Hitler's Brandenburgers

by Lawrence Paterson

  Evidently his idea fell on fertile ground as a reply submitted by OKW on 8 June readily agreed to his proposals. Kühlwein was to concentrate on constructing Streifkorps units, with an emphasis on the Balkans, Italy and France. The Baltic states, Denmark and Norway were to be ignored and Romania and Bulgaria temporarily omitted for ‘political reasons’. Provided that his organisational measures had no effect on the fighting power of his troops – for example, by the removal of officers, NCOs, men or equipment – and therefore no influence on the situation at the front line, he was given the go ahead to begin and a timetable that planned completion of restructuring by 1 August.

  From a total strength of 14,056 men in the Brandenburg Division, Kühlwein estimated that 900 would form the Streifkorps, including the bulk of the available language experts, including 210 Russian-speakers, 181 English-speakers, 185 Serbo-Croatian-speakers and 310 Italian-speakers. The reorganisation began immediately. Hauptmann Träger’s 8th Company/2nd Battalion/3rd Regiment was detached and redesignated ‘Streifkorps Südfrankreich’ on 14 July. The unit’s organisation was fixed at two ‘Einsatzgruppen’ (‘special purpose groups’, unrelated to the SS Einsatzgruppen responsible for murdering Jews in the East) with a separate headquarters and communications section. A small part of the 8th Company that had comprised approximately twenty Spanish volunteers (formerly of the Azul’ (‘Blue’) Division fighting with the Axis forces in the East) was detached and formed ‘Einsatzgruppe Pyrenäen’, the cadre around which Streifkorps Biskaya would be built. Led by Leutnant Demetrio, they would continue operations against the Maquis along the Franco-Spanish border until the Allied invasion of southern France.

  In total, Kühlwein eventually established five separate Streifkorps and an independent Einsatzgruppe under the command of Army Group North:

  Streifkorps Südfrankreich (Hauptmann Träger).

  Two Einsatzgruppen.

  Streifkorps Biskaya.

  Einsatzgruppe Pyrenäen (Leutnant Demetrio).

  Streifkorps Nordfrankreich (Leutnant Hoven).

  Einsatzgruppe Bretagne (Leutnant Pawel).

  Einsatzgruppe Flandern.

  (Operations of all three French Streifkorps to be coordinated by the enigmatic Major Hollmann)

  Streifkorps Kroatien (Hauptmann Benesch).

  Streifkorps Karpaten (Oberleutnant Müller).

  Einsatzgruppe Slowakei (Leutnant Pawlofsky), one officer, four NCOs, sixteen men.

  Einsatzgruppe Rumänien/Siebenbürgen (Romania/Transylvania).

  Einsatzgruppe Baltikum (Oberleutnant Seuberlich), two officers, thirty-six men.

  Training Battalion (Major Auch).

  To muddy the organisational waters even more, the Abwehr’s FAK units were also designated Streifkorps, identical to covert Brandenburg units in all but their place in the hierarchical administrative tree. Kühlwein feared the instant absorption of his division into the Waffen SS as part of Skorzeny’s Jagderverbänd following the subordination of the Abwehr under the umbrella of the RSHA. Together with his Chief of Staff, Major Erasmus, he repeated his calls for the elements outside of the Streifkorps, Fallschirmjäger and Küstenjäger to be transformed into a standard Jäger division, or perhaps upgraded to that of a Panzergrenadier formation. On 17 August, another milestone passed in the division history; they were authorised to wear the newly issued ‘Brandenburg’ cuff title.

  While this reorganisation had been taking place, the division continued to suffer depletion against guerrilla forces in every theatre in which they were deployed. In Yugoslavia German casualties from disease were unusually high, chiefly typhoid, dysentery and malaria. So too were casualties inflicted by the physical exhaustion of long marches and movements over extremely inhospitable terrain. Conversely, Tito’s forces continued to grow in both numbers and military sophistication with the assistance of Allied commandos and liaison missions.

  Amongst the Brandenburg casualties of that time was Major Friedrich von Koenen, killed on 21 August 1944, 15km south-east of Višegrad, Bosnia. The man who had led the ‘Tropical Company’ with such success was ambushed in an open-top staff car by what appears to have been not a Partisan unit but a group of Yugoslavian bandits who opportunistically attacked him on a lonely stretch of road. Koenen’s battalion adjutant was also killed and Koenen’s wedding ring and Knight’s Cross stolen while a briefcase carrying valuable secret documents was left untouched. Another of the ‘old guard’, Hauptmann Kriegsheim, assumed command of the 3rd Battalion.

  On 17 August 1944 Tito offered an amnesty to all Axis collaborators, the Yugoslavian King in exile broadcasting a message in support from London calling upon all Serbs, Croats and Slovenes to join Tito’s ‘National Liberation Army’. The effect that this astute move had on Axis forces was profound as morale plummeted amongst the Chetniks and many took the opportunity to change sides and defect to the Partisan cause. In neighbouring Romania on 23 August, as the Red Army pierced the Moldavian front, King Michael I mounted a successful coup, deposing the Antonescu dictatorship and effectively taking Romania out of the Axis. Romanian authorities offered German forces an unobstructed withdrawal from their country. Hitler, however, was certain that he could repeat the success of Operation ‘Margarethe’ and reverse the coup, and regional Wehrmacht and Waffen SS troops were immediately placed on alert to obstruct Soviet advances and quell Romanian ‘unrest’. Amongst those troops, the Brandenburger Fallschirmjäger Battalion and elements of the 4th Regiment were made ready.

  The Brandenburgers were tasked with relieving German forces trapped in Bucharest and began landing at the German-held Otopeni airport which was being used as a Luftwaffe night fighter base. The first wave parachuted in and were soon joined by the remainder who were flown in aboard huge six-engine Messerschmitt Me 323 Gigant transport aircraft. Romanian forces, justifiably, saw this as a breach of the terms offered for a peaceful withdrawal and fighting began almost immediately, Soviet troops soon joining the battle and the German forces forced to retreat to the west under heavy pressure. In the northern Carpathian foothills, the 3rd Battalion of the 4th Regiment became involved in bitter fighting against the first wave of Red Army attacks, suffering heavy casualties and being pushed back into Hungarian territory.

  Meanwhile, the 2nd Regiment had remained in Prijepolje and conducted small-scale actions supported by Muslim militia against Tito’s Partisans. During July, it took part in the last large-scale anti-Partisan drive in central Yugoslavia, Operation ‘Rübezahl’. Once again subordinated to 1st Gebirgs Division, Pfeiffer’s troops acted in concert with the 7th SS Gebirgs Division and Hauptmann Weithoener’s newly established Brandenburg Fallschirmjäger Battalion, finally brought up to strength during March. Alongside other Wehrmacht units, ‘Rübezahl’ intended to seal off elements of the main Partisan main force on the plateau between the rivers Piva and Tara in Montenegro and prevent them from moving into south-western Serbia.

  However, due to the collapse of Army Group South Ukraine’s front in Romania, the operation was peremptorily called off and all constituent units sent to intercept Soviet forces approaching Serbia: the 2nd Regiment sent to Belgrade and Weithoener’s battalion to Budapest. All three Brandenburger Regiments suffered heavy losses in the defensive fighting in Belgrade, which came under direct Soviet attack during October. Oberstleutnant Walther was wounded on 13 October and sent back to Germany, his place taken by Oberst von Brückner, previously of the 23rd Panzer Division.14 Brückner later won the Knight’s Cross while in command of the regiment on 11 March 1945. The 2nd Battalion was heavily engaged in the battle and Hauptmann Wandrey wounded on 16 October and evacuated with Hauptmann Heine taking charge, Hauptmann John also being forced to relinquish his command of 1st Battalion two days later as his old abdominal wound had never properly healed and incapacitated him once more. As John returned to Germany, Oberleutnant Kohl took his place. Hauptmann Hans Gerlach’s 1st Battalion north of Belgrade took part in a spoiling thrust against Soviet troops west of the Morava River alongside the 1st Gebirg
s Division but were repulsed in fierce fighting against Soviet armoured units; Gerlach was killed and Oberleutnant Schonherr assumed command as the Brandenburgers retreated into the chaos of Belgrade. During the Kampfgruppe fighting that followed in the cauldron, South African Rittmeister Rudolf Louis Ferdinand Mertens, commander of the 3rd Regiment, was killed near Apatin on 22 November and Heine’s hard-pressed 2nd Battalion was virtually annihilated in the close-quarters street battles. As the city fell to Soviet troops on 20 October, the last twenty-four able-bodied men of the 2nd Battalion attempted to escape across the Sava River but only Heine and his runner survived.

  As the Soviet advance continued into the Balkans, Army Groups F and E had both mounted operations aimed at combatting guerrillas, but both had failed. In Yugoslavia, despite inflicting grievous casualties on Tito’s troops, ‘Rübezahl’ failed to achieve its objective as the main Partisan force extricated itself from the German noose, partially due to the removal of 1st Gebirgs Division to reinforce the worsening situation in Romania. The tenuous German hold on the Balkans was crumbling and before long the evacuation of Greece began as Soviet advances threatened to completely isolate the German troops of Army Group E who held the Greek mainland. By the time that this evacuation had begun, the Brandenburg Division underwent its final transformation.

  Repurposing the Brandenburg Division

  On 8 September, OKW delivered an order that conclusively relieved the Brandenburg Division of all specialist roles and incorporated it into the standard Wehrmacht order of battle, Generaloberst Alfred Jodl issuing a proclamation to the division’s troops dated 11 September, 1944:

  Soldiers of the Brandenburg Division!

  The division is being relieved of its duties as a special operations unit and reorganised as a motorised Jäger division. You are therefore leaving the area of my direct command.

  I thank you for the readiness for action and your willingness to sacrifice that you have demonstrated. The division has fulfilled all my expectations in infantry battles and in special operations. I recall the particularly successful strike against Tito’s leadership in May of this year in which the division was decisively involved, using powerful forces.

  Nevertheless, orders for your reorganisation as a Jäger division have been given, only so that all forces that have proved themselves in special operations might be employed en-masse under a unified command and therefore achieve new successes. The name Brandenburg is a commitment! I am certain that in its new form the division will do its duty and continue its glorious tradition.

  Heil to the Führer!

  The division was to be expanded and have artillery and engineer battalions attached, along with Sturmgeschütz and anti-tank units. Only the Küstenjäger and Fallschirmjäger were to remain outside of this new designation, continuing in independent roles, as they already had been, until the end of the war. The men of the Streifkorps units were presented with a different option: either they relinquished their specialist status or they could be absorbed into the Waffen SS as part of Skorzeny’s longed-for expansion of his commando forces.

  Where previously Skorzeny’s command had comprised only Jagdverbänd 502, the Brandenburg Streifkorps would form the nuclei around which territorial Jagdverbände would be created. Skorzeny was given authorisation to recruit 800 Brandenburg volunteers during September 1944. In fact, 1,200 volunteered, though only 900 were accepted, virtually the entire Streifkorps strength.

  Each Jagdverbänd was a separate battalion drawn from political and nationalist groups of the countries in which they would operate, much along the original lines that the Brandenburg Regiment had pursued. This was unsurprising as Hauptsturmführer von Fölkersam was instrumental in assisting Skorzeny with his expanded Jagdverbände creation along the lines of original plans dating back to June 1944. Each theatre of operations was to have a separate Jagdverbänd to carry out special operations and sabotage behind enemy lines. To avoid the mistakes that had been made with the Brandenburg Division, the SS Jagdverbände were to operate independent of each other and never go into action as a regimental or divisional unit.

  Existing Brandenburg Kampfschule (now the domain of the Streifkorps) were incorporated into Skorzeny’s command, with each separate Jagdverbänd having one or more schools allocated. The central headquarters hub (SS Jagdverbände Führungs Stab) was in Friedenthal. Its remit was to issue orders covering the principles of recruiting and training which it then submitted to agencies of the Reich for authorisation. Each separate Jagdverbänd would then assume control of implementing these actions. Likewise, the headquarters staff remained a central point of contact (generally through the SS Ic Obersturmbannführer Dr Graf) for military requests which were then disseminated to the relevant Jagdverbänd.

  The structure of Skorzeny’s organisation was as follows:

  Commander: Obersturmbannführer Skorzeny.

  Adjutant and Liaison Officer: Sturmbannführer Radl.

  Chief of Staff: Hauptsturmführer von Fölkersam (succeeded by Obersturmbannführer Walther in January 1945).

  Ia: Hauptsturmführer Hunke.

  Ib: Hauptsturmführer Gerhardt.

  Ic: Obersturmbannführer Dr Graf.

  (plus extensive headquarters departments and personnel).

  Jagdverbänd Ost: (Hauptsturmführer von Fölkersam) approximately 300 men including Germans, Russians, Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians and Poles.

  Three separate subordinate units, one commanded by Sturmbannführer Auch, another by Untersturmführer Riedel, plus Jägd Einsatz Baltikum (Sturmbannführer Dr Pechau).

  Jagdverbänd Südost: (Obersturmbannführer Benesch) approximately 800 men of Streifkorps Kroatien, Streifkorps Slowakei, Streifkorps Rumänien and miscellaneous Brandenburg personnel.

  Subordinate units include Jägd Einsatz Slowakei (Untersturmführer Pawlofsky), Jägd Einsatz Ungarn (Hauptsturmführer Kirchner) and Jägd Einsatz Rumänien (Haupsturmführer Müller).

  Jagdverbänd Südwest: (Hauptsturmführer Gerlach, formerly commander of Brandenburg Kampfschule ‘Döberitz’) approximately 130 men including Streifkorps Süd Frankreich, Streifkorps Nord Frankreich, Streifkorps Italien, Kampschule Freiburg and miscellaneous Brandenburg personnel. Subordinate units included Jägd Einsatz Italien of approximately 120 Germans and 40 Italians.

  Jagdverbänd Nordwest: (Hauptsturmführer Hover) no Brandenburg personnel.Subordinate units include Jägd Einsatz Flandern (Untersturmführer Bachot).

  Jagdverbänd Mitte: predominantly made up of Jagderverbänd 502 ‘Friedenthal’ personnel.

  Fallschirmjäger Battalion 600: (Hauptsturmführer Milius) originally an SS penal unit (designated by the number 500 as all units numbered in the 500 range were penal units). After the ‘Rösselsprung’ raid the criminal element was removed and the battalion passed into Skorzeny’s command by Hitler’s order during August 1944.

  There were several operations mounted by the ex-Brandenburgers in the SS Jagdverbände, but they are outside the scope of this book, requiring their own separate treatment. Suffice to say that amongst the familiar names that became casualties during the final months of the war was Adrian Baron von Fölkersam, listed as killed in action after being shot in the head by Soviet troops at Hohensalza, West Prussia.15

  Interestingly, Otto Skorzeny’s reputation – which persists to this day, in no small part due to his own writings and interviews before his death in Spain in 1975 – appears to have been wildly exaggerated. While he certainly possessed bravery and charisma in equal measure, his immediate subordinate Sturmbannführer Karl Radl later observed to American interrogators that his ‘frequent absence from his Headquarters on active operations’ caused him to lose touch with administrative details. He therefore did not realise the wide gulf that existed between his plans and their execution.

  In addition, his gullibility and enthusiasm led him to believe every dressed-up report submitted by his ambitious inferiors. Skorzeny’s leadership was inadequate according to Radl. After the successful Mussolini rescue, Hitler
and Himmler used him for all sorts of special missions at the expense of the agencies he was supposed to be organising. This scattering of his interests became absolute early in 1944 when he became chief exponent of the Sonderkampf (miracle weapons) idea … Radl is more accurate than Skorzeny on detailed information. In his opinion, Skorzeny’s sabotage services were bound to fail.16

  The Brandenburg Division that has been the focus of this history, from this point on, no longer existed. For the shattered remnants of those units caught in the battles against Tito and the Red Army there was some time to rest and regroup once they had been withdrawn from the line that was finally established by the end of 1944. In southern France, the Allies had come ashore in Operation ‘Dragoon’ on 15 August and Demetrio’s Einsatzgruppe Pyrenäen retreated northward, Demetrio himself being captured by American troops on 10 September at Autun in Bourgogne as he attempted to reach German lines. Elements of Oberstleutnant F. Jacobi’s 3rd Regiment formed part of the German ‘Armee Ligurien’, attached to the LXXXVIII Army Corps that mounted a fighting retreat to the north.

  The division was officially reorganised as the Panzergrenadier Division ‘Brandenburg’, Generalleutnant Kühlwein departing as commander on 16 October 1944. His replacement was Generalmajor Hermann Schulte-Heuthaus who remained at this post until the war’s end. The order of battle at the Panzergrenadier Division’s inception in October 1944 was:

  Jäger Regiment 1 ‘Brandenburg’ (Oberst Erich von Brückner).

  Jäger Regiment 2 ‘Brandenburg’ (Oberstleutnant Karl-Heinz Oesterwitz).

  Panzerjäger-Abteilung ‘Brandenburg’ (Hauptmann Königstein).

  Nachrichten Abteilung ‘Brandenburg’ (Major Bansen).

  Feld Ersatz-Bataillon ‘Brandenburg’ (Hauptmann von Einem-Josten).