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| 5th SS Panzer Division Wiking | |
|---|---|
| Active | 1941 - 1945 |
| Allegiance |  Nazi Germany |
| Branch |  Waffen-SS |
| Type | Armoured |
| Size | Division |
| Commanders | |
| Notable commanders |
Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner Obergruppenführer Herbert Otto Gille Oberführer Eduard Deisenhofer Standartenführer Johannes Mühlenkamp Oberführer Karl Ullrich |
| Insignia | |
| Identification symbol |
 |
| Identification symbol |
Divisional insignia |
The 5th SS Panzer Division Wiking was one of the elite Panzer divisions of the thirty eight Waffen SS divisions. It was recruited from foreign volunteers, from Scandinavia, The Netherlands, and Belgium under the command of German officers. During the course of World War II, the division progressed from a motorised infantry division to a Panzer division and served on the Eastern Front during World War II. It surrendered in May 1945 to the advancing American forces in Austria.
After the success of the Infanterie-Regiment (mot.) Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler, SS-Verfügungstruppen-Division and the SS-Division Totenkopf during the early war campaigns in Poland and the West, it was decided to expand the number of Waffen SS divisions. Due to the influx of foreign volunteers, particularly from Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Norway, a decision was made to form a volunteer division of the Waffen SS under the command of German officers.[1]
This unit, originally organized as the Nordische Division
(Nr.5), was to be made up of Nordic volunteers mixed with ethnic
German Waffen SS veterans. To this end, the SS Infantry Regiment
Germania in the SS Verfügungstruppe Division was
transferred in late 1940 and used as the cadre for a new division
.[2] In
December 1940, the new SS motorized formation, was to be designated
SS-Division (mot.) Germania. but during
its formative period, the name was changed, to SS-Division
(mot.) Wiking. in January 1941.[3]
The division was formed around three motorised infantry regiments:
Germania, formed mostly from ethnic Germans;
Westland, consisting mainly of Dutch and Flemish
volunteers; and Nordland, comprised mostly of Danes,
Swedes and Norwegians.[2]
Command of the newly formed division was given to Brigadeführer
Felix
Steiner,[4] the
former commander of the Verfügungstruppe SS Regiment
Deutschland.
After formation the division was sent to Heuberg in Germany for training and by
April 1941, SS Division Wiking was deemed ready for
combat. It was ordered east in June 1941, to take part with Army Group
South's advance into the Ukraine during Operation Barbarossa.
In June 1941 the Finnish
Volunteer Battalion of the Waffen-SS was formed from Finnish volunteers. After
training this formation was attached to the SS Regiment
Nordland in January 1942, further bolstering the divisions
strength. About 430 Finns who were veterans of the Winter War served within
the SS Division Wiking division since the beginning of Operation
Barbarossa. In spring 1943, the Finnish battalion was replaced
by an
Estonian one.
The division was not ready for combat until 29 June 1941, seven
days after the launch of the operation. During its first action,
near Tarnopol in Galicia, Ukraine, the division acquitted
itself well. In August, SS Division Wiking was ordered to
establish a defensive perimeter around a bridgehead across the Dniepr river.
Despite determined attacks by the Red Army, the division held the line. Against
stiffening resistance, the division continued its advance towards
Rostov-on-Don.
It took part in the heavy fighting for Rostov before being ordered
back to the Mius River
line in November. During 1941, the Heer officers in charge of the deployment
of the SS Division Wiking were skeptical of its fighting
abilities and so were hesitant to commit it to any major actions.
As the division proved itself again and again in combat, it began
to earn the grudging respect of the Heer commanders.
After successfully holding the line over the winter of 1941–42, SS
Division Wiking was ordered to retake Rostov-on-Don and
advance into the Caucasus,
securing the region's vital oilfields. This attack was known as
Operation Maus, and formed a part of Army Group South's
offensive Case Blue, aimed at capturing Stalingrad and the Baku oilfields. Launched at the height of summer,
the offensive was unexpectedly successful. Within six weeks, Rostov
and the entire Don region had been recaptured, and SS Division
Wiking was advancing deep into the Caucasus.[5]
By late September 1942, SS Division Wiking was in a
position to launch an assault to capture the vital city of Grozny. Working in cooperation
with General der Panzertruppen Traugott Herr's 13.Panzer-Division, a plan was arranged to
capture the city. As they reached the Terek River, the Soviet defences
solidified. Several obstacle belts had to be breached before the Georgian Road (along which
American supplies were transported) could be reached. Realising the
difficult situation, Felix Steiner divided his division into
four columns, each with separate objectives, but all aimed at
breaching the Soviet defences and opening a road to the Caspian Sea.
The SS Regiment Nordland was to attack along the Kurp
River to Malgobek. The SS
Panzer battalion Wiking, with elements of the SS Regiment
Germania, was to breach the main line of defence and
establish a bridgehead. The SS Regiment Westland was to
capture the town of Sagopshin, and the division's engineer
component, along with the rest of SS Regiment Germania was
to advance along the Kurp.
The attack got underway on the night of 25/26 September 1942. SS
Regiment Nordland's assault soon bogged down, as they
realized that not only were they outnumbered by the Red Army, but
they were also well entrenched in prepared positions. Within thirty
minutes, almost half of the men of regiment had fallen. Despite
this, they still captured the hill, and its commander Fritz von
Scholz was awarded the Knight's Cross for his actions during
the battle. The division finally captured Malgobek on 6 October,
however the objective of seizing the capital and opening a road to
the Caspian was not achieved. The closest point to Grozny, Hill
701, was captured by the Finnish
volunteers (III (finn.) Battalion SS Regiment
Nordland. During this operation, SS Division
Wiking lost over 1,500 men. Several combat units were
reduced to only dozens of men, and as a veteran later wrote,
"Casualties weren't counted any more, just men left alive."
In the first week of November 1942, the division was transferred
from the Terek bend to the Urukh-Alagir sector to participate in
the renewed attack eastwards, which was attempted in the direction
of Ordzhonikidze rather than via Grozny. It ended up arriving just
in time to extricate the 13th Panzer
Division from encirclement at Gisel, after which it took up
defensive positions behind the Fiagdon river. The encirclement of
the 6.Armee at Stalingrad meant that the
Caucasus was relegated to a secondary theater, and when the attempt
to relieve Stalingrad failed in the face of further Soviet
advances, the entire Caucasian position itself began to come under
threat. SS Division Wiking was one of the first formations
to be withdrawn to bolster the retreating 4th Panzer Army,
entraining from 24 December for transport to Remontnaya, arriving
there on 31 December. The division fell back through Zimovniki,
Proletarskaya (holding open the bridge over the Manych), Zelina and
Yegorlykskaya towards Bataisk and Rostov, finally escaping through
the Rostov gap on 4 February.
In late November 1942 the division was redesignated the
5th SS Panzergrenadier Division
Wiking..[6] By
now the division had gained a reputation as an elite formation. In
early 1943, the division was ordered to fall back to the Ukraine
south of Kharkov, recently abandoned by Paul Hausser's II.SS-Panzerkorps, and now the scene
of fierce fighting for its recapture.
Erich von
Manstein, the new commander of Army Group South, threw 5 SS
Wiking and the 11th
Panzer-Division into action against the Soviet Mobile Group
Popov, which was threatening to break through to the vital rail
line. 5 SS Wiking had great difficulty dealing with the
armour heavy Soviet formation. The Panzergrenadier regiments of 5
SS Wiking were exhausted and understrength from the
fighting in the Caucasus, and the Panzer Battalion lacked
sufficient armour to counter the Soviet force. Despite this, the
division held off the Soviet assault, protecting the vital rail
line and helping bring about the destruction of Mobile Group Popov.
After the recapture of Kharkov, 5 SS
Wiking was pulled out of combat to be refitted as a
Panzergrenadier division.
Thanks to Heinrich Himmler's and Paul Hausser's
efforts, it had been decided that all Waffen SS Panzergrenadier
divisions were to have a regiment of Panzers, rather than only a
battalion. This meant that the SS Panzergrenadier formations were
full sized Panzer divisions in all but name. With the upgrade to Panzergrenadier
status, the division received SdKfz 251 halftracks for
one battalion of infantry and an additional panzer Battalion began
forming on 28 February 1943. It would be over a year before the new
battalion would receive its baptism of fire at Kovel.
During mid 1943, 5 SS Wiking underwent a major
transformation. Steiner, now an Gruppenführer, was transferred to command
of the III (Germanic) SS Panzer
Corps, currently forming in Croatia. His replacement was Herbert Otto
Gille, who was to prove himself Steiner's equal. The remnants
of the veteran SS Regiment Nordland, along with its
commander Fritz von Scholz, were removed from the division and used
as the nucleus of the new 11th SS
Volunteer Panzergrenadier Division Nordland. Also, the Finnish
Volunteer Battalion of the Waffen-SS was disbanded, as the
agreed two years' service of the Finnish volunteers had
expired.
In an attempt to offset the loss of the Finns and the
Nordland regiment, the newly formed Estonian volunteer formation Estonian Volunteer
Panzergrenadier Bataillon Narwa was attached to the
division.[6]
While the division was refitting, it was involved in minor
skirmishes with partisans. The reorganization was
completed by late June, and the division was moved to Izyum where it,
along with the 23.Panzer-Division was to form the reserve
force for Manstein's Army Group during the approaching Operation Citadel. While the operation was
in effect, several Soviet formations attacked towards Orel and Kharkov simultaneously. The
5 SS Wiking was engaged against the forces near Kharkov,
with the Estonians acquitting themselves well, destroying around
100 Soviet tanks over several days. When Citadel was canceled, the
division was still involved in halting Soviet attacks.
Further to the south, on the Mius-Front, a major Soviet offensive, Operation Rumyantsev, threatened to break
the German lines. 5 SS Wiking was joined by the 3rd SS
Panzergrenadier Division Totenkopf and 2nd SS Panzergrenadier Division
Das Reich and sent to the Mius-Bogodukhov sector to
halt the Soviet attacks. In subsequent fighting, the SS divisions
defeated two Soviet tank armies (totaling over 1,000 tanks) and
destroyed over 800 tanks. At no time did the SS divisions have any
more than 50 panzers in working order. In October, the division was
again pulled back out of the line, this time to be restructured as
a panzer division, the 5th SS Panzer Division
Wiking. [6]
To bolster the strength of the division, the Walloon volunteer unit 5th SS-Sturmbrigade Wallonien was
attached to the division, under command of Leon Degrelle. They
were the subject of ridicule from many Wiking veterans
until they proved their worth in the fighting for a forest near
Teklino, at the head of a salient into the Soviet lines. A second panzer
Battalion was also ordered to begin formation in Germany.
While the 5 SS Wiking was engaged near Teklino, several Red Army tank formations had
advanced along the side of the salient and succeeded in encircling
the German forces of XLII and XI Army Corps near Korsun.
During the battle of the Korsun-Cherkassy Pocket, 5 SS
Wiking defended against Soviet attacks on the eastern side
of the pocket. While General of Artillery Wilhelm
Stemmerman, the overall commander of the pocket, moved his
forces to the west in readiness for an attempt to breakout, 5 SS
Wiking, along with the 5th SS Sturmbrigade were
ordered to act as the rearguard. After repulsing all Soviet
attempts to break through near the town of Novaya-Buda, the 5 SS
Wiking rearguard split up and began withdrawing one
platoon at a time, under cover of darkness. Advancing through
Hell's Gate, the 5 SS Wiking came under heavy
fire. The division suffered heavy losses in men and materials
during the carnage of the Korsun Pocket. Gille the Divisional
commander, had proven his loyalty to his men, fighting alongside
them and remaining in action until all survivors had escaped. He
was one of the last to cross the Gniloy Tikich river to safety.
After the end of this battle, the 5th SS Sturmbrigade
Wallonien brigade was withdrawn from the division.
After a brief period of rest and refit, the 5 SS Wiking
was sent to assist in the defence of Kovel, which was under threat from a strong
Soviet force. Gille led his men towards the town and began setting
up a defensive perimeter, which was soon encircled by the Red Army.
The II.Battalion, SS Panzer Regiment 5 Wiking, newly
equipped with Panther Tanks, along with the
III.Battalion, SS Panzergrenadier Regiment Germania, newly
equipped and up to strength, arrived at the front from Germany and
began to form a relief unit. The unit was under the command of Obersturmführer Karl Nicolussi Leck, commander of
8.Company, II.Battalion, SS Panzer Regiment 5 Wiking.
Nicolussi Leck immediately launched an attack with five tanks. Soon
after beginning the attack, he received a radio message from the
besieged commander to halt his attack and withdraw. Nicolussi Leck
ordered his radio operator to ignore the call, and continue with
the attack. Risking court martial, Nicolussi-Leck proceeded to
fight his way though the Red Army encirclement, destroying several
tanks in the process. His Panther tank was the first vehicle to
break the encirclement, for his actions he was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron
Cross.[7]
After the relief force had established a corridor to the trapped
forces, the withdrawal began. Unlike the previous encirclement at
Korsun, they managed to escape with most of their equipment
intact.
In late August 1944, the division was ordered back to Modlin on the Vistula River line near Warsaw where it was to join the newly formed Army Group
Vistula. Fighting alongside the Luftwaffe's Fallschirm-Panzer
Division 1 Hermann Göring, the division annihilated
the Red Army 3rd Tank Corps. The advent of the Warsaw Uprising
brought the Soviet offensive to a halt, and relative peace fell on
the front line as in Warsaw Higher SS
and Police Leader Erich von
dem Bach Zelewski destroyed Warsaw with its civilians and Home
Army. The division remained in the Modlin area for the rest of the
year, grouped with the 3 SS Division Totenkopf as IV SS Panzer
Corps. Gille was promoted to command of the new SS Panzer
Corps, and after a brief period with Oberführer Dr. Eduard Deisenhofer in command, Standartenführer Johannes Mühlenkamp, commander of
the SS Panzer Regiment 5 Wiking, took command. Heavy
defensive battles around Modlin followed for the rest of the year,
and in October, Mühlenkamp was replaced by Oberführer Karl Ullrich. Ullrich
would lead the division for the rest of the war.
In late December 1944, the German forces, including 9th SS Mountain Corps, defending Budapest were encircled and
the IV.SS-Panzer Corps was ordered south to join Hermann Balck's 6th Army (Army Group Balck), which
was mustering for a relief effort, codenamed Operation
Konrad.
As a part of Operation Konrad I, the 5 SS Division
Wiking was committed to action on 1 January 1945, fighting
alongside the 3 SS Division Totenkopf. Near Tata, the
advance columns of 5 SS Division Wiking attacked the
Fourth Guards Tank Army. A heavy battle ensued, with the 5 SS
Division Wiking and the 3 SS Division Totenkopf
destroying many of the Red Armies tanks. In three days their panzer
spearheads had driven 45 kilometers over rugged terrain, over half
the distance from the start point to Budapest. The Soviets
maneuvered forces to block the advance, and they barely managed to
halt the advance at Bicske,
only 28 kilometres from Budapest.
Gille pulled the 5 SS Division Wiking out of the line and
moved it to the south of Esztergom, near the Danube bend. The second relief attempt, to be
known as Operation Konrad II, got under way on 7 January. In
atrocious conditions, the 5 SS Division Wiking advanced
southwards towards Budapest. By 12 January, the SS Panzergrenadier
Regiment Westland had reached Pilisszentkereszt, barely 20
kilometers from Buda. That morning
the panzergrenadiers spotted the church spires and turrets of the
distinctive Budapest skyline poking through the morning fog.
Despite its success, they had overextended and were vulnerable to
attack, unable to exploit its breakthrough and eventually ordered
to pull back and regroup. Hitler was furious at the lack of progress,
and called the operation 'utterly pointless'.
A third attempt, Operation Konrad III, launched in cooperation with
the veteran III.Panzerkorps took place 100 kilometers
to the south. This attack resulted in a 15 mile gap in the Soviet
lines and the destruction of the 135th Rifle Corps. Only the quick
redeployment of more troops by the Russians prevented a German
breakthrough. By the end of January the 5 SS Division
Wiking and 3 SS Division Totenkopf had suffered
almost 8,000 casualties, including over 200 officers.
At the beginning of February, the besieged forces capitulated, and
the 5 SS Division Wiking was ordered west to Lake Balaton where Obergruppenführer Sepp Dietrich's 6th SS Panzer Army was preparing for
another offensive.
After the failure of Konrad III, the 5 SS Division
Wiking began defensive operations, falling back into Czechoslovakia.
West of Budapest in more defensive operations, moving into the area
of Czechoslovakia. Gille's corps was too depleted to take part in
Operation Frühlingserwachen
near Lake Balaton,
and instead remained as a support to the 6th SS Panzer Army during
the beginning of the Operation.
5 SS Division Wiking performed a holding operation on the
left flank of the offensive, in the area between Velenczesee-Stuhlweissenberg. As Frühlingserwachen
progressed, the division was heavily engaged preventing Soviet
efforts to outflank the advancing German forces.
As the offensive stalled, the Soviets launched a major offensive,
the Vienna Operation, on 15 March. Attacking the border between the
3 SS Division Totenkopf, stationed to the north of 5 SS
Division Wiking, and the Hungarian 2nd Armoured Division,
contact was soon lost between these formations. Acting quickly,
Balck recommended moving the I.SS Panzer Corps north to plug the
gap and prevent the encirclement of the IV.SS Panzer Corps. Despite
this quick thinking, a Führer Order authorising this move
was slow in coming, and when the divisions finally began moving, it
was too late. On 22 March, the Soviet encirclement of the 3 SS
Division Totenkopf and 5 SS Division Wiking was
almost complete. Desperate, Balck threw the veteran 9th SS Panzer Division
Hohenstaufen into the area to hold open the small
corridor. In the battle to hold open the Berhida Corridor,
the Hohenstaufen bled itself white, but Gille's corps
managed to escape.
On 24 March, another Soviet attack threw the exhausted IV.SS Panzer
Corps back towards Vienna, all
contact was lost with the neighboring I.SS Panzer Corps and any
semblance of an organised line of defence was gone. The 5 SS
Division Wiking executed a fighting withdrawal into
Czechoslovakia. By early May, they were within reach of the
American forces, to whom the division officially surrendered near
Fürstenfeld, Austria on 9 May.[6]
Members of the division's bakery column, led by Obersturmführer Braunnagel and Untersturmführer Kochalty, assisted Einsatzgruppe A in rounding up Ukrainian
Jews. Witnesses report that the Jewish victims were forced to run a
gauntlet formed by soldiers who would beat them as they passed, and
when they reached the end of the gauntlet, Einsatzgruppen officers
murdered them and their bodies were pushed into a bomb crater. The
German 1st
Mountain Division is also suspected of being implicated.
Between 50 and 60 Jews were killed in this manner, as a part of the
larger Einsatzgruppe operation which resulted in over 700
murders.
In addition historian Eleonore Lappin from the Institute for the
History of Jews in Austria has documented several cases of war
crimes committed by members of the 5 SS Division Wiking in
her work The Death Marches of Hungarian Jews Through Austria in
the Spring of 1945
On March 28 1945 eighty Jews from evacuation column, though fit for
the journey, had been shot by three members of the Waffen SS
division ;;Wiking and five military policemen. On April 4,
twenty members of another column that left Graz tried to escape
near Eggenfeld, not far from Gratkorn. Soldiers from the 5 SS
Division Wiking that were temporarily stationed there
apprehended them in the forest near Mt. Eggenfeld and then herded
them in a gully, where they were shot. On April 7 and 11, 1945
members of the division executed another eighteen escaped
prisoners. 5 SS Division Wiking war crimes have not been
confirmed, mostly because they were not proven guilty in the
Nuremberg trials.[8]
The notorious Dr. Josef Mengele, served with the SS Division Wiking during its early campaigns. According to all accounts, he performed the normal duties of a combat medic, even being awarded the Iron Cross for saving two wounded men from a tank. After being wounded, Mengele was deemed unfit for combat and was absorbed into the SS Nazi concentration camp system, where he gained his infamy. Mengele was very proud of his Waffen SS service and his front-line decorations. As the true horrors of the concentration camp system came to light, his former comrades attempted to have his name removed from the division's roll of veterans.[9]
| June 1941 | 19,377 |
| Dec 1942 | 15,928 |
| Dec 1943 | 14,647 |
| June 1944 | 17,368 |
| Dec 1944 | 14,800 |
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  | Wiking Division - .:: Wiking Ruf - Europäische Freiwillige in der Waffen-SS ::. |
| | What made this man Mengele - What Made This Man? Mengle |
| | SS-Division Wiking at Rostov July 1942 - Axis History Factbook: SS-Division Wiking at Rostov July 1942 |
| | 5. SS-Panzer-Division Wiking - Axis History Factbook: 5. SS-Panzer-Division Wiking |
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