JohnnyFishfinger wrote:Rhah wrote:Reading a good one right now. Brandenburg Division by Eric Lefevre. So far a good read on the German Brandenburg commando unit in WW2. Specially trained as infiltrators. They worked at first under the Abwehr, recruited from expat Germans. Cool so far.
"Spoiler Alert"
didn't they all get executed when they dressed up as Americans during the Arden offensive?
No that wasn't the Brandenberg unit although you do hearincorrect reference to them. The unit you are thinking of is Otto Skozeny's Special Brigade 150. They were formed from volunteers from all services brought together in October 1944 "English speakers for a special mission". They were to manoeuvre ahead of the german troops using captured vehicles to capture strategic points and cause disruption
There were about 3000 men, a lot who had exaggerated their language abilities to get a cushy role. But about three hundred were gathered into what was called the Stielau unit. They were the troops that would be in small units in jeeps disrupting and misdirecting American units, while the bulk of Brigade 150 would fight in a more conventional role but using captured US and disguised german tanks to get an edge.
Of the Stielau unit, 44 men in three and four man units actually carried out the subversion you are talking about and only eight of the 44 were capturd or killed. At least four of them were executed by firing squad. Undoubtedly others of the bigger part of Brigde 150 were probably executed officially or summarily for their wearing of enemy uniform and there were many case of German soldiers killed wearing partial American kit captured and utilised purely because it was better than their own. Of course as well as the disruption they caused the stielau unit caused panic far beyond what they had actually carried out and many a German soldier wearing a US great coat** became classed as a saboteur and some paid the price....But hey, thats what you get !
** You may recall stills and footage of Kampf gruppe Hansen, popularly used in books and documentaries showing soldiers passing burning US vehicles. One carries a M1 Carbine and all are wearing US Raincoats,overcoats and capes over there still obvious German uniform.
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