19 Dec. 45
After the launching of the Polish invasion and as the
war progressed, still further divisions were added. The Organization
Book of the Nazi Party for 1943, our Document Number 2640-PS, lists
some eight divisions and two infantry brigades as existing at the end of
1942. I refer to Page 427b of the original, Page 5, last paragraph of
the translation. This was no longer an emergency force. It was an SS
army and hence came to be designated as the Waffen-SS. Himmler referred
to this spectacular development of this SS combat branch in his speech
at Posen on 4 October 1943 to SS Gruppenführer. That speech has
already been introduced in evidence at an earlier stage in the case, as
Exhibit Number USA-170. It is our Document Number 1919-PS.
I shall quote from that speech, Page 51 of the original, Page 2 of the
translation, second paragraph, headed "The SS in Wartime." I
quote:
"Now I come to our own development,
to that of the SS in the past months. Looking back on the whole war,
this development was fantastic. It took place at an absolutely
terrific speed. Let-us look back a little to 1939. At that time we
were a few regiments, guard units, 8,000 to 9,000 strong — that
is, not even a division, all in all 25,000 to 28,000 men at the
outside. True, we were armed, but we really only got our artillery
regiment as our heavy arm 2 months before the war began."
I
continue, quoting from the same speech a passage found on Page 8 of the
English translation and on Page 104 of the original. The passage in the
translation appears at about the middle of the page.
"In the hard battles of this year,
the Waffen-SS has been welded together in the bitterest hours from the
most varied divisions and sections out of which it was formed:
Bodyguard units" — Leibstandarte — "military SS"
— Verfügungstruppe — "Death's-Head Units, and then
the Germanic SS. Now when our Divisions 'Reich,' 'Death's-Head,' the
Cavalry Division, and 'Viking' were together, everyone knew in these
last weeks: 'Viking' is at my side, 'Reich' is at my side,
'Death's-Head' is at my side. Thank God, now nothing can happen to us."
The transformation of small emergency forces into a combat army did not
result in a separation of this branch from the SS.
Although tactically under the command of the Wehrmacht while in the
field, it remained as much a part of the SS as any other branch of the
organization. Throughout the war it was recruited, trained,
administered, and supplied by the main offices of the SS