Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts

Ukrainian volunteers of the SS Galician Division marching in Sanok, May 1943
Bosniak volunteers of the 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS "Handschar" (1st Croatian) being inspected by Haj Amin al-Husseini, alongside SS-Brigadeführer Karl-Gustav Sauberzweig, November 1943

During World War II, the Waffen-SS recruited significant numbers of non-Germans, both as volunteers and conscripts. Of a peak strength of 950,000 in 1944, the Waffen-SS consisted of some 400,000 “Reich Germans” and 310,000 ethnic Germans from outside Germany’s pre-1939 borders (mostly from German-occupied Europe), the remaining 240,000 being non-Germans.[1] Thus, at their numerical peak, non-Germans comprised 25% of all Waffen-SS troops.[a] The units were under the control of the SS Führungshauptamt (SS Command Main Office) led by Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler. Upon mobilisation, the units' tactical control was given to the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (High Command of the Armed Forces).[3]

  1. ^ Lumans 2012, p. 223.
  2. ^ Stein 1984, p. 133.
  3. ^ Stein 1984, p. 23.


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