SS: Hell on the Western Front

SS: Hell on the Western Front PDF Author: Chris Bishop
Publisher: SS
ISBN: 9781782743149
Category : World War, 1939-1945
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Despite their success during the invasion of Poland in 1939, the Waffen-SS still had something to prove as a fighting unit when they arrived in the west for the attack on the Low Countries in May 1940. SS: Hell on the Western Front describes in vivid detail the exploits of the Waffen-SS in Western Europe from 1940 to 1945. The book begins with the formation of the Waffen-SS and its growth and development into a combat arm. The successes of 1940 are examined, as the SS troopers swept all opposition before them, as is the darker side of the organization, with the first atrocities committed against Allied prisoners. As the preparations for the invasion of the Soviet Union advanced, Hitler was distracted by the crisis in the Balkans, where the Waffen-SS added to their growing reputation by capturing Belgrade and driving Allied troops out of Greece. By 1944, the Waffen-SS were back in France in numbers, in readiness to repel the expected Allied invasion. After the loss of Normandy, the Waffen-SS fought hard at Arnhem and during the Ardennes offensive, winning respect from the Allied troops that faced them. SS: Hell on the Western Front features the actions of such famous Waffen-SS divisions as the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, Das Reich, Hitlerjugend and Totenkopf, and provides an insight into how these ideologically motivated units consistently outfought the Allies, even when seriously disadvantaged due to lack of fuel or air support. Illustrated with rare photographs, SS: Hell on the Western Front is a thorough study of the Waffen-SS in the western theatre.

SS: Hell on the Western Front

SS: Hell on the Western Front PDF Author: Chris Bishop
Publisher: SS
ISBN: 9781782743149
Category : World War, 1939-1945
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Despite their success during the invasion of Poland in 1939, the Waffen-SS still had something to prove as a fighting unit when they arrived in the west for the attack on the Low Countries in May 1940. SS: Hell on the Western Front describes in vivid detail the exploits of the Waffen-SS in Western Europe from 1940 to 1945. The book begins with the formation of the Waffen-SS and its growth and development into a combat arm. The successes of 1940 are examined, as the SS troopers swept all opposition before them, as is the darker side of the organization, with the first atrocities committed against Allied prisoners. As the preparations for the invasion of the Soviet Union advanced, Hitler was distracted by the crisis in the Balkans, where the Waffen-SS added to their growing reputation by capturing Belgrade and driving Allied troops out of Greece. By 1944, the Waffen-SS were back in France in numbers, in readiness to repel the expected Allied invasion. After the loss of Normandy, the Waffen-SS fought hard at Arnhem and during the Ardennes offensive, winning respect from the Allied troops that faced them. SS: Hell on the Western Front features the actions of such famous Waffen-SS divisions as the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, Das Reich, Hitlerjugend and Totenkopf, and provides an insight into how these ideologically motivated units consistently outfought the Allies, even when seriously disadvantaged due to lack of fuel or air support. Illustrated with rare photographs, SS: Hell on the Western Front is a thorough study of the Waffen-SS in the western theatre.

Hitler's Home Guard: Volkssturmmann

Hitler's Home Guard: Volkssturmmann PDF Author: David Yelton
Publisher: Osprey Publishing
ISBN: 9781846030130
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Osprey's study of Germany's Home Guard during the latter part of World War II (1939-1945). The creation of the German Home Guard or Volkssturm on 18 October 1944 was a desperate measure by the Nazi regime to utilize every available manpower resource in their last-ditch attempts to delay their inevitable defeat. All able-bodied males between the ages of 16 and 60 who were not already members of the German Armed Forces were conscripted into one organization. The aim of the Volkssturm was to shore up the defense of the Reich, but also to restrict any possible revolt or dissent by exercising military discipline over the entire male population of fighting age. This Nazi fantasy was the creation of a new force of highly-motivated Aryans dedicated to the heroic defense of their fatherland. However, the Volkssturm failed due to poor equipment, lack of training, and low morale. Men who had no experience of combat and little or no inclination to fight, and who had little interest in the Nazi regime found themselves sent into battle against impossible odds and achieving little or nothing. The focus of the book is the section of Germany's western front where the Volkssturm fought in vain to slow the advance of Canadian forces and where the desertion rate was very high. David K. Yelton follows the experience of a Volkssturm conscript from his call-to-arms, into action and through to his capture and time as a POW, examining his personal reaction to the creation of the German Home Guard and his response to the fighting into which he was thrust.

A European Anabasis

A European Anabasis PDF Author: Kenneth Estes
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781911628354
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
Kenneth Estes studies the 100,000 West Europeans who fought against Russia as volunteers for the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS. A retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel, Estes shows tremendous knowledge of combat and writes gripping battlefield prose. Two-thirds of the West European volunteers came from Spain and the Netherlands, yet Estes demonstrates wide range and covers also Flemish, Walloon, French, Danish, and Norwegian combat units. Avoiding over-generalization, the author distinguishes carefully among the Danes and Flemings who fought competently with the SS-Wiking Division and later with Nordland, the courageous but poorly-armed Spanish, the ill-trained Dutch and French in Landstorm Nederland and SS-Charlemagne, and the Norwegians who after a first wave of enthusiasm held back altogether. Estes pulverizes the Nazi propaganda notion of a multinational European army defending 'Western civilization' against 'Bolshevism'. He shows that West Europeans, mainly of the urban working classes, volunteered from a mix of motives -adventure-seeking, ideology, hopes of personal advantage or material gain, a desire for better food, or a wish to escape a criminal record at home. He demonstrates that the best-performing foreign legions were trained and led by German officers and formed parts of larger SS units, and also that the Wehrmacht placed little value on foreign formations until its other manpower reserves ran out in 1944-45. This is a landmark work on a subject which has been much written about, but rarely understood or described as perceptively as in the pages of this book.

SS Das Reich at War, 1939–1945

SS Das Reich at War, 1939–1945 PDF Author: Ian Baxter
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1473890918
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 238

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Book Description
Between 1933 and 1939, the strength and influence of the SS grew considerably with thousands of men being recruited into the new ideological armed formation, many into units known as the SS-Verfgungstruppe (Special Disposal Troop). These troops saw action in Poland before switching to the Western Front in 1940. Out of this organisation the SS Das Reich Division was created.This book, with its extensive text and over 250 rare and unpublished photographs with detailed captions describes the fighting tactics, the uniforms, the battles and the different elements that went into making the Das Reich Division such a formidable fighting force. The chapters reveal the Division as it battled its way through Poland, the Low Countries, the Balkans and the Eastern Front. Finally the Das Reich defended Normandy before falling back to Germany.The Division gained its fearsome and notorious reputation for its fighting ability, often against vastly numerically superior forces, as well as its fanatical zeal.

Nineteen Forty-five

Nineteen Forty-five PDF Author: Newt Gingrich
Publisher: Baen Books
ISBN: 9780671876760
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 404

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Book Description
Describes the world that would have existed in 1945 if Adolf Hitler had not declared war on the United States after Pearl Harbor.

SS

SS PDF Author: Chris Bishop
Publisher: Zenith Press
ISBN: 9780760314029
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
No fighting organization has been more multifaceted, combining political, military, and criminal to earn a reputation that garnered both respect and contempt, than Nazi Germany's dreaded Waffen-SS. First started as Hitler's personal bodyguard, the SS evolved into Germany's best equipped and most ideologically motivated fighting units. SS: Hell on the Western Front details Hitler's "Sons of the Reich" as they conquer and then defend Germany's western front. Follow the actions and atrocities of some of the most famous divisions. Learn of the Hitlerjurgend (Hitler youth) division, made up solely of the class of 1926, a fanatic group who showed an indifference to the 60% causalities suffered in Normandy. Rare action photography augmented with battle plan maps enhance author Michael Williams's graphic description of the Waffen-SS on the Western Front.

The Waffen-SS

The Waffen-SS PDF Author: Jochen Böhler
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198790554
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 407

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Book Description
This is the first systematic pan-European study of the hundreds of thousands of non-Germans who fought - either voluntarily or under different kinds of pressures - for the Waffen-SS (or auxiliary police formations operating in the occupied East). Building on the findings of regional studies by other scholars - many of them included in this volume - The Waffen-SS aims to arrive at a fuller picture of those non-German citizens (from Eastern as well as Western Europe) who served under the SS flag. Where did the non-Germans in the SS come from (socially, geographically, and culturally)? What motivated them? What do we know about the practicalities of international collaboration in war and genocide, in terms of everyday life, language, and ideological training? Did a common transnational identity emerge as a result of shared ideological convictions or experiences of extreme violence? In order to address these questions (and others), The Waffen-SS adopts an approach that does justice to the complexity of the subject, adding a more nuanced, empirically sound understanding of collaboration in Europe during World War II, while also seeking to push the methodological boundaries of the historiographical genre of perpetrator studies by adopting a transnational approach.

Eastern Front

Eastern Front PDF Author: Ian Baxter
Publisher: Spellmount, Limited Publishers
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description
Featuring 250 previously unpublished action photographs, this work depicts the battles between the Waffen SS and the Red Army on the Eastern Front between 1941 and 1945.

The Last Battle

The Last Battle PDF Author: Stephen Harding
Publisher: Da Capo Press
ISBN: 0306822091
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
The incredible story of the unlikeliest battle of World War II, when a small group of American soldiers joined forces with German soldiers to fight off fanatical SS troops May, 1945. Hitler is dead, the Third Reich is little more than smoking rubble, and no GI wants to be the last man killed in action against the Nazis. The Last Battle tells the nearly unbelievable story of the unlikeliest battle of the war, when a small group of American tankers, led by Captain Lee, joined forces with German soldiers to fight off fanatical SS troops seeking to capture Castle Itter and execute the stronghold's VIP prisoners. It is a tale of unlikely allies, startling bravery, jittery suspense, and desperate combat between implacable enemies.

The German Defense Of Berlin

The German Defense Of Berlin PDF Author: Oberst a.D. Wilhem Willemar
Publisher: Pickle Partners Publishing
ISBN: 1786251469
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 126

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Book Description
Often written during imprisonment in Allied War camps by former German officers, with their memories of the World War fresh in their minds, The Foreign Military Studies series offers rare glimpses into the Third Reich. In this study Oberst a.D. Wilhem Willemar discusses his recollections of the climatic battle for Berlin from within the Wehrmacht. “No cohesive, over-all plan for the defense of Berlin was ever actually prepared. All that existed was the stubborn determination of Hitler to defend the capital of the Reich. Circumstances were such that he gave no thought to defending the city until it was much too late for any kind of advance planning. Thus the city’s defense was characterized only by a mass of improvisations. These reveal a state of total confusion in which the pressure of the enemy, the organizational chaos on the German side, and the catastrophic shortage of human and material resources for the defense combined with disastrous effect. “The author describes these conditions in a clear, accurate report which I rate very highly. He goes beyond the more narrow concept of planning and offers the first German account of the defense of Berlin to be based upon thorough research. I attach great importance to this study from the standpoint of military history and concur with the military opinions expressed by the author.”-Foreword by Generaloberst a.D. Franz Halder.