirmjäger Battalion. He is pictured here after his transfer to the Waffen SS and Skorzeny’s SS Jägdverbände, commanding the sniper school in Zeithain.
40. Light vehicle of the 13th (Tropical) Company, equipped with a single 20mm flak cannon.
41. Car emblazoned with the emblem of Sonderkommando Blaich, a single Heinkel He 111 that bombed the French stronghold of Fort Lamy south of Lake Chad.
42. A soldier of the ‘Free Arabia Legion’, part of the KODAT command that was ultimately headed by Theodor von Hippel before the collapse of Axis forces in North Africa.
43. Brandenburger recruits for the Kustenjäger Abteilung at the completion of training aboard the naval sail-training ship Gorch Fock in Swinemünde.
44. Identity card of a Soviet prisoner of war recruited into the Brandenburger Regiment.
45. Admiral Wilhelm Canaris on a visit to Brandenburg units at the front lines in Russian, October 1941.
46. Leutnant Trommsdorf and Finnish troops during the development of ‘Kompanie Trommsdorf’ for the attack on the Murmansk railway line. Trommsdorf ultimately proved incapable of the physical demands and returned to Germany, his unit taken over by Oberleutnant Otto Hettinger.
47. Brandenburgers kayaking towards the Murmansk railway line, August 1942.
48. Adjusting the small outboard motor aboard one of the Brandenburgers’ kayaks while headed towards the Murmansk line.
49. Brandenburgers in Finland used a mixture of German, Soviet and Finnish uniform and equipment, such as the Finnish Suomi KP/-31 submachine gun as pictured here.
50. Fritz Babuke, pictured here as Oberleutnant following his receipt of the EK I.
51. Chief instructor Leutnant zur See Alfred von Wurzian (left) at the first parade of the newly formed Meeresjäger Abteilung. Brandenburger Gebirgsjäger Hauptmann Fritz Neitzert (middle) was the Abteilung’s first commander.
52. The Brandenburger Meeresjäger Abteilung on parade in Piazza Dante, Valdagno, 1944. The recruits included men from all military branches, including the Waffen SS.
53. ‘Case Blue’, the advance into the Caucasus in pursuit of oil, marked the greatest penetration to the south-east by the Wehrmacht, spearheaded by Brandenburger units. This NCO carries a Russian map case.
54. Alexander von Pfuhlstein (left), pictured here as commander of 154th Infantry Regiment, attending a ceremony honouring fallen troops of the 58th Infantry Division at Novogrod, 1942. At right is the divisional commander, Generalmajor Karl von Graffen.
55. Admiral Canaris inspecting Brandenburger troops with Friedrich Wilhelm Heinz (middle) and regimental commander Alexander von Pfuhlstein (right). Pfuhlstein’s antipathy towards Heinz is well documented, though Heinz was a confidant of Canaris and the anti-Hitler circle within the Abwehr.
56. An NCO briefing during the advance of ‘Case Blue’. The Oberfeldwebel (third from left) carries the helmsman (Steuermann) qualification badge for engineer assault boats.
57. Cooperation between Brandenburg and Romanian forced had begun before the invasion of the Soviet Union, with Brandenburg units posted as security for Romanian oilfields. A large Romanian commitment fought alongside the German advance into the Caucasus.
58. Siegfried Grabert’s death in action announced in the newspaper Die Bewegung, the central publication of the National Socialist German Student Union.
59. Adrian Baron von Fölkersam following the award of his Knight’s Cross. His unit’s infiltration behind Soviet lines to Maykop remains one of the Brandenburgers’ most remarkable exploits.
60. Fighting for the oil transport depots in the Caucasus, 1942.
61. The bridge over the Bjelaja named after Leutnant d.R. Ernst Prochaska, the young commander of 8th Company killed immediately after its capture from Soviet troops. Prochaska was awarded the Knight’s Cross posthumously.
62. Oberleutnant Karl-Heinz Oesterwitz (left), pictured during the advance into the Caucasus.
63. Kurt Konrad Steidl, commander of the 1st Battalion, 2nd Jäger-Regiment. He was awarded the Knight’s Cross on 26 January 1944 for action against Greek partisans around Klisoura during the previous December in which his unit broke through the partisan lines, stormed and captured the bridge in Prijepolje and established a bridgehead in the town, destroying two partisan brigades. In 1944 he transferred to Skorzeny’s SS command.
64. The huge stone eagle that guarded the entrance gate to the Regenwurm training camp.
65. A snapshot of personnel in training at Regenwurmlager shows the diverse ethnicity from which both the Brandenburgers and the Abwehr as a whole drew members whom they considered best suited to operations within different geographical areas.
66. The brutality of anti-partisan warfare became an increasingly common theatre of action for the Brandenburgers. Ambushes on vulnerable road and rail communications networks were frequent and reprisals swift.
67. Brandenburgers were used in the inhospitable forests and marshes that surrounded the Prip’yat’ River to fight Soviet partisans in 1944 as the Wehrmacht retreated. Here a casualty is fortunate to be evacuated by air.
68. Jäger of the Brandenburger Division receiving fresh winter clothing.
69. Men of the Kustenjäger Abteilung at sea on the Adriatic aboard a heavy Sturmboot.
70. Leutnant Helmut Demetrio (in glasses) and his French men of the 8th Company, II Battalion, in the south of France.
71. An Italian soldier of the Blackshirt III ‘M’ Assault Battalion ‘9 September (Pontida)’, commanded by Major Carlo Zanotti, which placed itself under Brandenburger command following the armistice between the Allies and Italy.
72. Brandenburger troops were committed to searching for and fighting Greek guerrillas, which were themselves verging on civil war between opposing political ideologies. The Balkans became a morass of difficult and brutal operations for the German commandos.
73. Brandenburgers and Chetniks, uneasy allies of convenience – most of the time.
74. Brandenburgers question captured Yugoslavian Partisans. Tito’s troops were accorded the status of combatants, rather than guerrillas, by the Germans.
75. Well armed, disciplined and well organised, the communist Partisans that followed Marshal Josip Broz Tito were formidable adversaries for Brandenburger units.
76. Brandenburgers in action in Yugoslavia, 1943.
77. Brandenburger Fallschirmjäger rowing ashore on Levitha from a Junkers Ju 52 floatplane, 18 October 1943.
78. Brandenburger troops during the fighting for Leros, November 1943.
79. Troops of the 1st Company, Kustenjäger Abteilung at the 150mm battery on Monte Racchi, Leros.
80. Relaxing once the fighting had ended on Leros; the last great success for German forces in the Aegean.
81. Brandenburgers displaying an interesting mix of uniforms, Leros, 1943.
82. Wilhelm Walther (left) is seen here with Oberleutnant Max Wandrey and General der Flieger Helmuth Felmy at Wandrey’s Knight’s Cross ceremony, 9 January 1944.
83. Brandenburger troops boarding a Marinefahrprähme in the Dodecanese, 1943.
84. Oberleutnant Werner Lau, II Battalion, 4th Regiment ‘Brandenburg’.
85. Austrian-born Major Karl-Heinz Oesterwitz, pictured here after the establishment of Panzer Grenadier Division ‘Brandenburg’. During October 1940 he commanded the 7th Company of the Brandenburg Regiment, later taking part in the Balkans campaign and Operation ’Barbarossa’. He was awarded the German Cross in Gold for capturing an important bridge at Belorechensk as part of the advance into the Caucasus in August 1942. During fighting in the West Caucasus he was awarded the Knight’s Cross, the Oak Leaves following on 10 February 1945.
86. Friedrich ‘Fritz’ Kühlwein, last commander of the Brandenburg Division, before its conversion to Panzer Grenadier status.
87. Brandenburger PaK40 of the 2nd Regiment in action against Yugoslavian Partisans.
88. (above)Otto Skorzeny in Budapest, 1944. His commando mission to the Hungarian capital was carried out by his SS Jägdverbände, which included a large cadre of transferred Brandenburgers. In the middle is Adrian Baron von Fölkersam, one of the first Brandenburgers to join his command.
89. Dawn on the Eastern Front.
90. The Brandenburg cuff title; somewhat ironically not awarded until 17 August 1944 after the division was passing out of the realm of special forces.
Table of Contents
Title
Copyright
Contents
List of Plates
Foreword by David R. Higgins
Introduction
Glossary and Abbreviations
Comparative Rank Table
Prelude The Concept Behind the Brandenburger Regiment
1 Baptism of Fire
2 Operation ‘Weserübung’ and ‘Case Yellow’: Scandinavia and the West
3 The Regiment Brandenburg
4 Declared and Undeclared War in the Balkans
5 Hitler Turns East: The Invasion of the Soviet Union
6 War in the Desert
7 Rebuilding
8 ‘Case Blue’/Operation ‘Braunschweig’: The 1942 Summer Offensive in the Soviet Union
9 Regeneration, 1943
10 Partisan Warfare in the Balkans
11 Metamorphosis, 1944–1945
Appendix Major Decorations Awarded
Notes
Bibliography
Plate section
Table of Contents
Title
Copyright
Contents
List of Plates
Foreword by David R. Higgins
Introduction
Glossary and Abbreviations
Comparative Rank Table
Prelude The Concept Behind the Brandenburger Regiment
1 Baptism of Fire
2 Operation ‘Weserübung’ and ‘Case Yellow’: Scandinavia and the West
3 The Regiment Brandenburg
4 Declared and Undeclared War in the Balkans
5 Hitler Turns East: The Invasion of the Soviet Union
6 War in the Desert
7 Rebuilding
8 ‘Case Blue’/Operation ‘Braunschweig’: The 1942 Summer Offensive in the Soviet Union
9 Regeneration, 1943
10 Partisan Warfare in the Balkans
11 Metamorphosis, 1944–1945
Appendix Major Decorations Awarded
Notes
Bibliography
Plate section
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