An Experience
A
front experience will be presented here, which says more about the unity of
officer and men in our troop than instructive words, one of those modest
occurrences among hundreds. And yet, deep and genuine loyalty radiates from
this story about an unfulfilled comradely deed.
That was back in the
west, in the last days of May in the year 1940, when our regiment smashed into
the collapsing enemy. A company commander worked his way with two messengers
into the foremost line in order to reconnoitre new positions. On his orders the
bulk of the company stayed back under cover so as to not unnecessarily endanger
life in the hail of enemy shells. In the thick bushes and enemy fire, he lost
his two messengers and leapt from cover to cover alone. Not far. For an enemy
bullet ripped his hand and another his leg. Laboriously, he crawled back until
he reached his company again. Seriously wounded. A few bandages supplied the
first aid. With silent and sad mood, the officer’s driver had been the first to
rush over and stood before his chief as if he wanted to complain: “Why didn’t
you take me along? I would have certainly protected you...!”
But the next moment
his vehicle was already ready to take his wounded chief to the field hospital.
On the trip the
driver did not speak one syllable.
A soft, almost
motherly expression was on his face and a fearful sadness. Then his clear head
became iron and rigid again, as if the trip led to hell. Every encouraging word
of the officer faded without being able to produce more than a painful tremble
on his mouth. It almost looked as if not the chief, rather the upright driver,
had to drive back to the surgeon with the bullets in his body. The driver
remained silent to the chiefs questions and a restrain sobbing coughed the
youth.
“Faiss, good old
driver, what is wrong with you? I will soon be well again and with you!” The
officer tried to comfort him. But then the youth lost his composure.
“No”, he said, and a
few tears slid down his dusty face. “That alone is not what it is, Hauptsturmführer. I have always
thought that I must be with you... and if you were one day wounded... that I
could then save you. And today it happened, and I was not with you...”
As if a whole world
had collapsed, so shaken did he speak it. But the company commander’s heart was
moved, when he heard these few words, which encompassed an entire world, and a
glowing wave of comradeship embraced both of them.
The wounds no longer
burned and the day was suddenly brighter and more beautiful.
The comradeship,
which day and night seemed a self-evident manifestation of soldierly life to
both of them, had through the words of the loyal driver been suddenly brightly
illuminated, and almost hurt in its kindness and purity...
That is the story of
an unfilled comradely deed, which actually in truth had found its highest
fulfillment in the decoration of the heart. It is also a little monument to all
of our good soldiers. That is the best bond that surrounds officer and
enlisted man in the Waffen-SS: the unbreakable loyalty.
Of Personality
Should we in the
Waffen-SS speak of “authority”? Does not a mysterious energy flow from the
genuine leader, which shines through the whole unit and draws all to him? What
kind of pitiful authority was the one that Jews and Marxists tried to convince
us of: authority as something not personal, rather only a function of the
office or uniform of the holder? They themselves only wanted to interpret the
concept of authority so as to bestow the appearance of leadership on their
pitiful inability. There is no officer among us who would claim authority, because
he wears the rank insignia of a superior, rather National Socialist authority
declares the opposite, that is wears the rank insignia, because it documents
the inner and outer worth for it. Hence our authority does not last as long as
we wear the insignia, rather we wear the insignia s long as we possess the
inner worth for it. Thus we must always strive to prove ourselves worthy,
always work on ourselves, and the outer rise of a career can be nothing other
than the equal rise of our accomplishment. Only so should we perceive the
concept of authority. The content of our work, of our accomplishment, of our life,
can alone be the measurement for the degree of our authority. Only its being
made visible needs as external attribute the rank insignia. Thus perceived,
every officer rank will demand respect from the start, for every subordinate
knows that the difference in rank is only a criterion for the superior strength
of accomplishment.
The Political Soldier
It is obvious that
the force of attraction that emits from the military officer is in the final
analysis based on his faith in Germany, which means in his political view.
Today it may already seem incomprehensible that there were once non-political
officers and non-political soldiers. This manifestation can only be understood
in terms of the political division of our German folk. The far-reaching result
was that after splendid military victories, the following political results
were often enough pitiful. The great historical end of such ideological
division came about through the Führer
through
the creation of the political soldier in his embodiment in the Waffen-SS!
Unfortunately, in the past, politics and Wehrmacht too often marched
separately. In the Waffen-SS, for the first time, the indissolvable union has
been created in such a way that idea and sword belong together, that the
political will strengthens the sword of the soldier to invincibility!
From that each
officer in the Waffen-SS must draw the conclusion that he sees as his highest
example the Führer as
the most glorious union of the political and military will-bearer of the
nation. The Führer lives
as an example of this necessity for us and for the entire German folk numbering
millions. Each SS officer must be a small copy of this in his circle of
activity, the officer of a platoon, of a company or of a regiment. The military
deeds of his unit can be nothing else than the application of the political
will of his superiors on the military plain. He must always appear to his men
as the National Socialist, as the radiant political soldier with excellent
military ability. In both life tasks, he must always endeavor to perfect
himself. The National Socialist in him must always jealously strive to match
the military expert in him, and the military officer must never stand behind
the political one. The ideal of the union of both most outstanding elements of
an officer in the Waffen-SS must accompany us in all future in all great and
small things.
Of Volunteers and Reservists
In the Waffen-SS we
have a large number of volunteers. When the Führer started his fight for Germany, he had
nothing but the firm faith in the great future of his folk. Faith, however,
gave him words and deeds of enthusiasm and of power. His first followers came
and their number climbed from hundreds to thousands and hundreds-of-thousands.
But nobody was
drafted and brought by the power of a written law. Nobody was compelled to
come and dragged by the force of an external order. All of them came
voluntarily!
And voluntarism
became a graduator of the inner and outer power of the movement. The Waffen-SS
as the final perfection of the National Socialist military idea is nothing
other than a continuation of the military power of this idea. The decision to
join the Führer’s military
corps is nothing other than the free will for the continuation of the former
political struggle on another level. So the volunteers in the Waffen-SS are
the descendants of the old fighters who wish to do more than duty requires,
to voluntarily wage the fight for Germany like those old followers of the Führer. They may claim for
themselves to be young comrades of these old ones. They may say of themselves
that they, too, want to voluntarily dedicate their life to Germany. Thus must
we also value the action of these young men.
In addition to these
volunteers among the Waffen-SS are also the reservists, who constitute
the main contingent of the German army. Inside our Waffen-SS, they are
naturally only a smaller portion. They have taken their path under more difficult
conditions than the young, active SS man. They have devoted time and energy to
learning a profession and at the same time they are soldiers. What personal
self-confidence must lie within them, since they belong to the “older” age
groups. Nonetheless, they believe in their strength so much that they feel
strong enough to be able to still keep up with the Führer’s charging youth. But they have at least one
thing in common with their young comrades: their young heart, and no young man
can say that these “older” men are behind him in that. But where the heart is
young, then body and spirit are with it! I do not believe that there is anybody
who can tell during a charge into enemy positions who is a reservist and who is
active. The life age is no longer written in the sweaty, dripping faces, in the
dusty features of the warriors, and the radiant eyes of both are the same.
Reservist or active soldier? Who asks about that in the hail of shells, in the
shell crater and in the trench? Both are comrades in the assault pace of our
struggle. How many are there among the reservists who come to the flag of
victory for the second time out of the same faith as in the period of struggle,
from the unshakeable loyalty to the Führer,
to
whom they can now visibly again prove that they still want to fight for him and
Germany with all the strength of their hearts and fists. And who had been there
in the period of struggle? Through the decision to voluntarily fight in our
ranks, they have proven that they belong to us and have always belonged to us.
They have made up the time and put themselves in the circle around the Führer, have grasped our
hands and hearts, and we have taken them in as our good comrades. The older a
reservist is, the younger must be his heart, the greater must we value him in
his faith in eternal Germany. The coming victory will have been won by neither
“actives” nor “reservists” alone, rather simply the German musketeer, and both
are that to the same degree. As long as we have reservists in our ranks, we
know that the faith in its own strength and the glorious victory does not only live
within the enthusiastic heart of the youth.
Alfred Jantsch
Achieve
much, stand out little, be more than appear. - Clausewitz
SS Leitheft, Year 8, Issue 2
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