Waffen-SS

Waffen-SS PDF

Author: Adrian Gilbert

Publisher: Da Capo Press

Published: 2019-06-25

Total Pages: 512

ISBN-13: 0306824663

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From an award-winning and bestselling historian, the first comprehensive military history in over fifty years of Hitler's famous and infamous personal army: the Waffen-SS The Waffen-SS was one of the most feared combat organizations of the twentieth century. Originally formed as a protection squad for Adolf Hitler it became the military wing of Heinrich Himmler's SS and a key part of the Nazi state, with nearly 900,000 men passing through its ranks. The Waffen-SS played a crucial role in furthering the aims of the Third Reich which made its soldiers Hitler's political operatives. During its short history, the elite military divisions of the Waffen-SS acquired a reputation for excellence, but their famous battlefield record of success was matched by their repeated and infamous atrocities against both soldiers and civilians. Waffen-SS is the first definitive single-volume military history of the Waffen-SS in more than 50 years. In considering the actions of its leading personalities, including Himmler, Sepp Dietrich, and Otto Skorzeny, and analyzing its specialist training and ideological outlook, eminent historian Adrian Gilbert chronicles the battles and campaigns that brought the Waffen-SS both fame and infamy.

Hitler's Gauls

Hitler's Gauls PDF

Author: Jonathan Trigg

Publisher: The History Press

Published: 2009-11-20

Total Pages: 220

ISBN-13: 0750967110

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The divisions of the Waffen-SS were among the elite of Hitler’s armies in the Second World War. But alongside the Germans in the Waffen-SS fought an astonishingly high number of volunteers from other countries. By the end of the Second World War these foreign volunteers comprised half of all Hitler’s Waffen-SS, and filled the ranks of over twenty-four of the nominal thirty-eight Waffen-SS divisions. So during the most brutal war that mankind has ever known, hundreds of thousands of men flocked to fight for a country that was not theirs, and for a cause that was one of the most monstrous and barbaric in history. Who were these men, and why did they fight? Hitler’s Gauls is an in-depth examination of one of these legions of foreign volunteers, the Charlemagne division, who were recruited entirely from conquered France. The men in Charlemagne, often motivated by an extreme anti-communist zeal, fought hard on the Eastern Front including battles of near annihilation in the snows of Pomerania and the final stand in the ruins of Berlin. This definitive history, illustrated with rare photographs, explores the background, training, key figures and full combat record of one of Hitler’s lesser known foreign units of the Second World War.

Hitler's Generals

Hitler's Generals PDF

Author: Correlli Barnett

Publisher: Grove Press

Published: 1989

Total Pages: 524

ISBN-13: 9780802139948

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With essays from Carlo D'Este, Martin Blumenson, Walter Goerlitz, Gen. John Hackett, and Martin Middlebrook, Hitler's Generals probes the central mystery of why a generation of the world's most able commanders and staff officers came to be seduced by Hitler, and why they failed to deflect him from his disastrous decisions. From Kenneth Macksey's essay on Heinz Guderian, who created the Panzier divisions and innovated the use of dive bombers, to Earl Ziemke's portrait of Karl Gerd von Runstedt, whose stalling of the German blitzkrieg allowed 338,000 Allied troops enough time to fall back on Dunkirk and escape to fight again, these are bold and incisive assessments of the twentieth century's greatest strategists and villains. Book jacket.

Hitler's Brandenburgers

Hitler's Brandenburgers PDF

Author: Lawrence Paterson

Publisher: Greenhill Books

Published: 2018-08-30

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 1784382310

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‘A fitting tribute to Germany's clandestine warriors, and a guarantee that their extraordinary efforts have not been relegated to comparative obscurity or entirely forgotten’ - David R Higgins. Hitler's daring and pioneering Brandenburgers special forces served in every German theatre of action. This is the most comprehensive account of an unusual and profoundly successful band of men. Lawrence Paterson traces the origins of the small unit, before the outbreak of war in 1939, as the brainchild of Admiral Canaris and part of his Abwehr intelligence unit through through to its breaking up in 1944 when it was largely converted to a, conventional Panzergrenadier division. At that point, many Brandenburgers transferred to Otto Skorzeny’s SS Jägdverbände. It is well-known that German troops disguised themselves as Allied troops for the Battle of the Bulge - but less well known the Brandenburger operations used such disguises - more effectively -in in advance of the Blitzkrieg in 1939-41. Despite their profound success as commando raiding troops their history has been overshadowed by equivalent Allied units and largely ignored. However, within North Africa the Brandenburgers employed similar techniques to the SAS and LRDG, at first earning Erwin Rommel’s disapproval for their unorthodox methods until he began to feel the effect of similar Allied raids. Paterson details the roles of key individuals, such as Theodor von Hippel, along with forensic details of key operations. He explodes many of the myths about the unit and provides a clear and comprehensive history of this key part of the Wehrmacht.

Hitler's Children

Hitler's Children PDF

Author: Gerhard Rempel

Publisher: UNC Press Books

Published: 2015-07-15

Total Pages: 369

ISBN-13: 1469620618

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Eighty-two percent of German boys and girls between the ages of ten and eighteen belonged to Hitlerjugend--Hitler Youth--or one of its affiliates by the time membership became fully compulsory in 1939. These adolescents were recognized by the SS, an exclusive cadre of Nazi zealots, as a source of future recruits to its own elite ranks, which were made up largely of men under the age of thirty. In this book, Gerhard Rempel examines the special relationship that developed between these two most youthful and dynamic branches of the National Socialist movement and concludes that the coalition gave nazism much of its passionate energy and contributed greatly to its initial political and military success. Rempel center his analysis of the HJ-SS relationship on two branches of the Hitler Youth. The first of these, the Patrol Service, was established as a juvenile police force to pursue ideological and social deviants, political opponents, and non-conformists within the HJ and among German youth at large. Under SS influence, however, membership in the organization became a preliminary apprenticeship for boys who would go on to be agents and soldiers in such SS-controlled units as the Gestapo and Death's Head Formations. The second, the Land Service, was created by HJ to encourage a return to farm living. But this battle to reverse "the flight from the land" took on military significance as the SS sought to use the Land Service to create "defense-peasants" who would provide a reliable food supply while defending the Fatherland. The transformation of the Patrol and Land services, like that of the HJ generally, served SS ends at the same time that it secured for the Nazi regime the practical and ideological support of Germany's youth. By fostering in the Hitler Youth as "national community" of the young, the SS believed it could convert the popular movement of nazism into a protomilitary program to produce ideologically pure and committed soldiers and leaders who would keep the movement young and vital.

Hitler's Gladiator

Hitler's Gladiator PDF

Author: Charles Messenger

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2011-08-01

Total Pages: 493

ISBN-13: 1628730455

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A charismatic yet notorious character, Sepp Dietrich the man is impossible to separate from Sepp Dietrich the General, who was awarded twenty-four different honors during his service to the Nazi party and was known for his devotion to his men as he led them through some of the fiercest fighting in the war. In this extensively researched book, historian Charles Messenger attempts to discover the truth about this sparsely documented man, painting a vivid picture of the aggressive war and politics under the Third Reich. From Dietrich’s humble upbringing and his eventual rise to General, to his dissatisfaction with Hitler’s leadership and the trials he faced after the war, Dietrich remains a mysterious figure in history.

Hitler's Violent Youth

Hitler's Violent Youth PDF

Author: Bob Carruthers

Publisher: Pen and Sword

Published: 2015-06-30

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 1473833515

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This is the fascinating story of how the events which befell Hitler between 1889 and 1924 influenced his political outlook and heralded the formation of the Sturm Abteilung Ð the notorious SA. Drawing extensively on Hitler's own biographical account in Mein Kampf, Emmy Award winning author and historian Bob Carruthers illustrates how a series of violent events transformed Hitler's view of the world and led directly to the Beer Hall Putsch of 1924.??Hitler's difficult relationship with his brutal father, his harsh experiences in Vienna and his involvement in the Great War conditioned Hitler to celebrate violent acts. By Hitler's own account, his love of violence and complete disregard for the consequences of his actions was vindicated by a series of victories in fierce encounters involving beer hall brawls and street battles. Each successive triumph over adversity influenced his decision-making process and culminated in the ill-fated events of November 1924, which saw Hitler imprisoned for the second time.??The parallel growth of the SA from a small group of fist fighters to a feared paramilitary force is also covered in detail, along with a comprehensive survey of the violent events between 1920 and 1924, which shaped this infamous political instrument of terror.

Hitler and His Generals

Hitler and His Generals PDF

Author: Harold C. Deutsch

Publisher: U of Minnesota Press

Published: 1974

Total Pages: 490

ISBN-13: 0816657440

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Hitler and His Generals was first published in 1974. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions. The author, who told the story of second of four conspiratorial rounds in his earlier book The Conspiracy against Hitler in the Twilight War,describes here the situations and events leading up to the first round of conspiracy. The present volume deals with the virtual coup d'etat by which Hitler sought to establish ascendancy over the Wehrmacht early in 1938. The account focuses on sensational events centering about Hitler's successful efforts to oust Field Marshal Werner von Blomberg, the War Minister, and Colonel General Baron von Fritsch, the Army commander in chief, in order to consolidate control of the military in his own hands. Using as an excuse Blomberg's marriage to a woman with a discreditable past, he forced Blomberg's resignation. He accomplished Fritsch's resignation through charges of homosexuality which were trumped up by Himmler, Heydrich, and Goering. He then appointed Colonel General Walther von Brauchitsch, who was under personal obligation to him, as commander in chief. Through these moves, as Dr. Deutsch shows, Hitler closed the door to all means other than conspiracy for the active Opposition movement to express itself against his aggressive policies. The story of the first round of conspiracy will be the subject of another book by Professor Deutsch, to be published later.

Lives of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers

Lives of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers PDF

Author: Bryan Mark Rigg

Publisher: Bryan Mark Rigg

Published: 2022-11-20

Total Pages: 361

ISBN-13: 1734534168

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They were foot soldiers and officers. They served in the regular army and the Waffen-SS. And, remarkably, they were also Jewish, at least as defined by Hitler's infamous race laws. Pursuing the thread he first unraveled in Hitler's Jewish Soldiers, Bryan Rigg takes a closer look at the experiences of Wehrmacht soldiers who were classified as Jewish. In this long-awaited companion volume, he presents interviews with twenty-one of these men, whose stories are both fascinating and disturbing. As many as 150,000 Jews and partial-Jews (or Mischlinge) served, often with distinction, in the German military during World War II. The men interviewed for this volume portray a wide range of experiences-some came from military families, some had been raised Christian—revealing in vivid detail how they fought for a government that robbed them of their rights and sent their relatives to extermination camps. Yet most continued to serve, since resistance would have cost them their lives and they mistakenly hoped that by their service they could protect themselves and their families. The interviews recount the nature and extent of their dilemma, the divided loyalties under which many toiled during the Nazi years and afterward, and their sobering reflections on religion and the Holocaust, including what they knew about it at the time. Rigg relates each individual's experiences following the establishment of Hitler's race laws, shifting between vivid scenes of combat and the increasingly threatening situation on the home front for these men and their family members. Their stories reveal the constant tension in their lives: how some tried to hide their identities, and how a few were even "Aryanized" as part of Hitler's effort to retain reliable soldiers—including Field Marshal Erhard Milch, three-star general Helmut Wilberg, and naval commander Bernhard Rogge. Chilling, compelling, almost beyond belief, these stories depict crises of conscience under the most stressful circumstances. Lives of Hitler's Jewish Soldiers deepens our understanding of the complex intersection of Nazi race laws and German military service both before and during World War II.