The Crusade of a Walloon Volunteer: August 8, 1941 - May 5, 1945 by Gerry Villani

Author:Gerry Villani [Villani, Gerry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

Entry into the Waffen SS

After a well-deserved three weeks of vacation we rejoined our military camp where 2,000 legionnaires formed an infantry regiment with two battalions. Amongst them were many new recruits, former NCOs and officers of the Belgian Army, and former POWs. The staff was filled by veterans who had been promoted and I became a Caporal-Chef of Master Corporal, and I spent six weeks in a special training platoon where I received my new NCO shoulder boards. In the meantime we received an unexpected visit by the Reichsführer-S, and on June 3 all the foreign legions, considered as political formations, became part of the Waffen SS. Commander Lippert was promoted to Major, and on June 27 the Legion Wallonie was transported to Wildflecken. Now we were SS and this enraged our opponents even more who had seen us as traitors since August 1941. But I don’t want to express my opinion on that as numerous books have objectively been written about what happened and what didn’t happen on the topic of the SS or Waffen SS. But for many ignorant people this transition to the Waffen SS still ignites a lot of hate. For us legionnaires the transition from the Wehrmacht to the Waffen SS changed absolutely nothing to the cause we had joined in the first place. The only thing that changed was the salute and the insignia on the uniform, specifically the SS runes on the tunic collar and the death’s head on our headgear. Also, the motto on our belt buckle changed from “Gott Mit Uns” to “Meine Ehre Heißt Treue.” The fighting unit that would come out of this regiment was no longer an infantry regiment, but became a motorized assault brigade (Sturmbrigade Mot.) Personally I think this was the most beautiful unit I’ve ever known in the Legion Wallonie and in any other conventional ground army. An assault brigade of this model had enormous fire power and a huge variety of firearms. Such a unit was able to do anything considering its composition. The motorized infantry brigade consisted of: 1,000 men, a battery of 14 medium-sized tanks, an anti-aircraft battery of four 88 mm guns, an anti-tank battery of twelve 75 mm cannons, a battery of field artillery consisting of two 105 mm and two 75 mm cannons, a battery of two rapid firing 20 mm light anti-aircraft guns, one signals platoon, one motorcycle platoon, and one platoon of combat engineers. There was one general staff at company level and one at brigade level. Furthermore, we had a repair and maintenance unit. A true assault force that could be used in the campaign at Cherkasy with all the success that we had predicted.

From all these units the infantry battalion had its training on location. All the other units were part of the special weapons and received their training in different schools between July to October 1943. All the units of the newly formed brigade were wearing the name and insignia specifically for their unit and their mission, except for one: the platoon of assault pioneers.

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