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The following is an interesting piece written about the Hitler-Youth of the Volkssturm and the Werewolf movement I discovered on a Russian website. I apologise for any translation errors.
Werewolf. By Ruth Fraiger
Hitler-Jugend and the Werewolf Movement.
Partisan Hitler Youth Program
In the autumn of 1944, the leadership of the Hitler Youth finally decided to use the fanaticism of the youth. Members of the State Council long ago longed to begin a systematic struggle against "foreign invaders" and internal enemies of the Reich. The leaders of the Hitler Youth planned to go the track, trodden by the SS division of the same name, wishing to turn the youth movement into a full-fledged military organization. In August 1944, the Chief of Staff of the Imperial Youth Leaders, Helmut Mockel, initiated the initiative to train 100,000 boys, of whom it was planned to create special "self-defence units". These detachments were to fight anti-fascists and enemy guerrillas operating on the outskirts of the Reich. In the autumn of 1944, they were supposed to put these young men under arms, fully equip them and send them to fight against the French partisans.
On the eve of the creation of the Volkssturm, the leadership of the GY was going to create "Combat detachments named after Herbert Norkus", named to the part of the Hitlerjugend martyr who died in a street skirmish in 1932. However, these formations of the people's militia were never destined to appear - the party leadership began to implement a project called Volkssturm. To the great disappointment of the imperial youth leadership, 300,000 adolescents were not assigned such a big role, as the upper GJ counted on it. No less disappointment was expressed by fanatical adolescents themselves, when they got into the so-called Volkssturm of the Third Wave, which was created in the spring of 1945, that is, when the Third Reich was literally breathing on ice. Such measures were by no means an accident, but a certain precaution. In the leadership of the Nazi party, it was reasonably believed that constant contact with older people, more soberly assessing the situation, could undermine the morale of adolescents. But never the less the Imperial youth leadership managed to achieve certain concessions. October 30, 1944, it was decided that from the young men born in 1928 it will be possible to form separate armed detachments that would carry out their activities with the corresponding regional leaders of the State. That is, as you can see, these small formations were absolutely independent of Volkssturm, although formally they belonged to the people's militia. These detachments actually became the basis of the so-called "tank destroyers", which could be found in any part of Germany (we'll talk about them in more detail in the third part). Given the unconventionality in tactics and style of combat, "tank destroyers" can be safely attributed to the same category as "werewolves." In principle, the leadership of HG used Volkssturm for cover. In Northern Germany, British troops captured far more than one youth unit of "fighters". All of them had bandages and patches of Volkssturm, although members of this organization never carried out actions behind enemy lines.
In addition to Volkssturm, the Hitler youth leadership also showed interest in the formation of partisan groups and reconnaissance detachments that were to operate in the territory occupied by the Allies. Already in the summer of 1944, many Hitler Youth activists were cut off from schooling and their public duties. They passed special training, after which they had to cross the front line. One fifteen-year-old boy, captured by the Allies, talked about his training in a special camp, where between July and September 1944, another 400 teenagers received special training. Teachers and instructors in this camp were German and Flemish SS men. According to the directive of the higher police and SS leadership of the Rhine Westmarch, All the young men from GU were to get the skills of guerrilla warfare. Later, such an order issued and the Imperial youth leadership, extending its effect to the whole of Germany. Similar initiatives have already been shown from below. In Koblenz, local leader Hitler Youth Schneider insisted that all young men of the 1929-1930s were to be mobilized to participate in partisan detachments. This initiative was supported in November 1944. On the other hand, there is evidence that says that only the most fanatical members of the State Department have been recruited. And the geography of the activities of such camps was limited to West Germany. Such undertakings aroused political enthusiasm among the local leadership of the Hitler Youth, who watched in horror as the parts of the Allies approached their native lands.
But when this initiative began to be realized, the leadership of the Hitler Youth was waiting for another disappointment - all the youth partisan detachments had to obey the "Bureau of Pratsman", in effect becoming one of the components of the "Werwolf". From the organizational point of view, this step was quite logical. By the end of 1944, it became apparent that there was a need for coordination between the SS and GY. This would not only avoid unnecessary material costs, but also put an end to duplication of functions. As a result, in early 1945, a closed conference was held in Potsdam, in which representatives of the SS and the Hitler Youth attended. In fact, the parties were represented by Pruitsman and Cloos. During the negotiations, an agreement was reached that the staff of the Kloos department would be subordinate to the "Bureau of Prutzman." From that moment on, all the youth guerrilla formations became units of the Werwolf. After this meeting, Kloos and his co-workers moved to Rheinsberg, where they were disguised as the recruiting center of the SS Hitler Youth. Himself, Cloos was now represented as a special commissioner of the Imperial Youth leadership. In practice, representatives of the Hitler Youth were free in their actions. Representatives of Kloos traveled around West Germany, independently agreeing on further work with police and SS ranks. On January 25, 1945, Kloos's activities were expanded, he now had to create youth guerrilla groups in East Germany. Since that moment, adolescents from subversive groups have come to be called just like SS men - "werewolves." As if accidentally among the youth began to actively spread the book Lons. It was a very true move - inspired by the book, the youth simply burned with a desire to become "werewolves."
Despite the fact that Kloos acted under the signboard of "Werwolf", his employees were not going to somehow coordinate their actions with the SS leadership. The Hitler Youth continued to train young men (this time called "werewolves") in their own camps. GY functionaries, as before, conducted an active recruitment campaign through their own educational institutions, about which Prutzman hardly knew anything. It is not surprising that the employees of Bureau Prutzman often complained about the lack of cooperation between the two wings of the Nazi guerrilla movement. The SS tried to put an end to the activities of Kloos, close the youth camps and give them to the SS, but the undertaking failed.
On the other hand, young "werewolves" believed that their project was still overseen by the Imperial youth leadership, recruitment in young "werewolves" was carried out by commissioners from the Gau. The process itself was fundamentally different from the search for volunteers, which was carried out within the framework of the SS. In the Hitler Youth it looked like this. Above in the regional offices descended order - to select an average of six to twelve teenagers in order that they were specially trained. Candidates for "werewolves" were to be loyal to the regime, to be smart, but not to be activists who were known throughout the district. In the number of such "volunteers" were girls. They should have been well acquainted with the technique, since they were supposed to be trained on a radio operator. Other girls simply worked as typists and employees in the "Werewolf" of Kloos. Not all regional leaders of the Hitler Youth were involved in the preparation of the "werewolves". For example, in the territory of Nordmark (Frisia and Schleswig-Holstein) only five of the existing twelve regional leaders of the GY in preparation for the "werewolves" were involved. Four districts were assigned to each of them. In the areas along the Rhine, the training of young "werewolves" was perhaps the most active. To this end, special brochures were even printed in Wiesbaden.
After such a specific recruitment, children entered preliminary courses, after which they were sent to specialized camps. All the issues of training and training of teenagers were supervised by specialists from the battalion "Albert Leo Schlagueter", who simultaneously obeyed both Cloos and Pruitsman. Two boys captured by the Americans showed during interrogation that they were trained first in a sports school and then in a camp called "Roda Ron" where they were taught the skills of sabotage and subversive agitation. When training sabotage the emphasis was placed on the breakage of telephone lines. In other camps, more attention was paid to military training. In camps near Palatinate and Waldmore, the SS instructors taught 15-16-year-olds to orientate themselves on the terrain, after which they went on a weekly course, During which children were introduced to various types of weapons: Mauser rifle, submachine guns, machine guns, grenade launchers, etc. In conditions when the Wehrmacht was sorely lacking in ammunition, the Hitler Youth had only plenty in the camps. They could almost train round the clock in shooting. At the end of the training SS instructors formed small groups, which usually consisted of three to six children. In other camps, the training of radio operators was under way. Young men, well versed in radio engineering, have always been in demand in the "Werewolves." They fell into both youthful and adult partisan detachments. Such specialized training took place at least in one camp, which was located in the town of Enigen, near Reutlingen. An interesting fact: the children who underwent training were dressed in the shape of the African Corps. Those of the GY members, Who did not get into the camps, received detailed instructions on how to behave in the occupied territories. They had to distribute leaflets, the caches with which were prepared in advance. In addition, they were ordered spontaneous sabotage: "Take everything you can from the enemy. The front line depends on the situation in the rear of the enemy. The more you do harm, the more you will do for your Motherland. "
At the end of 1944, youth units began individual attacks to the rear of the enemy. Some of these "saboteurs" were almost immediately captured by the Allies in Eastern Belgium during the Ardennes operation. The seized partisans from the Hitler Youth showed that they were either recruited unofficially (they decided to launch acts of sabotage on their own initiative, using instructions issued in the autumn of 1944), or they were thrown into the enemy's rear at the initiative of the regional leader Walter Dennis. Some of these boys, who got weapons, still managed to cut off American lines of communication, to shell out transport vehicles. In one case, the young "werewolf" delivered V. Dennis valuable information about the location of the American artillery and some army units. Such self-sufficient detachments were very active during the German counter-offensive in Alsace, where they acted as scouts and saboteurs. As a result, the Americans regarded the activities of such detachments as "a very significant threat."
As soon as the American troops were able to go deeper into the territory of the Rhineland, about a hundred youth detachments were sent immediately behind the front line. Here are just brief summaries for February-March 1945: two young men detained while watching the road Gangelt-Gailenkirchen; Two young guerrillas were detained by soldiers of the 104th US Infantry Regiment; Ten members of DG were captured by officers of the 7th Armored Regiment; Five radio operators from the "Union of German Girls" arrested in Cremfeld, after they were booked; In the vicinity of Bonn, on March 18-22, 15 young "werewolves", equipped with equipment for sabotage, were detained. This list can be continued for a very long time. In one case, a child who was a pimph (an organization that preceded the Hitler Youth) killed an American soldier. The witness of this event recalled: "We stopped to rest, when a little boy, 9-10 years old, asked a soldier for a chocolate. This boy was very cute, so no one paid attention when he reached into his pocket. But from his pocket he pulled out a pistol and shot a soldier in the stomach. "
A lot of young men were in special detachments formed by the leadership of the State Department in the Riparian regions, namely Kirsch in Bonn and Schneider in Koblenz. Having shown initiative in March 1945, they sent several young reconnaissance and sabotage groups across the Rhine. The river was usually crossed by rubber boats. Young "werewolves" "excelled" in Cologne, where they made several attacks on American soldiers. The Wehrmacht officers, who were familiar with Schneider, highly appreciated his activity. In one of the army reports it was said that this leader of the Hitler Youth had gathered more than a hundred people who were very determined. In addition to direct attacks on Americans, these boys specialized in disabling vehicles - they mixed sugar in gas tanks. In mid-March 1945 it was decided to expand the activities of these units, and Schneider received explosives from the Wehrmacht. From now on, the children had to engage in larger diversions.
After the Allies managed to cross the Rhine, they ran into numerous groups of young "werewolves." The district of Bonn was simply inundated with youth formations created on the initiative of Kirsch. In the town of Diet, the Americans detained five well-armed teenagers who showed that they were only part of a detachment of young saboteurs who numbered more than two hundred people. Arrested on March 31, 1945 in Bensheim, members of the Hitler Youth gave similar information - they were listed in a detachment of 250 teenagers, each of whom vowed to kill the Americans. On April 15, ten young men were captured in the same Bensheim, who were waiting for further instructions from the regional leadership of the GY. All the children turned out to be fanatical National Socialists who did not even want to hear about the possibility of the existence of other political doctrines.
By the end of April, the Allied forces were able to gain a foothold in areas where the most active actions of young Nazi guerrillas could be expected. Despite all the reports and information received by the army counterintelligence, the Americans did nothing to reduce the activity of youth from the State Department. On the contrary, they only aggravated the situation and provoked discontent. In April 1945, a "conspiracy" was opened in Alsfeld, which consisted of seven boys, who were eager to seize weapons and start a guerrilla war. At all of them for the collar of the collar were found badges of the Hitler Youth. Despite the fact that they did not have time to commit any attacks, they were shot. In Magdeburg, the number of murdered and shot teenagers was not accountable. They were executed when they were detained with weapons in their hands, there is no need to speak about the attacks. Violence led to more radical actions. There was a case when the teenagers lured an American transport convoy in ambush, after which they threw grenades at it, causing considerable damage to technology and manpower. In Saxony, a group of young guerrillas entered the parking lot, where German trophy equipment was located, and put it out of action. Near Hanover, a boy died who became a kind of Nazi kamikaze. He approached the tanks with fuel, but the bomb exploded earlier than he could cause significant damage to fuel supplies. In the Rural town of Dislaken and the Swabian settlement of Memmingen, a nine-year-old girl shot two American soldiers. In Kalba, one of the Hitler Youth members aimed at an American officer with a pistol, but was shot before he could pull the trigger. This incident made a depressing impression on the local population. Near Oldenburg, British soldiers were able to catch young "werewolves", who, behind a haystack, alerted several grenade launchers. In the rear of the Ninth US Army, a fourteen-year-old boy blew up a bridge in the center of Düsseldorf so professionally that many Americans died. The saboteur was detained by intelligence and taken to the army headquarters, where they could not believe for a long time that this terrorist act was the child's handiwork.
One of the "hot spots" of Germany was Altmark, a wooded area bordering the Elbe. In the Altmark forests, not only the "werewolves" were found shelter, but also the scattered remnants of the Wehrmacht units. According to an American journalist who visited this turbulent region in April 1945, "he was literally crammed with youth and the so-called" werewolves. " A characteristic feature of the "werewolf" detachments in this area was that adults and adults were the children and adolescents who were the actual commanders of the partisan formation. One of the most active was the partisan detachment operating in the vicinity of Stendel. In Tangermunde several young "werewolves" fired from the ruins of the American transport column. The Americans responded by opening a chaotic fire, watering all the surrounding houses and ruins from all kinds of weapons. They did not see where the snipers had settled, and so they shot at everything that moved. One of the goals of the "werewolves" was achieved - the local population did not conceal their hatred of the Americans.
There is evidence that the Red Army also faced young "werewolves" at the time of entering Germany. Here, as on the Western Front, the adolescents used to conduct reconnaissance. The two boys who acted on the Oder front were awarded the Iron Cross, when they were able to obtain important documents behind the front line. Or another example: On February 4, 1945, a youthful partisan detachment from the besieged city of Elbing managed to destroy a Soviet tank. This squad continued to operate for almost a month, until it was neutralized by parts of the NKVD. Partisans were three teenagers, dressed in civilian clothes. From all weapons to this point they have only a few pistols.
The only successful attack on the Red Army, which was undertaken by young "werewolves," was a sortie in the industrial city of Hindenburg (Upper Silesia). It was very loudly screamed in Nazi propaganda. According to official German statements, the "combat group" HJ, established after the occupation of the city by Soviet troops, decided to "avenge the outrage and looting." Teenagers, armed with machine guns and grenades, were able to surround the school where the Red Army soldiers stopped to stay. The school was peppered with grenades. After the explosions, the building collapsed, buried under the wreckage of 60 people.
Партизанская программа гитлерюгенда - Вервольф. Осколки коричневой империи - Фрайгер Рут - Ogrik2.ru - Читать книги онлайн
Werewolf. By Ruth Fraiger
Hitler-Jugend and the Werewolf Movement.
Partisan Hitler Youth Program
In the autumn of 1944, the leadership of the Hitler Youth finally decided to use the fanaticism of the youth. Members of the State Council long ago longed to begin a systematic struggle against "foreign invaders" and internal enemies of the Reich. The leaders of the Hitler Youth planned to go the track, trodden by the SS division of the same name, wishing to turn the youth movement into a full-fledged military organization. In August 1944, the Chief of Staff of the Imperial Youth Leaders, Helmut Mockel, initiated the initiative to train 100,000 boys, of whom it was planned to create special "self-defence units". These detachments were to fight anti-fascists and enemy guerrillas operating on the outskirts of the Reich. In the autumn of 1944, they were supposed to put these young men under arms, fully equip them and send them to fight against the French partisans.
On the eve of the creation of the Volkssturm, the leadership of the GY was going to create "Combat detachments named after Herbert Norkus", named to the part of the Hitlerjugend martyr who died in a street skirmish in 1932. However, these formations of the people's militia were never destined to appear - the party leadership began to implement a project called Volkssturm. To the great disappointment of the imperial youth leadership, 300,000 adolescents were not assigned such a big role, as the upper GJ counted on it. No less disappointment was expressed by fanatical adolescents themselves, when they got into the so-called Volkssturm of the Third Wave, which was created in the spring of 1945, that is, when the Third Reich was literally breathing on ice. Such measures were by no means an accident, but a certain precaution. In the leadership of the Nazi party, it was reasonably believed that constant contact with older people, more soberly assessing the situation, could undermine the morale of adolescents. But never the less the Imperial youth leadership managed to achieve certain concessions. October 30, 1944, it was decided that from the young men born in 1928 it will be possible to form separate armed detachments that would carry out their activities with the corresponding regional leaders of the State. That is, as you can see, these small formations were absolutely independent of Volkssturm, although formally they belonged to the people's militia. These detachments actually became the basis of the so-called "tank destroyers", which could be found in any part of Germany (we'll talk about them in more detail in the third part). Given the unconventionality in tactics and style of combat, "tank destroyers" can be safely attributed to the same category as "werewolves." In principle, the leadership of HG used Volkssturm for cover. In Northern Germany, British troops captured far more than one youth unit of "fighters". All of them had bandages and patches of Volkssturm, although members of this organization never carried out actions behind enemy lines.
In addition to Volkssturm, the Hitler youth leadership also showed interest in the formation of partisan groups and reconnaissance detachments that were to operate in the territory occupied by the Allies. Already in the summer of 1944, many Hitler Youth activists were cut off from schooling and their public duties. They passed special training, after which they had to cross the front line. One fifteen-year-old boy, captured by the Allies, talked about his training in a special camp, where between July and September 1944, another 400 teenagers received special training. Teachers and instructors in this camp were German and Flemish SS men. According to the directive of the higher police and SS leadership of the Rhine Westmarch, All the young men from GU were to get the skills of guerrilla warfare. Later, such an order issued and the Imperial youth leadership, extending its effect to the whole of Germany. Similar initiatives have already been shown from below. In Koblenz, local leader Hitler Youth Schneider insisted that all young men of the 1929-1930s were to be mobilized to participate in partisan detachments. This initiative was supported in November 1944. On the other hand, there is evidence that says that only the most fanatical members of the State Department have been recruited. And the geography of the activities of such camps was limited to West Germany. Such undertakings aroused political enthusiasm among the local leadership of the Hitler Youth, who watched in horror as the parts of the Allies approached their native lands.
But when this initiative began to be realized, the leadership of the Hitler Youth was waiting for another disappointment - all the youth partisan detachments had to obey the "Bureau of Pratsman", in effect becoming one of the components of the "Werwolf". From the organizational point of view, this step was quite logical. By the end of 1944, it became apparent that there was a need for coordination between the SS and GY. This would not only avoid unnecessary material costs, but also put an end to duplication of functions. As a result, in early 1945, a closed conference was held in Potsdam, in which representatives of the SS and the Hitler Youth attended. In fact, the parties were represented by Pruitsman and Cloos. During the negotiations, an agreement was reached that the staff of the Kloos department would be subordinate to the "Bureau of Prutzman." From that moment on, all the youth guerrilla formations became units of the Werwolf. After this meeting, Kloos and his co-workers moved to Rheinsberg, where they were disguised as the recruiting center of the SS Hitler Youth. Himself, Cloos was now represented as a special commissioner of the Imperial Youth leadership. In practice, representatives of the Hitler Youth were free in their actions. Representatives of Kloos traveled around West Germany, independently agreeing on further work with police and SS ranks. On January 25, 1945, Kloos's activities were expanded, he now had to create youth guerrilla groups in East Germany. Since that moment, adolescents from subversive groups have come to be called just like SS men - "werewolves." As if accidentally among the youth began to actively spread the book Lons. It was a very true move - inspired by the book, the youth simply burned with a desire to become "werewolves."
Despite the fact that Kloos acted under the signboard of "Werwolf", his employees were not going to somehow coordinate their actions with the SS leadership. The Hitler Youth continued to train young men (this time called "werewolves") in their own camps. GY functionaries, as before, conducted an active recruitment campaign through their own educational institutions, about which Prutzman hardly knew anything. It is not surprising that the employees of Bureau Prutzman often complained about the lack of cooperation between the two wings of the Nazi guerrilla movement. The SS tried to put an end to the activities of Kloos, close the youth camps and give them to the SS, but the undertaking failed.
On the other hand, young "werewolves" believed that their project was still overseen by the Imperial youth leadership, recruitment in young "werewolves" was carried out by commissioners from the Gau. The process itself was fundamentally different from the search for volunteers, which was carried out within the framework of the SS. In the Hitler Youth it looked like this. Above in the regional offices descended order - to select an average of six to twelve teenagers in order that they were specially trained. Candidates for "werewolves" were to be loyal to the regime, to be smart, but not to be activists who were known throughout the district. In the number of such "volunteers" were girls. They should have been well acquainted with the technique, since they were supposed to be trained on a radio operator. Other girls simply worked as typists and employees in the "Werewolf" of Kloos. Not all regional leaders of the Hitler Youth were involved in the preparation of the "werewolves". For example, in the territory of Nordmark (Frisia and Schleswig-Holstein) only five of the existing twelve regional leaders of the GY in preparation for the "werewolves" were involved. Four districts were assigned to each of them. In the areas along the Rhine, the training of young "werewolves" was perhaps the most active. To this end, special brochures were even printed in Wiesbaden.
After such a specific recruitment, children entered preliminary courses, after which they were sent to specialized camps. All the issues of training and training of teenagers were supervised by specialists from the battalion "Albert Leo Schlagueter", who simultaneously obeyed both Cloos and Pruitsman. Two boys captured by the Americans showed during interrogation that they were trained first in a sports school and then in a camp called "Roda Ron" where they were taught the skills of sabotage and subversive agitation. When training sabotage the emphasis was placed on the breakage of telephone lines. In other camps, more attention was paid to military training. In camps near Palatinate and Waldmore, the SS instructors taught 15-16-year-olds to orientate themselves on the terrain, after which they went on a weekly course, During which children were introduced to various types of weapons: Mauser rifle, submachine guns, machine guns, grenade launchers, etc. In conditions when the Wehrmacht was sorely lacking in ammunition, the Hitler Youth had only plenty in the camps. They could almost train round the clock in shooting. At the end of the training SS instructors formed small groups, which usually consisted of three to six children. In other camps, the training of radio operators was under way. Young men, well versed in radio engineering, have always been in demand in the "Werewolves." They fell into both youthful and adult partisan detachments. Such specialized training took place at least in one camp, which was located in the town of Enigen, near Reutlingen. An interesting fact: the children who underwent training were dressed in the shape of the African Corps. Those of the GY members, Who did not get into the camps, received detailed instructions on how to behave in the occupied territories. They had to distribute leaflets, the caches with which were prepared in advance. In addition, they were ordered spontaneous sabotage: "Take everything you can from the enemy. The front line depends on the situation in the rear of the enemy. The more you do harm, the more you will do for your Motherland. "
At the end of 1944, youth units began individual attacks to the rear of the enemy. Some of these "saboteurs" were almost immediately captured by the Allies in Eastern Belgium during the Ardennes operation. The seized partisans from the Hitler Youth showed that they were either recruited unofficially (they decided to launch acts of sabotage on their own initiative, using instructions issued in the autumn of 1944), or they were thrown into the enemy's rear at the initiative of the regional leader Walter Dennis. Some of these boys, who got weapons, still managed to cut off American lines of communication, to shell out transport vehicles. In one case, the young "werewolf" delivered V. Dennis valuable information about the location of the American artillery and some army units. Such self-sufficient detachments were very active during the German counter-offensive in Alsace, where they acted as scouts and saboteurs. As a result, the Americans regarded the activities of such detachments as "a very significant threat."
As soon as the American troops were able to go deeper into the territory of the Rhineland, about a hundred youth detachments were sent immediately behind the front line. Here are just brief summaries for February-March 1945: two young men detained while watching the road Gangelt-Gailenkirchen; Two young guerrillas were detained by soldiers of the 104th US Infantry Regiment; Ten members of DG were captured by officers of the 7th Armored Regiment; Five radio operators from the "Union of German Girls" arrested in Cremfeld, after they were booked; In the vicinity of Bonn, on March 18-22, 15 young "werewolves", equipped with equipment for sabotage, were detained. This list can be continued for a very long time. In one case, a child who was a pimph (an organization that preceded the Hitler Youth) killed an American soldier. The witness of this event recalled: "We stopped to rest, when a little boy, 9-10 years old, asked a soldier for a chocolate. This boy was very cute, so no one paid attention when he reached into his pocket. But from his pocket he pulled out a pistol and shot a soldier in the stomach. "
A lot of young men were in special detachments formed by the leadership of the State Department in the Riparian regions, namely Kirsch in Bonn and Schneider in Koblenz. Having shown initiative in March 1945, they sent several young reconnaissance and sabotage groups across the Rhine. The river was usually crossed by rubber boats. Young "werewolves" "excelled" in Cologne, where they made several attacks on American soldiers. The Wehrmacht officers, who were familiar with Schneider, highly appreciated his activity. In one of the army reports it was said that this leader of the Hitler Youth had gathered more than a hundred people who were very determined. In addition to direct attacks on Americans, these boys specialized in disabling vehicles - they mixed sugar in gas tanks. In mid-March 1945 it was decided to expand the activities of these units, and Schneider received explosives from the Wehrmacht. From now on, the children had to engage in larger diversions.
After the Allies managed to cross the Rhine, they ran into numerous groups of young "werewolves." The district of Bonn was simply inundated with youth formations created on the initiative of Kirsch. In the town of Diet, the Americans detained five well-armed teenagers who showed that they were only part of a detachment of young saboteurs who numbered more than two hundred people. Arrested on March 31, 1945 in Bensheim, members of the Hitler Youth gave similar information - they were listed in a detachment of 250 teenagers, each of whom vowed to kill the Americans. On April 15, ten young men were captured in the same Bensheim, who were waiting for further instructions from the regional leadership of the GY. All the children turned out to be fanatical National Socialists who did not even want to hear about the possibility of the existence of other political doctrines.
By the end of April, the Allied forces were able to gain a foothold in areas where the most active actions of young Nazi guerrillas could be expected. Despite all the reports and information received by the army counterintelligence, the Americans did nothing to reduce the activity of youth from the State Department. On the contrary, they only aggravated the situation and provoked discontent. In April 1945, a "conspiracy" was opened in Alsfeld, which consisted of seven boys, who were eager to seize weapons and start a guerrilla war. At all of them for the collar of the collar were found badges of the Hitler Youth. Despite the fact that they did not have time to commit any attacks, they were shot. In Magdeburg, the number of murdered and shot teenagers was not accountable. They were executed when they were detained with weapons in their hands, there is no need to speak about the attacks. Violence led to more radical actions. There was a case when the teenagers lured an American transport convoy in ambush, after which they threw grenades at it, causing considerable damage to technology and manpower. In Saxony, a group of young guerrillas entered the parking lot, where German trophy equipment was located, and put it out of action. Near Hanover, a boy died who became a kind of Nazi kamikaze. He approached the tanks with fuel, but the bomb exploded earlier than he could cause significant damage to fuel supplies. In the Rural town of Dislaken and the Swabian settlement of Memmingen, a nine-year-old girl shot two American soldiers. In Kalba, one of the Hitler Youth members aimed at an American officer with a pistol, but was shot before he could pull the trigger. This incident made a depressing impression on the local population. Near Oldenburg, British soldiers were able to catch young "werewolves", who, behind a haystack, alerted several grenade launchers. In the rear of the Ninth US Army, a fourteen-year-old boy blew up a bridge in the center of Düsseldorf so professionally that many Americans died. The saboteur was detained by intelligence and taken to the army headquarters, where they could not believe for a long time that this terrorist act was the child's handiwork.
One of the "hot spots" of Germany was Altmark, a wooded area bordering the Elbe. In the Altmark forests, not only the "werewolves" were found shelter, but also the scattered remnants of the Wehrmacht units. According to an American journalist who visited this turbulent region in April 1945, "he was literally crammed with youth and the so-called" werewolves. " A characteristic feature of the "werewolf" detachments in this area was that adults and adults were the children and adolescents who were the actual commanders of the partisan formation. One of the most active was the partisan detachment operating in the vicinity of Stendel. In Tangermunde several young "werewolves" fired from the ruins of the American transport column. The Americans responded by opening a chaotic fire, watering all the surrounding houses and ruins from all kinds of weapons. They did not see where the snipers had settled, and so they shot at everything that moved. One of the goals of the "werewolves" was achieved - the local population did not conceal their hatred of the Americans.
There is evidence that the Red Army also faced young "werewolves" at the time of entering Germany. Here, as on the Western Front, the adolescents used to conduct reconnaissance. The two boys who acted on the Oder front were awarded the Iron Cross, when they were able to obtain important documents behind the front line. Or another example: On February 4, 1945, a youthful partisan detachment from the besieged city of Elbing managed to destroy a Soviet tank. This squad continued to operate for almost a month, until it was neutralized by parts of the NKVD. Partisans were three teenagers, dressed in civilian clothes. From all weapons to this point they have only a few pistols.
The only successful attack on the Red Army, which was undertaken by young "werewolves," was a sortie in the industrial city of Hindenburg (Upper Silesia). It was very loudly screamed in Nazi propaganda. According to official German statements, the "combat group" HJ, established after the occupation of the city by Soviet troops, decided to "avenge the outrage and looting." Teenagers, armed with machine guns and grenades, were able to surround the school where the Red Army soldiers stopped to stay. The school was peppered with grenades. After the explosions, the building collapsed, buried under the wreckage of 60 people.
Партизанская программа гитлерюгенда - Вервольф. Осколки коричневой империи - Фрайгер Рут - Ogrik2.ru - Читать книги онлайн