Re: OT - Unknown WW2 History... (Longish...but hopefully interesting)

Willow wrote:
I thought I knew my history of World War Two fairly well….

While reading several of the mysteries by Scandinavian writers, I came
across references to Nazi activities from Sweden, Iceland and Norway.
Not just the formation of local Nazi groups, but volunteers who joined
the German forces, often in battalions comprised of volunteers from
the same country. This caught my interest. So, as is usual for me, I
started to dig around on the Internet…

Not just Scandiavians. Certain countries, no doubt the result of
geoography, were indeed allies of the Germans – Bulgaria, Croatia,
Finland, Italy (of course), Romania and Slovakia. In addition, the
foreign battalions included volunteers from Albania, Belgium, Denmark,
Estonia, France, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Montenegro,
Netherlands Norway, Serbia, Slovenia, and Sweden:

“One of the most amazing aspects of WWII, and one of the least well
known, is the incredibly large number of foreign volunteers that
joined the German Armed Forces between 1939 and 1945. During WWII,
nearly 2,000,000 foreigners served within the German fighting forces,
many as willing volunteers, others through varying degrees of
conscription. The reasons these volunteers joined the German Wehrmacht
were varied, but a simple look at the numbers begins to tell the story
- in the East alone nearly 1,000,000 men volunteered for service with
Germany. This number is a direct result of the situation millions
faced under the brutal rule of the Soviet Empire. Many foreign
volunteers and conscripts were anonymously intergrated into all areas
of the military, while a great number of others formed distinct units
consisting either partly or entirely of volunteers of specific ethnic,
cultural or political backgrounds. These units were employed in all
varieties of combat tasks from carrying wounded and supplies, to
fighting partisans, to serving on the front line. Some of these units
would prove to be tenacious and elite formations - the match of any
regular German units - while others would prove worthless in serious
combat. Some units even mutinied and resisted the Germans after having
been fully trained and armed! In the end, many volunteers were openly
slaughtered by the partisans, and in some cases by the Allies
themselves, while most others were handed over to their respective
former homelands. In most cases, as with those sent to the former
Soviet Union, these volunteers would never be seen again.”

Countries represented by volunteers included even India and Turkey and
even North Africa. The “Ostlegionen” was comprised of volunteers from
Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Caucasian Muslims, North Caucasians,
Chechens, Turkestans, Uzbeks, Kazakhs and Volga-Tatars

The largest group to join with the Germans were Russians. A certain
Russian general, captured when forced to remain in place by Stalin’s
orders, was allowed to recruit captured Russians both on the front and
from laborers in Germany to join the Russian Liberation Army. In the
40% of Russia captured by the Germans, in most instances the Germans
were greeted as liberators especially in the Ukraine. After all,
Stalin was hardly a nice dictator. General Vlasov had been
instrumental in driving German forces away from Moscow (awarded
Stalin’s highest medal) but became disillusioned by Stalin’s actions.
His “army” eventually numbered almost 900,000 troops and was part of
the Waffen SS. While this group fought mostly on the Eastern Front
against the Soviets, some units were moved to the West. They were not
“nazis” nor did they agree with Hitler’s aims, but they were strongly
pro-Russian and anti-Soviet. Indeed, they fought the Germans and
liberated Prague at the war’s end.

Along with the Russians, there were many Ukrainians that joined
special units of the German armies, notably the Nightingale Battalion
and units of the Waffen SS. Once again, they were anti-Stalin and not
generally pro-Nazi. In fact there was a strong Ukrainian “government
in exile” which survived the war and continued to operate in North
American for many years. It was a very complicated time. A Hapsburg
prince was trying to become “King of the Ukraine” finally ending up in
Soviet hands and executed after favouring first the Germans and later
the Soviets.
http://www.infoukes.com/upa/related/military.html
http://ukr-ww2.onestop.net/


One has to add to this list with the White Russians and Cossacks.
Many of these had moved west to France after the Russian Civil War but
were reformed as military units and joined with the German forces,
again with the aim of ousting Stalin and forming a “free” Russia or
Ukraine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XV_SS_Cossack_Cavalry_Corps

Thanks to the American and British actions during Operation Keelhaul
after WW2, almost all of the Russian and Ukrainian groups were
returned to Soviets after WW2 and either killed or sent to the
Gulags. The only small group to escape forced repatriation were those
who crossed the border into Liechtenstein.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Monument_(Liechtenstein)


Given the large amount of Russian territory under German occupation, I
suppose it was natural to make some new arrangements. One was the
amazing Lokot Autonomy, basically a country. You can find its’ story
here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lokot_Republic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Keelhaul

Some may recall that Count Tolstoy (stepchild of the writer Patrick
O'Brien (MAster and Commander)) a book on the Yalta Treaty and
Operation Keelhaul. He was sued in the UK by Lord Adington for libel
and lost. He was then supported by many writers and others until the
death of Lord Addington:
"In July 1995, the European Court of Human Rights concluded
unanimously that the British Government had violated his rights in
respect of Article 10 of the Convention on Human Rights, although this
referred strictly to the amount of the damages awarded against him and
did not overturn the guilty verdict of his libel action. The Times
commented in a leading article:“ In its judgment yesterday in the case
of Count Nikolai Tolstoy, the European Court of Human Rights ruled
against Britain in important respects, finding that the award of £1.5
million levelled against the Count by a jury in 1989 amounted to a
violation of his freedom of expression. Parliament will find the
implications of this decision difficult to ignore"

All in all, it seems I have to relearn a large bit of history. While
I knew a few groups fought with the Germans for a variety of reasons,
most of the above was certainly not known prior to my surfin’ the
Net.

Willow



I had known about Russian units turning around and attacking the Soviet Union. It occurred to me that that may have been one of the reasons that Stalin ordered Russians returned at the end of the war to be executed. I also knew about at least some Eastern European combat units - not all of them were volunteers, however; their countries had been conquered. They were mentioned in William Craig's excellent history entitled: *Enemy at the Gates: the Battle of Stalingrad* . [By the way, the movie of the same name is based on about six pages from the middle of Craig's book.] And I knew about Italian units (of course, they were allies from the start) that fought on the Eastern Front. Dibdin, you may recall, has his Italian detective's father lost on the Eastern front.

But I was unaware that so many countries not under German sway had contributed so many soldiers to the Nazi cause.

As to the pretend governments, yes! I recall reading articles in the 1970s (Wall Street Journal, maybe) about these near vacant offices in London and Washington manned by elderly men waiting for Communism to end so they could reestablish the former governments. So little did they understand how that could never happen. If I remember correctly, one such office figures at the start of Le Carre's *Smiley's People* .

--
Francis A. Miniter

Oscuramente
libros, laminas, llaves
siguen mi suerte.

Jorge Luis Borges, La Cifra Haiku, 6
.

Relevant Pages

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  • Why not everybody hates the former Soviet Union/Russia
    ... my take on the former Soviet Union/Russia. ... They're back with the West German army, and I call that murder, ... particularly gifted at learning languages, ... sputnik, a Russian club was established at our school, thank you Mr. ...
    (soc.culture.baltics)
  • Re: Why doesnt everybody hate the former Soviet Union/Russia?
    ... > my take on the former Soviet Union/Russia. ... They're back with the West German army, and I call that murder, ... > particularly gifted at learning languages, ... > sputnik, a Russian club was established at our school, thank you Mr. ...
    (soc.culture.baltics)
  • OT - Unknown WW2 History... (Longish...but hopefully interesting)
    ... Not just the formation of local Nazi groups, but volunteers who joined ... joined the German Armed Forces between 1939 and 1945. ... faced under the brutal rule of the Soviet Empire. ... Russian general, captured when forced to remain in place by Stalin’s ...
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  • Re: Dune meets Darwin
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