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| Obermullah Waffen-Hauptsturmführer der SS Nureddin Namangani |
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| Volksdeutsche of 7.SS-Freiwilligen-Gebirgs-Division Prinz Eugen |
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| Bosnian Muslims of Kroatische SS-Freiwilligen-Gebirgs-Division |
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| Bosnian Muslims of 13.Waffen-Gebirgs-Division der SS Handschar |
Following the Balkan campaign many Slavic units were set up under direct control of SS to restore order in occupied Yugoslavia. These units marked the expansion of the SS into a multi-ethnic military force. The new formations were made up of Albanians, Bosnian Muslims, Croats and Serbs with mostly Volksdeutsche (ethnic German) officers from Romania and Serbia. The Balkan SS formations were involved in internal security operations and anti-partisan warfare during the war. Poorly equipped and poorly trained their performance was of minor military value and the formations were heavily involved in war crimes and atrocities. Murder, rape and mass executions were all too common in Yugoslavia during World War II. The resistance groups divided into two main movements - the Yugoslav royalist and Serbian nationalist Chetniks and the Communist Partisans. Also operating in the Balkan was the Russisches Schutzkorps Serbien composed of anti-communist White Russian émigrés who plundered peasants in the areas within which they operated, and the 1.Kosaken-Kavallerie-Division composed of eastern Cossacks who committed a number of atrocities against the civilian population including several mass rapes and routine summary executions. Other divisions designated to the Balkans as anti-partisan mountain divisions were the Volksdeutsche division SS-Freiwilligen-Division Prinz Eugen, redesignated as the 7.SS-Freiwilligen-Gebirgs-Division Prinz Eugen in Oct. 1943, and the Kroatische SS-Freiwilligen-Gebirgs-Division, redesignated as the 13.Waffen-Gebirgs-Division der SS Handschar in May 1944. Prinz Eugen was made up of Volksdeutsche from Croatia, Serbia, Hungary and Romania, and famed for its cruelty and accused of a number of war crimes in their anti-partisan operations. The Handschar was composed of Bosnian Muslims or ethnic Bosniaks. It earned a reputation for brutality and savagery, not only during combat operations, but also through atrocities committed against Serb and Jewish civilians. Top clip: members of the SS could be of any religion except Judaism. This clip shows the Uzbek Imam Waffen-Hauptsturmführer der SS Nureddin Namangani leading a prayer with Central Asian and Caucasian Muslim SS volunteers. Fair use. Second image: according to some accounts, a photo of an SS-Untersturmführer of SS-Gebirgsjäger-Regiment 14 of the 7.SS-Freiwilligen-Gebirgs-Division Prinz Eugen in Montenegro or Serbia in 1944 by Austrian explorer and photographer Ernst A. Zwilling. Credit: Karl Mensburg. Commons: Bundesarchiv. Third image: ethnic Bosniaks of the Kroatische SS-Freiwilligen-Gebirgs-Division in 1943. Being non-Germanic, its members were not entitled to wear the SS runes collar patch. Headgear was the SS M43 fez: a field gray model to be worn in combat and a red model while off duty. Credit: Richard White. Fair use. Bottom image: ethnic Bosniaks of the 13.Waffen-Gebirgs-Division der SS Handschar in the Balkan Mountains of Bosnia in 1944. Credit: Julius Backman Jääskeläinen. Fair use.
As early as 1941, the Wehrmacht distributed the military handbook "Islam" to train its soldiers to behave correctly towards Muslim populations. On the eastern Front, the Nazi occupiers ordered the rebuilding of mosques, prayer halls, and madrasas — previously destroyed by Moscow — and the re-establishment of religious rituals and celebrations. It was clear to every German officer that Muslims were to be treated as allies against the Soviet Bolsheviks.
ReplyDeleteWriters on the subject should not lump all Waffen-SS Divisions together as if they were the same. The Balkans and Eastern Europeans in the SS such as Albanians, Bosniaks, Cossacks and Russians were nothing but butchers, with a few exceptions. They had very little in common with the so-called Germanic Waffen-SS Divisions.
ReplyDeleteFully agree on the above comment, the only common ground between a Waffen-SS soldier, let's say from the Benelux or Scandinavia with one from the Balkans or the USSR was their hatred of Russian imperialism and communism. They were not comparable in terms of military resources, fighting quality, or for that matter in moral standing or values. One just has to look at their respective combat records and behaviors that they displayed, both on and behind the frontlines.
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