Heinrich Himmler : A Life (89 page)

SS recruitment in Denmark began in July 1940 and was carried out by the DNSAP, the Danish Nazis. On 1 September the Waffen-SS recruitment office opened a branch in Copenhagen.
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However, following opposition
from the Foreign Ministry, which had been bypassed, it had to be closed down again for the time being.
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On 25 May 1940 Himmler had ordered the creation of an SS-Standarte ‘Westland’ for Dutch and Flemish volunteers. The two new Standarten, ‘Westland’ and ‘Nordland’, together with the Regiment ‘Germania’ which was composed of Germans, were intended to form the Waffen-SS division ‘Viking’.
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In the autumn of 1940 Himmler created a Dutch as well as a Flemish General SS, thereby rounding off his establishment in the two countries.
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In February 1941 Berger received permission from Himmler to recruit Finns. At the start of the war with the Soviet Union 400 Finns were already serving in the ‘Viking’ Division.
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At the beginning of April 1941 Hitler also gave permission for the establishment of an SS-Standarte ‘North West’ for volunteers from the Netherlands and Flanders, who did not need to meet the ‘racial’ criteria for membership of the SS and were not to be admitted into it.
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A few months later, after the outbreak of the war against the Soviet Union, these first steps towards recruiting volunteers who did not count as ‘Teutons’ were to lead to the creation of ‘legions’ in the Waffen-SS. Despite the relaxation of the selection criteria, however, Himmler’s first recruitment programme in northern and western Europe was not particularly successful. Up until June 1941, apart from the Finns, the SS had recruited only 2,000 west European volunteers.
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The ethnic German minorities in eastern and south-eastern Europe proved more productive. They were to provide a reservoir not only for the Waffen-SS but also for armed self-defence units operating under the aegis of the SS. Shortly after the start of the Second World War the Waffen-SS had already begun recruiting among the ethnic Germans from Yugoslavia who were working in the Reich. The Waffen-SS’s recruitment office had also begun to take steps to register the ethnic Germans in Yugoslavia itself, even though Göring had forbidden it.
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On Himmler’s instructions, Berger recruited 200 ethnic Germans from Yugoslavia and, after the country was occupied in April 1941, increased these efforts considerably. The other ethnic German minorities in the Balkans now also became a target for SS recruiters.

First moves in this direction were made as early as 1940. In August 1940 the German Reich forced through Hungarian claims to territory at the expense of Romania in the so-called Second Vienna Award, thereby
documenting its dominant position in the Balkans. This had direct repercussions not only for the aspirations to independence of the ethnic German groups in both countries but also for Himmler’s and Berger’s recruitment measures.

In the summer of 1939 the Waffen-SS had already recruited a group of sixty to eighty ethnic German grammar-school boys from Romania and brought them to Germany. There these young men joined the Waffen-SS and received basic military training.
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In the spring of 1940 a further thousand young men, who allegedly were needed in the Reich as agricultural labour, were given a preliminary medical then taken over the border to Vienna and there given their final medical examination; 700 of them joined the Waffen-SS.
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This recruitment drive, which became known as the ‘1,000-man action’, represented the start of the systematic recruitment of ethnic Germans from Romania for the Waffen-SS, which reached its high point in 1943.

The Second Vienna Award and the consequent ceding of territory brought about the abdication of the King of Romania. The pro-German Marshall Ion Antonescu formed a new government and, on 9 November 1940, Nazi sympathizers within the German minority exploited the political upheaval to found the NSDAP of the Ethnic German Group in Romania, Berger’s son-in-law, Andreas Schmidt, taking over the leadership.
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Despite this close connection between Schmidt and Berger, the party’s foundation had taken place without the prior approval of Himmler, who in the meantime had become the central figure in ethnic German politics. In fact, Himmler regarded the founding of this party, which called itself National Socialist and displayed the swastika flag, as ‘entirely detrimental to us’; the other Balkan states would consider it a threat to their independence and it would cause unnecessary annoyance to Russia. Thus, the party should display ‘the swastika as little as possible’.
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‘As always happens in ethnic German questions,’ Himmler complained to Berger, he ‘was told about it only when the damage had been done’: ‘If something goes well then it’s always the others who are responsible, but if something doesn’t go off as planned then it’s the Reichsführer’s fault.’
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In connection with the Vienna Award the Germans imposed a minority agreement on the Hungarian government, according to which the already Nazi-inclined National League of Germans in Hungary was declared to be the sole legitimate representative of the ethnic Germans in Hungary and membership of the ethnic group was linked to a commitment to Nazi
ideology.
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However, Franz Basch, the leader of the ethnic group, rejected an initial move by Berger to recruit 500 ethnic Germans from Hungary for the Waffen-SS. Nevertheless, Hungarian Germans who had fled to the Reich or were declared to be ‘itinerant workers’ did join the Waffen-SS.
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In the autumn of 1940 Sturmbannführer Viktor Nageler, whom the SS had sent to Slovakia in the summer of 1940 as an adviser to the Hlinka Guard, began to assess volunteers for the Guard in accordance with ‘racial’ principles. Between November 1940 and January 1941 the Danube SS recruitment office carried out an assessment, disguised as a medical examination, of a total of 4,694 men. More than half of the candidates proved to be ‘suitable’; 40 per cent were even ‘eligible for the SS’. In January 1941 Himmler approved further assessments but did not want to do anything ‘for the time being’.
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The SS had also created a paramilitary organization within the German ethnic group in Slovakia, which called itself the ‘Voluntary Protection Squad’, and, in addition, a clandestine SS unit with the title ‘Einsatztruppe’, which, in accordance with Himmler’s instructions, was expanded to form an ‘ET Sturmbann’ and served as a source of recruitment for the Waffen-SS.
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At the end of 1940, however, Berger informed Himmler that Franz Karmasin, the leader of the ethnic group, was causing ‘the men all sorts of difficulties’ because he considered the SS was exerting too much influence on the formation of the Hlinka Guard. For, in the meantime, Sturmbannführer Nageler, who had been assigned to the Hlinka Guard as an adviser, had started to create an elite unit from the members of the Guard, the so-called Wehrmannschaften (defence teams), who were envisaged as in the future helping the SS to integrate Slovakia into a greater Germanic empire. By creating such an elite, Nageler intended nothing less than to select racially ‘valuable’ Slovaks in order to amalgamate them with the ‘Germanic’ population. This was a project with which Himmler sympathized and which he was to return to in the following year.
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However, the implementation of such ideas would have damaged in the long term the privileged position the German ethic group was claiming for itself in Slovakia, and this was the reason for Karmasin’s opposition.

By contrast, and in direct opposition to Nageler’s scheme, Berger advocated creating out of the ET Sturmbann a Standarte of the General SS in Slovakia. However, Himmler considered such ideas ‘premature’.
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At this point Himmler was concerned above all to avoid anything that might damage German–Slovak relations; the accusations being made against him
in connection with the failed legionnaires’ putsch in Romania, to which we shall return in the next section, made this appear advisable.
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Nevertheless, despite Karmasin’s obstruction and Himmler’s cautious approach, by the end of 1941 the Waffen-SS had managed, through individual commitment, to recruit 600 ethnic Germans from Slovakia.
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During 1940 the SS also began trying to recruit from the ethnic Germans in Alsace, though with only moderate success. At the beginning of 1941 there were only around 200 volunteers. At short notice Himmler expected those responsible to produce an immediate increase to 500 recruits: ‘Germanic tribes who do not have a single son participating in the current great freedom struggle for the reordering of Europe will lose all self-respect and will be unable to retrieve it for decades.’
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On 23 October 1940 Hitler met the Spanish dictator, Franco, at the railway station in Hendaye in order to discuss the modalities of Spain joining the Axis alliance, without, however, achieving a really significant result. A few days before this meeting Himmler had travelled to Spain and, among other things, had met Franco. Evidently the presence of the Reichsführer was intended to reinforce the final discussions concerning security for the meeting of the two dictators in Hendaye.
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Moreover, Himmler will have used his visit to discuss the relatively intense German–Spanish police relations. The official reports, however, gave the impression of it being primarily a tourist visit.

On 20 October, after stops in San Sebastian and Burgos, Himmler arrived by train in Madrid. According to the
Völkischer Beobachter
: ‘The streets leading to the North Station were packed with people and Falangists in uniform together with units of the newly formed Spanish police lined the route to the Ritz Hotel. Flags were flying throughout Madrid in celebration. The Reichsführer-SS was warmly greeted by the population on his drive through the streets.’
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On the same day Himmler was received by Franco, and in the afternoon he attended a bullfight where, according to the
Völkischer Beobachter
, his arrival was greeted ‘with loud applause’.
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On the following day Himmler went to Toledo in order to look at the historic fortifications, the Alcázar, which in the meantime had become a pilgrimage site for Spanish nationalists. In 1936, at the beginning of the Civil
War, for two months Franco supporters had withstood a siege by superior Republican forces.
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The day after he visited the archaeological museum in Madrid, studied intently a map of the barbarian invasions, and asked the director of the museum to provide him with a copy of some of the exhibits.
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That evening Himmler spoke at a meeting of the Madrid branch of the German NSDAP, in which he gave the audience some of his impressions of his recent trip. He was quoted by the
Völkischer Beobachter
as saying: ‘One can still see in the Germanic physiognomies of the northern Spanish traces of the German blood that over the centuries has been lost to the Reich. However, since the year 1933 this tragic development has ceased.’ Himmler then turned ‘to the great settlement project in the German east’, and ‘gave graphic details of the huge trek involved in the resettlement programme’. In the east, according to Himmler, ‘not only [ . . . ] were settlements being constructed but the landscape is being given a new appearance’. Himmler noted with approval that in Spain they had begun the necessary reforestation of the barren Karst areas and the plains, and continued—now evidently mounting one of his hobby-horses: ‘We too must create windbreaks in the German east by planting dense forests. This would block the Asiatic wind coming from the Steppes.’
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On 23 October he flew to Barcelona, from where on the following day he set out for home.
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During the coming years official state visits by Himmler such as the one to Spain were to be relatively infrequent. This was not simply because the number of states with which the Third Reich still maintained diplomatic relations continually declined, but above all because Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop regarded all diplomatic activities undertaken by Himmler with great suspicion and endeavoured to restrict them. The reason for this change in attitude was the SD’s unsuccessful initiatives in Romania at the beginning of 1941.

In January 1941 the SD intelligence network in Romania had supported an unsuccessful putsch by the Iron Guard, the paramilitary organization of the Romanian fascists, against the dictator Antonescu, a close ally of Nazi Germany, and subsequently helped the leader of the putsch, Horia Sima, to escape to Germany. This dilettante action not only discredited the SD in the eyes of the Nazi leadership but also weakened Himmler’s position vis-à-vis the Foreign Ministry. Hitler explicitly disapproved of the SD’s independent initiative and instructed Himmler to keep Jost’s SD foreign department on a tight leash.
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On 21 February Himmler met Jost and the people responsible
for the security police’s and SD’s activities in Romania for a discussion of these events.
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Himmler always rejected accusations that he himself had supported Sima’s putsch. In fact, when, during the planning stage of the so-called legionnaires’ putsch, he had been asked for support he had sent Sima a letter in Hitler’s name admonishing him to work collegially with Antonescu. However, he could not dispute the reproach that his agents in Romania had at the very least acted without authorization.
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From now on Himmler showed a demonstrative lack of interest in Romanian domestic politics. A few years later, at a meeting with Antonescu in March 1944, he claimed that ‘after the unfortunate legionnaires’ putsch I [kept] my people out of Romania’. Antonescu, at least, was not convinced by this retreat: he made it unmistakably clear to Himmler at this meeting that the SD was encouraging opposition to him in Bucharest. Himmler replied with disarming naivety that, ‘all in all’, he could not ‘believe that’, as the police attaché had only ‘two or three assistants’.
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