German Units
Luftwaffe preparations for the Ardennes Offensive
The situation for the Luftwaffe was not encouraging. Fuel was the main concern within the Luftwaffe with aircraft availability a close second. The general policy was one of a concerted effort to conserve fuel and assets. This resulted in a stockage of reserve fuel and ammunition as well as an increase in serviceable aircraft. The past few months of near…
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The First Secret Missions over Great Britain
In the mid-1930s, the German high command was dominated by the view that the main threat to the formation and expansion of the ‘Thousand-Year Reich’ was France. Furthermore, Hitler considered Britain a potential ally. However, the ubiquitous Abwehr stretched its secret tentacles in the direction of England. In 1936, the…
SS PARATROOPERS
SS PARATROOPS 1: SS-Jäger, SS-Fallschirmjäger Bataillon 500; Bucharest, October 1944 Parading after the successful Operation Panzerfaust, this man is identifiable only by his Waffen-SS belt buckle. He wears the Luftwaffe paratroop helmet without insignia; the Luftwaffe second-type jump smock in splinter camouflage pattern, again without insignia; field-grey jump trousers, and…
RÖSSELPRUNG
After 1941, the Balkans provided a much-required supply of natural resources for the Reich. One source, citing post-war reports from the Nuremberg trials, stated the Balkans provided “50% of petroleum, 100% of chrome, 60% of bauxite and 21% of Copper” for the German war machine. To protect both this vital…
Kesselring and Rotterdam
The Führer’s pronounced intention to invade the West as soon as Poland had been taken might well have led to an offensive in November had not a combination of internal Wehrmacht politics and bad weather conspired to prevent it. Both the air force and tank force experts, upon whom all…
German-Japanese Diversion Cancelled
In some of Great Britain’s Asian colonies, especially in the part of British India that would become Pakistan, the outbreak of the Second World War was received with enthusiasm. As in many other colonial possessions, the local population hoped for liberation from the colonial yoke. The most warlike mountaineers waged…
The K-Verbände in Scandinavia
While real enemies assailed German-held Europe from east, west and south, Hitler remained obsessed with the phantom threat to the Scandinavian sector of his Thousand-Year Reich throughout the course of the Second World War. The conquest of Norway and Denmark had secured the Reich’s northern flank and, of more immediate…