Hitler's Brandenburgers

by Lawrence Paterson

  On 15 February Kürschner was ordered to report to Lahousen at the Abwehr’s Tirpitzufer offices in Berlin. Once there, he was presented with reconnaissance photos and a map on which four Dutch bridges across the Juliana Canal at Obbicht, Berg, Urmond and Stein were highlighted. The West Platoon was tasked with the capture of all four of these bridges west of Sittard that would need to be taken and held until the main invasion force of the 7th Infantry Division arrived to make the crossing. The Abwehr would place at Kürschner’s disposal whatever camouflage and specialist equipment he would require, including fabricated Dutch uniforms to be worn over their German ones. Intensive training began, the West Platoon moving into the Erkelenz area and concentrating on night manoeuvres, orienteering and hand-to-hand combat. Intelligence reports of explosives rigged to at least one of the bridges also placed emphasis on speed of movement and the rapid defusing of sabotage equipment. During April, Kürschner was promoted to the rank of Leutnant.

  The defence of The Netherlands hinged primarily on establishing water obstacles. The Dutch military was relatively small and the eastern and southern area that required guarding stretched for 700km. Neutrality had protected The Netherlands during the previous war, though the army had mobilised as a precaution, but the threat posed by Nazi hostility was judged to be perceptibly greater than that of twenty-six years before. Moreover, Dutch interpretation of ‘strict neutrality’ prevented any form of potential high-level defensive coordination with the Allied powers or neighbouring Belgium before 1939. The Dutch Prime Minister, Hendrikus Colijn, believed that any potential German invasion could be halted by ‘opening the floodgates’ and judicial flooding of the polder alongside rapid demolition of bridges. While it would not defeat an invasion, it was hoped that it would delay an attacking force long enough for complete mobilisation and for defensive lines to be established to the west.

  The Netherlands finally acknowledged the threat of European war against the Axis powers following the Italian invasion of Abyssinia, but last-minute attempts at purchasing advanced weaponry were too late to significantly alter the composition of the Dutch Army. Immediately before the outbreak of war and despite assurances from the German ambassador that Dutch neutrality was ‘inviolate’ on 27 August, the country fully mobilised its forces. The hurried German military build-up near the border that had presaged Hitler’s initial invasion plans during November 1939 had already raised alarm levels, but the failure of the invasion to take place fatally denigrated the standing of Dutch intelligence officers who had forecast the attack.

  While Kürschner’s men continued to mount exercises in preparation for seizing their assigned bridges, further small Brandenburg units were formed for the Western offensive. Two platoons belonging to Walther’s 4th Company were also moved to forward bases in preparation for ‘Case Yellow’. During the middle of February Leutnant Witzel and Feldwebel Stöhr took approximately sixty men (1st Platoon) into a camp in the Reichswald near Asperden to operate against four bridges in the Dutch province of Brabant. Witzel’s force was subordinated to XXVI Army Corps and company commander Walther attached himself to the attack on the Gennep railway bridge. Canaris visited Witzel’s men near Asperden at the beginning of May and was apparently impressed, though Witzel later recalled that he had been less enthusiastic about demonstrations of killing with knife and garrotte.12

  Siegfried Grabert took another forty men of 2nd Platoon further south, operating adjacent to Kürschner’s West Platoon and stationed in a small camp in the woods near Arsbeck, subordinated to XI Army Corps. Grabert’s targets were four more bridges over the Maas between Roermond and Maaseik. Over the weeks that followed, various Brandenburgers slipped across the border to reconnoitre the layout of the enemy’s defences. Moving in pairs or singly they took the opportunity to prepare a full picture of the terrain they would be traversing once the invasion day arrived. Weekend passes for the troops in training were limited to controlled visits to nearby towns, the destinations themselves rotated to prevent any kind of relationships forming between the men and the locals.

  Rudloff’s 3rd Company in Bad Münstereifel numbered three officers and 154 NCOs and men and was assigned Belgian targets. Leutnant Hütten and his section would attack objectives in the area between Eupen and Malmedy while Leutnant Kutschera and his troops operated to the south in the region surrounding St Vith. Rudloff exercised overall command, dividing his men into small parties of between three and fifteen men armed with small arms, hand grenades and explosives. Attached to IV Army Corps, the 3rd Company was to clear the path for the panzers that would provide the vital edge in the invasion, passing through the weakly defended Ardennes. They were not the only commando-type troops engaged; several hundred men of the elite Grossdeutschland Division were to be air-landed in Luxembourg and Belgium by shuttles of Fieseler Fi 156 Storch aircraft to hinder the movement of French and Belgian reinforcements.

  During March two platoons of Fabian’s 2nd Company were moved to forward staging areas from where they too would move into Luxembourg. Leutnant Schöller commanded a small detachment based at Trier while Feldwebel Eggers took his men to Sankt Thomas, moving into advanced positions amongst the bunkers of the West Wall around Ammeldingen bei Neuerburg after first returning home to fetch suitable civilian clothes for the purpose of disguise.

  The Brandenburgers were divided into small teams that rarely numbered more than twelve for ‘Case Yellow’. While many of the chosen Brandenburgers could speak fluent Dutch, volunteer Dutch nationals were attached for the missions. Many members of Anton Mussert’s Nationaal-Socialistische Beweging (NSB – Dutch Nazi Party) had been jailed as The Netherlands declared the country to be in a state of siege during April, others fleeing over the border to Germany to join those who had already relocated and been surreptitiously enlisted by the Abwehr. The Dutch Nazis were therefore members of the Nationaal-Socialistische Bond van Nederlanders in Duitsland (NSBND), their leader Julius Herdt Mann attending a meeting with Lahousen in Berlin on 14 November 1939. Though minutes do not remain of the meeting, it is assumed that Herdt Mann was informed of plans for the occupation of The Netherlands as he offered a significant number of NSBND members for the task outlined to him. At least forty of these expatriates were taken on as Kampfdolmetscher (combat interpreters). While linguistics was an integral part of Brandenburg training, the edge provided by genuine native speakers was worth the inclusion of additional men. This subsequently proved so successful that it would become a frequent feature of future Brandenburg actions in all theatres, augmenting those who could pass as indigenous to the theatre of operation.

  A separate Abwehr formation was also created for ‘Case Yellow’. The Austrian Hauptmann Fleck, late of Abwehrstelle Breslau, was placed in command of Bataillon z.b.V. 100, charged with taking and holding the bridges in and around Maastricht in support of the army advance towards Fort Eben Emael. Fleck’s battalion was made up of 550 Abwehr men with fifty seconded from the Brandenburgers. Fleck’s unit remained separate to Hippel’s battalion and was a combination of orthodox Wehrmacht troops and special forces employing the same methodology. Fleck’s command was comprised of a headquarters company with attached bicycle and motorcycle units, one Engineer company, one combined engineer and infantry company, a battery of four 88mm Flak guns and two armoured vehicles. A special formation was created internally, led by Fleck’s adjutant Leutnant Hans-Joachim Hocke, designated Sonderverbänd Hocke. It was to this special unit that the task of capturing the bridges over the Maas near Maastricht would fall.

  At OKH in Berlin it had become apparent that the burgeoning Baulehr-Bataillon z.b.V. 800 had reached the point where it required a more expansive regimental command structure to achieve the variety of tasks now being demanded of it in widely dispersed geographical locations. Those men not assembled for impending action in any theatre were grouped in Brandenburg an der Havel as battalion headquarters, forming a reserve pool ready for transfer wherever required. However, with the likely upgrading of Baulehr-Bataillon z.
b.V. 800 to regimental status, a new forward operations staff was created under the command of Major Hubert Kewisch. Kewisch had been the pre-war commander of the armoured cars of 1st Squadron (Panzerspäh) of Potsdam’s Aufklarungsabteilung 8 (8th Reconnaissance Battalion) in the rank of Rittmeister. Then, his unit had been incorporated in the 5th Panzer Division, primarily made up of Silesians or Sudeten Volksdeutsche. Promoted to Major after the Polish campaign, Kewisch was subsequently transferred by OKH to Baulehr-Bataillon z.b.V. 800 in anticipation of its expansion to regimental size.

  Meanwhile, despite the loss of fifty men to Fleck’s battalion, the Brandenburgers were now combat-ready for the impending invasion of the West but events in Scandinavia overtook them and all eyes were momentarily diverted to the north.

  CHAPTER 2

  Operation ‘Weserübung’ and ‘Case Yellow’: Scandinavia and the West

  ‘If you find yourself in a fair fight, you didn’t plan your mission properly.’

  David Hackworth

  Germany’s industrial war machine relied heavily on raw materials imported from Scandinavia, particularly iron ore extracted from Sweden’s Gällivare mines and shipped through neutral Norwegian coastal waters to Germany in accordance with international agreements. Hitler had long feared Allied interference with these crucial imports through an invasion of Norway and not without justification. Winston Churchill advocated seizure of Norway or, at the very least, the vital mines under a pretext of military assistance to Finland, which had been under attack by the Soviet Union since November 1939. The cessation of those hostilities removed the potential for such subterfuge, but British, French and Polish troops were nonetheless made ready for an attack on Norway.

  The Wehrmacht had in the meantime begun preparation for the same strategic move. With ‘Case Yellow’ delayed from Hitler’s initial November timetable, his misgivings about Allied intentions in Scandinavia grew. On 15 February 1940, the Royal Navy ignored Norway’s neutrality and attacked the German supply ship Altmark that had moored in Norwegian territorial waters. British prisoners taken by the ‘pocket battleship’ Admiral Graf Spee were aboard, being transferred to German captivity, and were freed by the Royal Navy, seven German sailors being killed in the action. This removed the last of Hitler’s restraint towards the region and an invasion of Norway and Denmark was ordered prepared under the command of Generaloberst der Infanterie Nikolaus von Falkenhorst. The new operation took precedence over all previous instructions and France and the Low Countries were to be dealt with shortly thereafter.

  Denmark was to be occupied in Operation ‘Weserübung Süd’, Norway invaded with the more extensive ‘Weserübung Nord’ that required huge commitment from all three branches of the Wehrmacht. The attack on Denmark has often been presented as a bloodless coup, a footnote in the history of ‘Weserübung’. However, although resistance was relatively futile and brief, the Wehrmacht suffered casualties almost disproportionate to the amount of actual fighting. Denmark itself was not of major interest to Germany: the small country was destined for invasion to secure the southern flank of Scandinavian operations and provide the forward airfield at Aalborg for use by the Luftwaffe against Norway. Though Denmark had reliable intelligence that invasion was at hand, its government refused to allow military defensive deployments lest they provoke Germany.

  The Brandenburger commitment to ‘Weserübung’ was quite small, their first operation against Denmark codenamed ‘Sanssouci’. A small unit led by 28-yearold Latvian Feldwebel Robert Sorgenfrey crossed over the border near Flensburg during the night of 8 April, dressed in civilian clothes. Sorgenfrey’s task was to ensure the swift capture of the railway station at Tinglev, securing the line for German use during the following day. Undefended, the station was quickly taken and German troops breached the border at Kruså at 0415hrs, skirmishing with Danish guards and losing two armoured cars and three motorcycles. The defenders were quickly forced to retreat with one man killed and another injured, and the German advance continued, shortly linking with Sorgenfrey’s Brandenburgers, whereupon the small team returned to Germany.1

  Skirmishes between the Kriegsmarine and Norwegian warships around Oslo began on the night of 8 April and at 0500hrs the German Ambassador informed the Norwegian government both verbally and in writing that they were ‘requested’ to place themselves under German military protection, citing the imminence of Allied occupation as the cause. A similar note had been delivered to the Danish government. The latter acquiesced under protest, the former refused. Landings by Fallschirmjäger and amphibious troops in Denmark proceeded as planned, meeting little resistance. ‘Weserübung Süd’ progressed smoothly with troops landed in the capital Copenhagen from the ship Hansestadt Danzig. Other amphibious landings were made near Middelfahrt to protect the bridge over the Little Belt and at Gjedser, Nyborg and Korsoer. The brief but sharp skirmishes that had been fought near the German border were finished within six hours when Denmark formally capitulated, but left at least 203 German troops dead, twelve armoured cars destroyed or damaged and four tanks damaged. The Danes lost sixteen men killed and twenty wounded.

  In Norway, the battle would last considerably longer, particularly in and around Narvik and Trondheim, with German troops consolidating their initial landing positions to differing degrees, but the main beachhead at Oslo failed to break out to the north and link up the German pockets. Falkenhorst’s intelligence assessment of Norwegian strength before the beginning of ‘Weserübung’ had overestimated the size of the Norwegian military, but underestimated its willingness and ability to fight. Although the Allied expeditionary force that had also landed in Norway was badly coordinated and chaotic, it managed to severely blunt the German offensive in the north. Hippel’s men were not utilised in the first wave of troops of ‘Weserübung Nord’, but as the advance rapidly stalled with heavy Norwegian resistance and British, French and Polish reinforcements, the Brandenburgers were called into action.

  A new Nordzug (North Platoon) – actually more like company size – was created in Brandenburg an der Havel for potential service in Norway. Leipzig-born Leutnant Johann Karl Fürchtegott Zülch, only recently turned 27, was placed in command of the platoon, which was subdivided into separate components. The first, comprised primarily of men from Upper Silesia, was intended to operate against four Polish battalions that had landed near Narvik on 9 April under French command, soon formed into the Polish Independent Highland Brigade. A second platoon, mainly made up of Palestinian Germans led by Feldwebel Lange, combined with the so-called Bergzug (Mountain Platoon) of predominantly South Tyrolian mountaineers, gathered under the command of Leutnant Fritz Benesch.

  A forward operational headquarters under the command of Major Kewisch (Einsatzstab Kewisch) was flown to Oslo on 20 April by Ju 52 aircraft, all four of which were destroyed that night by British bombing while still on the newly captured aerodrome. Kewisch received his briefing from Oberst Erich Buschenhagen, Chief of Staff to Falkenhorst. The orders for the Brandenburg troops were relatively broad in their scope. Codenamed Operation ‘Carolus’, Kewisch’s men were to mostly wear civilian clothes and secure bridges and other river crossings, clear or mark approach roads of mines, disable Norwegian Army communications centres and disrupt troop movements wherever possible. Supply centres for both the Norwegian and Allied troops were to be attacked and destroyed and Kewisch’s men to infiltrate behind enemy lines to harass the Allied supply routes.

  As the first men of the North Platoon arrived in Oslo at the end of April, Kewisch immediately began moving into action, leading the spearhead of his men north from Oslo on 1 May, flown by Ju 52 aircraft towards the front line of the 181st Infantry Division at Trondheim. Benesch’s Mountain Platoon was shortly thereafter detached from Kewisch’s command and ordered to accompany the 2nd Mountain Division as it headed towards Narvik. The division was attempting to reinforce the hard-pressed German invasion force which had been pushed on to the defensive and would soon be forced to abandon the town and move east. />
  During the advance, the Mountain Platoon went into action during the attack towards Mo i Rana. A frontal assault along the main road that ran alongside Ranfjorden by mountain troops was halted at the Dalselva River by fierce defence that comprised 1st Scots Guards (less C Company, which was detached at Bodø), No. 1 Independent Company, a troop of 203 Battery, 51st Field Regiment, Royal Artillery, with four 25-pounder guns, a troop of 40mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns of the 55th Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment, Royal Artillery and other attached smaller contingents that included a Norwegian troop (the entire Allied force named ‘Trappescol’ as a whole). Thwarted by the strong defence, the Mountain Platoon marched east with a company of mountain troops to begin an outflanking manoeuvre that traversed the river and reached the lake of Andfiskvatnet before swinging west and attacking the defensive lines from the rear. The speed with which they moved prompted the British commander of the North-Western Expeditionary Force, Lieutenant General Claude Auchinleck, to complain in a letter to General John Dill, Vice Chief of the Imperial General Staff, regarding the rather precipitate retreat from Mo: ‘Why our soldiers cannot be as mobile as the Germans I don’t know, but they aren’t apparently.’2