Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy

During World War II Nazi Germany occupied all or parts of the following non-tripartite countries: Poland, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, Belgium, Netherlands, France, Yugoslavia, Greece, Soviet Union, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Egypt and Italy. The term of "Collaboration" was coined by Marshall Philippe Pétain, who proclaimed the Vichy regime in July 1940 and actively supported Collaborationism with Germany. Collaboration ranged from urging the civilian population to remain calm and accept occupation by German forces, organizing trade, production, financial and economic support, actively recruiting members for various branches of the German armed forces, officially joining the Axis powers after having been invaded, to declaring war on the Allies and actively waging war against the Allies with national armed forces.

Reasons for collaboration

There were various reasons for collaboration with the Nazi authorities: fear for one's life; believing that the Nazis would win the war and thus it would be better to be on the winning side; attempting to avoid conflict with the powerful Nazi occupational forces (such as in Denmark); seeking short-term goals, such as a better-paid job with higher privileges; ability to legally take revenge against former personal enemies; and pure Nazism and antisemitism. Hatred of Stalinism, and disgust of over twenty years of the Soviet system, contributed greatly to this collaboration, especially in Russia and Ukraine. The Nazis failed to capitalize on this sentiment, and slowly much of this anti-Soviet sentiment reversed itself and cooperation with the Nazis in the east began to diminish. The "anti-Bolshevik" forces changed sides again, and thought it would be better to be on the other winning side, or in short, their earlier "opportunism", reversed itself.

Apart from these rather 'negative' reasons, cooperation with the National-Socialist regimes lay also in the prospect of a strong European nation. Although present day historians and those opposed to Nazism (as Nazism is generally seen as evil today) will often claim cooperation was only because of self-interest or hatred towards others, Europe united under a strong Fascist/Nazi regime appealed to a considerable number of people. Foreign Waffen SS units were often motivated by this thought. In order to keep an objective view, it should thus be noted that a Nazi Europe also had positive prospects for a lot of people. Allied (counter-)propaganda and the condemnation of collaborators have largely downplayed this view of a united Europe, which would have seriously weakened both the US and Soviet position in the world. The modern-day attempt at a united Europe is the European Union.

Apart from active forms of collaboration, there was also a 'passive collaboration', where people just went on with life, but were necessarily influenced by the new Fascist government.

Requirements for collaboration

The Nazis did not consider everyone equally fit for cooperation. Even people from closely related nations were often valued differently. For example, the Scandinavians and Northern Europeans were considered to be better than Lithuanians due to the supposed Lithuanian intermixing with Slavs at the past. Slavs were considered to be even worse.

The Jews were considered to be worst of all and thus unfit for cooperation, although some were used in concentration camps as Kapos to report on other prisoners and enforce order. Others governed ghettos and helped organize deportations to extermination camps (judische Polizei).

Partial list of collaborationist organizations

Albania

In April 1943 Reichsfuhrer-SS Heinrich Himmler created 21st Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Skanderbeg (1st Albanian) manned by Albanian volunteers and Kosovar Albanians. From August 1944, the division participated in operations against Yugoslav partisans and local Serbs. The discipline in the division was poor and in the beginning of 1945 it was disbanded. The emblem of the division was a black Albanian eagle.

Belarus

Belorussian collaborators participated in various massacres of Belorussian villagers. Many of these collaborators retreated with German forces in the wake of the Red Army advance, and in January 1945, formed the 30th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Belorussian).

Belgium

373rd infantry battalion of Wehrmacht, manned by Belgians, took part in anti-guerrilla actions on an occupied territory of the USSR since August 1941 till February 1942. In May 1943 the battalion has been transformed into 5th SS Volunteer Sturmbrigade Wallonien and sent to the Eastern Front. In the autumn the brigade has been transformed into 28th SS Volunteer Grenadier Division Wallonien; its remains surrendered to British troops in the final days of war.

Bosnia

The 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS (also known as the 1st Croatian or Handschar division), manned by Bosniaks and Croats, but commanded by German officers, has been created in February 1943. The division participated in anti-guerrilla operations in Yugoslavia. By 1944, most of the division defected to the Yugoslav partisans.

Central Asia

The Turkestan legion was the general name for the units of Central Asian exiles and POWs who fought on the side of Germany during the war. Estimates of the total number of Central Asians who fought under the Nazis number in the hundreds of thousands.

Croatia

Main article: Independent State of Croatia

Ante Pavelić's Croatian puppet state was an ally of Nazi Germany. The Croatian nationalists, Ustashe, killed at least tens of thousands of Serbs and other victims in the Jasenovac concentration camp.

The 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Handschar (1st Croatian), created in February 1943, and the 23rd Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Kama, created in January 1944, were manned by Croats and Bosniaks as well as a local Germans. Both divisions operated against partisans and were responsible for a number of atrocities against civilians. .

Denmark

Main article: Occupation of Denmark

The occupied Danish government cooperated reluctantly with the Nazi regime by various means, first and foremost by calming the civilian population after the surrender and discouraging resistance against the occupation. However, this was seen as the only realistic course to preserve peace and maintain a functioning economy in Denmark (trade with the Allies had been cut off), by avoiding any conflict with the occupying forces, as Denmark was obviously no match for the German military. The government also cooperated in passing information regarding Danish communists to the Germans.

However, the government did not allow the Germans to interfere in the Danish politics to the extent that they did in other countries (for instance Denmark refused to allow identification of Jewish people). The Danish people and most individual politicians, including the prime minister and King Christian X, were hostile towards their captors, and the Danish resistance became very strong, including a very successful effort to save the Danish Jews.

Estonia

Main article: Estonian Self-Administration

1941 the Eesti Omakaitse (Estonian Self-Defence) took part in the round-up of hundreds of suspected communist sympathizers and Jews (and possibly in their killing) According to Soviet estimates, in Tartu the Eesti Omakaitse shot about 9,000 Soviet POWs.

The all-volunteer Estnische SS-Legion was created in 1942. The unit was expanded into a divison in 1944 by illegal conscription and designated the 20th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Estonian), finished its way in May 1945 in Czechoslovakia. The Nuremburg Trials ruled that conscripts to the Waffen SS were exempted from the judgement that applied to the Waffen SS . The division's soldiers carried stripes with the Estonian national colors and images of three lions.

Estonian auxiliary police participated in the extermination of the Jews in Estonia and Pskov region of Russia and provided guards for concentration camps for Jews and Soviet POWs (Jägala, Vaivara, Klooga, Lagedi), in all of which prisoners were killed. The 36th Estonian Police Battalion took part in mass shooting of Jews in a Byelorussian town of Novogrudki on 7 August, 1942. The 37th, 38th, 40th, 286th, 288th Estonian battalions operated against the partisans in the Pskov, Luga, Gdov regions of Russia and Belarus. The 658th battalion participated in punitive operations against civilians near the town of Kingisepp and the village of Kerstovo (the Leningrad region) and burnt down the villages Babino, Habalovo, Cigirinka, etc.

See also: Estonian war crimes trials

France

Main article: Vichy France

The Vichy government, headed by Marshall Philippe Pétain and Pierre Laval, actively collaborated in the extermination of the European Jews. It also participated in Porrajmos, the extermination of Rom people, and in the extermination of other "undesirables." Vichy opened up a series of concentration camps in France where it interned Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, political opponents, etc. Directed by René Bousquet, the French police helped in the deportation of 76,000 Jews to the extermination camps. In 1995 President Jacques Chirac officially recognized the responsibility of the French state for the deportation of Jews during the war, in particular during the July 1942 Vel'd'hiv raid, during which Laval decided, by his own, to deport children along with their parents. Only 2,500 of the deported Jews survived the war. The 1943 Battle of Marseille was another event during which the French police assisted the Gestapo in a massive raid, which included an urban reshaping plan involving the destruction of a whole neighborhood in the popular Old Port. Some few collaborators were judged in the 1980s for crimes against humanity (Paul Touvier, etc.), while Maurice Papon, who had became after the war prefect of police of Paris (a function in which he illustrated himself during the 1961 Paris massacre) was convicted in 1998 for crimes against humanity. He had been Budget Minister under President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. Other collaborators, such as Emile Dewoitine, managed to have important functions after the war (Dewoitine was eventually named head of Aérospatiale, the firm which created the Concorde plane). Debates concerning state collaboration remain, in 2007, very strong in France.

The French volunteers to the SS formed the 33rd Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS Charlemagne (1st French), which in 1945 was among the final defenders of Berlin.

Greece

After the German invasion of Greece, a Nazi-held puppet government was established in Athens. The three quisling prime ministers (Georgios Tsolakoglou, Konstantinos Logothetopoulos and Ioannis Rallis) cooperated with the Axis authorities. Besides, Greek National-Socialist parties (such as the Greek National Socialist Party) or anti-semitic organisations (such as the National Union of Greece) helped German authorities fight the Resistance and identify and deport Greek Jews. Moreover, special armed collaborationist forces (such as the Security Battalions) were created to aid the collaborationist regime.

About 1,000 Greeks from Greece and thousands of Greeks from the Soviet Union, avenging their prosecution from Soviet authorities, joined the Waffen-SS, especially in Ukrainian divisions. A special case is that of the infamous Sevastianos Foulidis, a Greek who was an official of the Wehrmacht as well as an effective spy at the Abwehr.

Hungary

Hungary was a war ally and then puppet state of Nazi Germany. The Hungarians played an active role in the murder of about 23,600 Jews (14,000-18,000 of whom were from Hungary) in Kamenets-Podolsk in the late August of 1941. Radical Hungarian governments — mainly the puppet government of Döme Sztójay, appointed after the German occupation — actively participated in the Holocaust.

The Arrow Cross Party was a Hungarian Nazi party led by Ferenc Szálasi which ruled Hungary from October 15, 1944 to January 1945 following the German SS coup in Budapest. During its short rule, 80,000 Jews were deported from Hungary to their deaths. Out of 825,000 Hungarian Jews before the war, only 260,000 survived.

Italy

Main article: Italian Social Republic

Latvia

Having occupied Latvia in summer 1941, German command has created the local voluntary troops (Schutzmannschaft or Schuma), to struggle against the Soviet partisans and serve as guards in concentration camps for Jews and Soviet prisoners of war[1]. The group of the Latvian auxiliary police known as Arajs Commando murdered about 26,000 Jews, mainly in November and December 1941.

On October 16, 1941, 16th Latvian battalion under the command of Karlis Mangulis was sent to the Eastern front. At the end of December 1941, 17th Latvian Vidzeme battalion was sent to Belarus. On January 13, 1942, 18th Kurzeme battalion started service in Ukraine. On March 30, Liepaja battalion has been attached to 21st to group of German armies "North", sieged Leningrad. In May 1942, two more Latvian battalions were sent to Ukraine, one to Belarus and one to Leningrad region .

In 1942-1944, Latvian auxiliary police together with Lithuanian and Ukrainian Schuma-battalions participated in large punitive operations in Leningrad, Novgorod, Pskov and Vitebsk regions[2]. In February - March 1943 eight Latvian Schuma-battalions took part in anti-partisan operation "Winterzauber" in triangle Sebezh - Osveya - Polotsk in Belarus and in Pskov region (Russia). During this operation 158 settlements have been plundered and burnt down. The inhabitants of 8 villages were massacred (Gerlach, C. "Kalkulierte Morde", Hamburger Edition, Hamburg, 1999).

The Latvian Volunteer SS Division (Lettische SS-Freiwilligen-Division), manned by 32,000 volunteers, was created in February 1943. The division was headed by Latvian Minister of Defence Rudolf Bangerskis. In October 1943, the Division was split up into two parts, which would ultimately come to be called the 15th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Latvian) and the 19th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (2nd Latvian).

In November 1943, the 1st Latvian division fought Soviet troops near Novosokolniki (Russia). This division finished its path in April 1945, in Germany, having surrendered to the British (Williamson, G. "The SS: Hitler's Instrument of Terror", Brown Packaging Limited, 1994). The 2nd Latvian division fought on the Leningrad front.

Lithuania

Prior to the Nazi invasion, some people in Lithuania believed Germany would grant the country independence. Nazi Germany used this situation to its advantage and indeed in the first days permitted a Lithuanian government to be established. However, when the territory was fully occupied, that government was disbanded and banned, and some of its supporters ended their days in concentration camps. An unit of Lithuanian insurgents headed by Algirdas Klimaitis and instigated by Germans started anti-Jewish pogroms in Kaunas on June 26, 1941.

In 1941 Lithuanian Security Police (Lietuvos saugumo policija), subordinate to Nazi Germany's Security Police and Nazi Germany's Criminal Police, was created. Of the 26 local police battalions formed, 10 were involved in the Holocaust (2 of them systematically). In total, Germans involved 2,000-3,000 Lithuanians in the Holocaust. The notorious Lithuanian Sonderkommando Squad in Vilnius killed tens of thousands Jews and others in Paneriai and other places. 2nd Lithuanian battalion has been organized in 1941 in Kaunas. On October 6, 1941, the battalion started service in Belarus (Minsk, Borisov and Slutsk regions) to fight against the Soviet partisans. In Minsk, the battalion shot about 9.000 Soviet prisoners of war, in Slutsk, it massacred 5.000 Jews. In March 1942, in Poland, the 2nd Lithuanian battalion carried out guard duty in the Majdanek concentration camp. [3] In July 1942, 2nd Lithuanian battalion participated in deportation of Jews from the Warsaw ghetto to a death camp[4]. In August - October 1942, the Lithuanian battalions were in Ukraine: 3rd in Molodechno, 4th in Donetsk, 7th-в in Vinnitsa, 11th in Korosten, 16th in Dnepropetrovsk, 254th in Poltava, and 255th in Mogilyov (Belarus)[5]. In February - March 1943 2nd Lithuanian battalion participated the large antiguerrilla action "Winterzauber" (Winter magic) in Belarus, cooperating with several Latvian and 50-th Ukrainian Schuma-battalions. Schuma-battalions burned down villages suspected in supporting Soviet partisans. [6] 3rd Lithuanian battalion took part in the "Marsh fever Southwest" antiguerrilla operation, carried out in Baranovich, Berezov, Ivatsevich, Slonim and Ljahovich regions of Belarus in cooperation with the 24th Latvian battalion (Chuev S. "Damned soldiers"). In 1942–1944 the 13th and 256th Lithuanian battalions operated against partisans in Pskov and Novgorod regions of Russia. [7]

The Lithuanian Territorial Defense Force was formed from volunteers in 1944. Its whole leadership was Lithuanian, while arms were provided by Germans. Purpose of Lithuanian Territorial Defense Force was to fight Soviets and Polish partisans in territory of Lithuania. After brief engagements against Soviet and Polish partisans, due to the disagreements with Nazi administration, the force was disbanded the same year, its leaders arrested, and some of its members executed by the Nazis.

Netherlands

Thousands of Dutch volunteers were soldiers of the 11th SS Volunteer Panzergrenadier Division Nordland (created in February 1943). The division participated in fights against Soviet army and was crushed in the Berlin battle in April-May 1945.

SS-Freiwilligen Legion Niederlande, manned by Dutch volunteers, battled against the Soviet army beginning in 1941. In December 1944 it was transformed into the 23rd SS Volunteer Panzergrenadier Division Nederland, and participated in fights in Courland and Pomerania.

Norway

In Norway, the Vidkun Quisling government was installed by the Germans as a puppet regime, while the true Norwegian government was in exile. Quisling encouraged Norwegians to serve as volunteers in the Waffen SS, collaborating in the deportation of Jews, and was responsible for the executions of Norwegian patriots.

In spite of this, the vast majority of Norwegians hated the Nazis, and many contributed to the resistance, including the rescue of Jews and others. However, about 45,000 Norwegian collaborators had joined the Norwegian fascist party, and some police units helped arrest many of Norway's Jews. After the war, Quisling and other collaborators were executed. Quisling's name has become an international eponym for traitor.

Palestinian Islamists

A Palestinian Arab nationalist and a Muslim religious leader and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Mohammad Amin al-Husayni worked for the Nazi Germany as a propagandist and a recruiter of Muslim volunteers for the Waffen SS and other units.

On November 28 1941, Hitler officially received al-Husayni in Berlin. Hitler made a declaration that after "...the last traces of the Jewish-Communist European hegemony had been obliterated... the German army would... gain the southern exit of Caucasus... the Führer would offer the Arab world his personal assurance that the hour of liberation had struck. Thereafter, Germany's only remaining objective in the region would be limited to the Vernichtung des... Judentums ['destruction of the Jewish element', sometimes taken to be a euphemism for 'annihilation of the Jews'] living under British protection in Arab lands.."

The Mufti spent the remainder of the war assisting with the formation of Muslim Waffen SS units in the Balkans and the formation of schools and training centers for imams and mullahs who would accompany the Muslim SS and Wehrmacht units. Beginning in 1943, al-Husayni was involved in the organization and recruitment of Bosnian Muslims into several divisions. The largest of which was the 13th "Handschar" division of 21,065 men.

In 1944, al-Husayni sponsored an unsuccessful chemical warfare assault on the Jewish community in Palestine. Five parachutists were supplied with maps of Tel Aviv, canisters of a German–manufactured "fine white powder," and instructions from the Mufti to dump chemicals into the Tel Aviv water system. District police commander Fayiz Bey Idrissi later recalled, "The laboratory report stated that each container held enough poison to kill 25,000 people, and there were at least ten containers."

Poland

The 1939 Nazi edict ordered all the Polish policemen to work for the German occupational authorities. The Blue Police (German: Polnische Polizei, Polish: Granatowa policja) auxiliaries patrolled the streets and searched for Jews (in most instances very reluctantly) ; they were also used in the suppression of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. From 1942 on they were employed in anti-partisan activities in Poland and the Ukraine. However, many of them were in fact a double agents for the Polish Resistance.

In 1944 Germans clandestinely armed a few regional Armia Krajowa (AK) units operating in Lithuania in order to encourage them to act against the Soviet partisans in the region; in Novgorod district and to a lesser degree in Vilnius district. Some partisan units even openly collaborated with the Germans to avoid Russian units and move to the Western Allies (see the story of the Holy Cross Mountain Brigade).

Romania

Romania became a puppet state of the Nazi Germany and thus it is sometimes considered that those who cooperated with the Romanian government during World War II were Nazi collaborators.

A report released in 2004 by a panel commissioned by the Romanian government assessed that a total of between 280,000 and 380,000 Jews were murdered or perished in Romania as a direct result of the policies or actions of the World War II Romanian regime led by Ion Antonescu. Approximately 200,000 Jews were killed in the Odessa region, often called Transnistria (occupied from the USSR) at the end of 1941 and during 1942 by the Romanian Army and the Einsatzgruppe D. The District Commissioner Col. Modest Isopesco and the German advisor to the Romanian administration Fleisher took decision to murder all the inmates at the Bogdanovka extermination camp after several cases of typhus were discovered in the camp. Romanian soldiers and gendarmes, together with Ukrainian police and civilians, and local ethnic Germans under the commander of the Ukrainian regular police, Kazachievici, participated in the massacres.

Additionally, 25,000 Roma were sent to concentration camps, of which an estimated 11,000 died. The Romanian government had a program of deportation of the Romanian Jews to camps in Transnistria, implemented especially in the Moldavia region. However, this was terminated in 1943, 16 months before Romania ended its alliance with Nazi Germany and 340,000 Romanian Jews survived the war.

Russia

Cooperation with Nazis existed in various places in Russia. There existed several divisions manned by Russian collaborators, including the notorious 29th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Russian), infamous because of its atrocities in Belarus and Poland, and the 30th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (2nd Russian).

Pro-German Russian forces also included the anti-communist Russian Liberation Army (POA, Russian: Русская Освободительная Армия). In March 1945, however, POA turned against the SS and fought on the side of Czech insurgents during the Prague Uprising.

Serbia

Main article: Nedić's Serbia

Serbia was set up as a Nazi puppet state under Serbian army general Milan Nedić. The internal affairs of the Serbian puppet state were moderated by German racial laws, that were introduced in all occupied teritories with immediate effects on Jews, Roma people, as well as imprisonment of left oriented persons. The two major concentration camps in Serbia were: Sajmište and Banjica. Under Nedić, Belgrade was declared to be Judenfrei in 1942.

Slovakia

Main article: Slovak Republic (1939-1945)

Ukraine

Main article: Ukrainian-German collaboration during World War II

In Ukraine, many local men enlisted into the German auxiliary police. Large numbers of Ukrainians actively participated in the genocide on the Jewish population. The Ukrainian auxiliary police participated in the Babi Yar massacre and in other Ukrainian cities and towns, such as Lviv, Lutsk, and Zhitomir. On September 1, 1941, Ukrainian newspaper controlled Volhyn wrote "The element that settled our cities (Jews)... must disappear completely from our cities. The Jewish problem is already in the process of being solved." There is evidence that Ukrainian forces participated in crushing the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943 and also later the Warsaw Uprising of 1944.

By April 28, 1943 German Command created the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS Galizien (1st Ukrainian) manned by 14,000 volunteers. There are many proven and documented incidents of atrocities and massacres committed by the SS Galizien against minorities, particularly Jews during the course of WW2 In May 2006, a Ukrainian newspaper Ukraine Christian News commented: "Carrying out the massacre was the Einsatzgruppe C, supported by members of a Waffen-SS battalion and units of the Ukrainian auxiliary police, under the general command of Friedrich Jeckeln. The participation of Ukrainian collaborators in these events, now documented and proven, is a matter of painful public debate in Ukraine."

Tripartite Pact

In the European theatre several countries signed or adhered to the Tripartite Pact particularly in Eastern Europe and Balkan.

• Slovakia entered into a treaty of protection with Germany on March 23, 1939.
• Albania joined Italy in "personal union" on April 7, 1939.
• Hungary signed the Tripartite Pact on November 20, 1940
• Bulgaria signed the Tripartite Pact on November 1, 1940.
• Romania signed the Tripartite Pact on November 23, 1940.
• Yugoslavia signed the Tripartite Pact on March 25, 1941, but suffered coup d'état as a consequence, and therefore cannot be considered as part of the Pact.

The tripartite signatories can best be described as a whole as the "Axis Powers" which in a sense was a collaborationist effort or alliance much like the Allies. Collaboration within the Axis alliance is detailed in Axis Powers, this article will deal mostly with significant collaboration by governments or civilians in occupied territories.

Material support

Material support was the direct government sanctioned involvement in the war effort in support of the Axis powers politically, economically and materially.

The most significant support of Germany came from the European tripartite signatories of the Balkans. Albania declared war on the Allies along with the Kingdom of Italy in 1940 and later that year Slovakia declared war on Great Britain and the United States. Bulgarian, Slovakian, Albanian and Hungarian national units and armies fought with the German forces against the Soviet Union on the eastern front throughout the war.

However, significant support was also given by many countries initially at war with Germany but which subsequently elected to adopt a policy of co-operation.

The Vichy government in France is one of the best known and most significant examples of collaboration between former enemies of Germany and Germany itself. When the French Vichy government emerged at the same time of the Free French in London there was much confusion regarding the loyalty of French overseas colonies and more importantly their overseas armies and naval fleet. The reluctance of Vichy France to either disarm or surrender their naval fleet resulted in the British destruction of the French Fleet at Mers-el-Kebir on 3 July 1940. Later in the war French colonies were frequently used as staging areas for invasions or airbases for the Axis powers both in Indo China and Syria. This resulted in the invasion of Syria and Lebanon with the capture of Damascus on June 17 and later the Battle of Madagascar against Vichy French forces which lasted for 7 months until November the same year.

Many other countries cooperated to some extend and in much different ways. Denmark's government cooperated with the German occupiers until 1943 and actively helped recruit members for the Nordland and Wiking Waffen SS divisions and helped organize trade and sale of industrial and agricultural products to Germany. In Greece, the three quisling prime ministers (Georgios Tsolakoglou, Konstantinos Logothetopoulos and Ioannis Rallis) cooperated with the Axis authorities. Agricultural products (especially tobacco) were sent to Germany, Greek "volunteers" were sent to to work to German factories, and special armed forces (such as the Security Battalions were created to fight along German soldiers against the Allies and the Resistance movement. In Norway the government successfully managed to escape to London but Vidkun Quisling established a puppet regime in its absence - albeit with little support from the local population.

Volunteers

Volunteers joined the Wehrmacht, the auxiliary police (Schutzmannschaft) and the Waffen SS from most occupied countries and even a small number from some Commonwealth countries (British Free Corps). Overall, almost 600.000 of Waffen-SS members were non-German [8] with some countries as Belgium and the Netherlands contributing thousands of volunteers.

Various collaborationalist parties in occupied France and the Vichy government assisted in establishing the Légion des volontaires français contre le bolchevisme (LVF). This volunteer army initially counted some 10,000 volunteers and would later become the 33rd Waffen SS division and one of the first SS divisions comprising mostly foreigners.

Following is a list of the 21 largest Waffen SS division composed mostly or totally of members from foreign countries.

• Wiking
• Nordland
• 1st Croatian
• 1st Ukrainian
• 1st Latvian
• 2nd Latvian
• 1st Esonian

• 1st Albanian
• Kama
• Nederland
• 1st Hungarian
• 2nd Hungarian
• 1st Flemish
• Wallonien

• 1st Russian
• 1st Italian
• 2nd Russian
• 1st Belarussian
• 3rd Hungarian
• 1st French
• Landstorm Nederland

Apart from frontline units volunteers played another important role notably in the large ‘’Schutzmannschaft’’ units in the German occupied territories in Eastern Europe. After Operation Barbarossa recruitment of local forces began almost immediately mostly by initiative of Himmler. These forces were not members of the regular armed forces and were not intended for frontline duty but were instead used for rear echelon activities including maintaining peace, fighting partisans, acting as police and organizing supplies for the front lines. In the later years of the war these units numbered almost 200.000.

The Polish Polnische Polizei was a notorious example of such a unit. It was primarily utilised by the Germans to deal with criminal activities, but were also widely used in combating smuggling and in measures against the Jewish population. At their peak in 1943, they numbered some 16,000. They patrolled the ghettos, searched for Jews who had escaped and guarded the gates of the Warsaw Ghetto and 367 of them were used in the suppression of the Warsaw Ghetto uprisings.

Collaboration with the Empire of Japan

During World War II the Empire of Japan occupied all or parts of at least 9 countries: China, France, United States, Philippines, United Kingdom, Netherlands, Thailand (Siam), Portugal and Australia.

The Japanese set up several puppet regimes in occupied Chinese territories. The first of which was Manchukuo in 1932, followed by the East Hebei Anti-Communist Autonomous Government in 1935. Similar to Manchukuo in its supposed ethnic identity, Mengjiang (Mengkukuo) was set up in late 1936. Wang Keming's collaborationist Provisional Government of the Republic of China was set up in 1937 following the start of full-scale military operations between China and Japan, and it became the Reformed Government of the Republic of China in 1938. The Wang Jingwei Regime, established in 1940, "consolidated" these regimes, though in reality neither Wang's government nor the constituent governments had any autonomy.

The military forces of these puppet regimes, known collectively as the Collaborationist Army (伪军), numbered more than a million at their height, and a total of some 2 million were ever conscripted. Although certain collaborationist forces had limited battlefield presence during the Second Sino-Japanese War, most were relegated to behind-the-line duties.

Miscellaneous

• 60% of the Waffen SS comprised non-German volunteers .
• The predominantly Scandinavian Nordland division along with remnants of French and Dutch volunteers were last defenders of the Reichstag in Berlin.

See also

• Resistance during World War II
• Collaborationism
• Axis Powers

Further reading

• Chuev S.: Damned soldiers ISBN 978-5-699-05970-6, M, 2005
• Williamson, Gordon: The SS: Hitler's Instrument of Terror, Brown Packaging Limited, 1994
• Gerlach, Christian: Kalkulierte Morde, Hamburger Edition, Hamburg, 1999
• Klaus-Peter Friedrich Collaboration in a "Land without a Quisling": Patterns of Cooperation with the Nazi German Occupation Regime in Poland during World War II - Slavic Review Vol. 64, No. 4 (Winter, 2005), pp. 711-746
• Jeffrey W. Jones "Every Family Has Its Freak": Perceptions of Collaboration in Occupied Soviet Russia, 1943-1948 - Slavic Review Vol. 64, No. 4 (Winter, 2005), pp. 747-770
• Birn, Ruth Bettina (2001), Collaboration with Nazi Germany in Eastern Europe: the Case of the Estonian Security Police. Contemporary European History 10.2, 181-198.

References

• Feldgrau
• Arad, Yitzhak. Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka - The Operation Reinhard Death Camps, Indiana University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis, 1987