Did the British SAS and the German SS ever come into combat during world war two?

Luke · #1 (**permalink**) April 9th, 2008, 10:23 PM

Any info would be cool,it will be interesting to see what happened between these very trained soldiers.

Za Rodinu · #2 (**permalink**) April 9th, 2008, 11:02 PM

Trained soldiers? SS? Sure!

Quote:

21. SS-Waffen-Gebirgs-Division Skanderbeg - In a desperate attempt to utilize all available sources of manpower, Himmler ordered formation of a Albanian mountain division on 17 April 44. The division recruited mostly from the Albanians living in Kosovo as they were believed to be of Aryan descent and more reliable than the tribes in Albania. The 7. SS-Gebirgs-Division Prinz Eugen furnished a cadre to form the basis of the new division. In addition the 13. SS-Gebirgs-Division Handschar provided a reinforced battalion of men of Albanian extraction. This was incorporated as III./Waffen-Gebirgsjäger-Rgt. 50.

The Albanians generally retained their traditional blood feuds and code of vengeance which greatly hindered their combat efficiency. They also proved to be less than enthusiatic at this late date and desertions were common. When the division moved into Macedonia in early September a thousand men from Waffen-Gebirgsjäger-Rgt. 50 deserted, complete with personal weapons and equipment. The third battalion, those men transferred from Handschar, accounted for some 697 of that total.

As the Soviets drew nearer, the Partisans grew bolder and initiated attacks in August on Skanderbeg's positions in the Kosovo area. This cost it some 300 casualties during the month. Not so curiously, the missing accounted for about half of that total, which leads me to suspect that many took the opportunity to desert.

By October, it was clear that that the Albanians were more trouble than they were worth and the division was reduced to a more sustainable regimentgruppe based on Waffen-Gebirgsjäger-Rgt. 51.

Nothing like the smell of a busted myth in the morning

Using a reputable source

Obscure Combat Formations of the SS - World War 2 Talk

Paul Errass · #3 (**permalink**) April 10th, 2008, 12:30 AM

Luke,

You can't compare the SAS to the SS , the SAS are are relatively small group of special forces , best in the world in my opinion and the SS were an Army of 1,000,000 men some of whom were arguably some of the finest combat troops of WW2 whilst others were almost useless as posted by Z R.

Paul

Luke · #4 (**permalink**) April 10th, 2008, 01:31 AM

Oic, nice info on the ss there za, i always used to think they where all like the sas of Germany, but i guess not all of there soldiers where that disciplined. And as for your opinion on the SAS being the best in the world paul, i completely agree with you, i've heard countless times that you have to be a bit loony to go through there extremely intense training process and i have read about a few missions they have done and left ALOT of destruction behind them.

Paul Errass · #5 (**permalink**) April 10th, 2008, 08:47 AM

We seem to have quickly digressed from your original question Luke , i'm sure that at some point the SAS and the SS would have been in combat against each other but i don't know of any specific incident , anyone any info on this one ???

Wessex Wyvern · #6 (**permalink**) April 10th, 2008, 08:53 AM

From here.
Special Air Service In Europe - Wild Bill Guarnere.Community

Quote:

Operation Bulbasket started on June 6th 1944, and the men sent to France were those from B squadron from the 1 SAS. Early targets included railway lines, the line between Dijon and Paris was blown up 22 times, 200 plus German soldiers were killed with 100 prisoners taken.

Some raiding parties often found themselves in unexpected and dangerous situations, one group led by Capt Harrison stumbled upon a large group of SS soldiers in the village of Les Ormes. As they drove into the village in two jeeps a German soldier waving a pistol at them had a nasty surprise when the twin Vickers guns opened up, the SS men in the village square scattered as their staff cars and trucks exploded. Most of them died in the first few seconds, as Harrison shouted at his driver to turn round for a second attack he found his driver dead slumped over the wheel, and the Vickers guns jammed. While the second jeep gave covering fire Harrison shot several more SS with his carbine then scrambled aboard under a hail of bullets. They raced back to base and later learned they had interrupted an SS execution squad planning to shoot 20 French hostages, two hostages had already been shot but the Germans loses included 60 men killed and all their transport destroyed.

Major Roy Farran was also carrying out effective raids at the same time, on the 20th August sixty men and twenty jeeps were transported by Dakota's to an airstrip near Rennes (200 miles west of Paris) Their objective was to attack any German columns they could find in the forest tracks north of Orleans. The most successful of these involved the attack on an occupied chateau at Chatillon, one group occupied a near by crossroads while Farran with nine jeeps took up positions at all junctions leading to Chatillon. A mortar bombardment caused a column planning to relieve the 150 troops at the chateau to stumble into the first groups ambush at the crossroads. Farran's group destroyed eight trucks loaded with troops; the battle became a series of surprise attacks by both sides.

Farran was nearly killed after being spotted on the edge of a ploughed field, his men were forced to crawl along the furrows under a hail of machine gun fire. They met up with the first group and took their wounded to field hospital at Aigny-le-Duc where they learnt the battle was over. Farran and his men were credited with killing 100 Germans, wounding many more and destroying nine trucks, four cars and a motorcycle.

By the end of July nearly 800 SAS men were in France and raiding from 18 bases.
A month later and 1100 men were behind enemy lines. It got to the stage that the Germans had anti SAS units working and they started to have an effect many men from 2 SAS never returned home.

It was not all success for the SAS, German agents infiltrated the Marquis and led a German ambush of 500 men to surround the SAS base near Verrieres on the 2/3rd July. As the Germans searched the woods the SAS decided to make a run for it, 34 of them kept together and were escaping down a forest track when they were ambuhed and captured. A wounded officer was brutally clubbed to death by German rifle butts. Some of the wounded men were taken to hospital and never seen again and all the captured men dissapeared as well.

It was a mystery as to what happened to them as some of those who ran managed to get out of the woods and make it back home to England.

As the allies pushed the Germans back they discovered the old SAS base near Verrieres and found a mass grave with 31 bodies buried, there were 30 SAS and one pilot who had been shot down.

After they were captured the men were handed over to German security service led by a man called Kieffer, they were tortured and he had all the men dressed in civillian clothing and had them all shot with Sten guns to make it look like some misunderstanding.

But unknown to Kieffer one man managed to escape, and after the war he gave evidence that helped to get Kiefer the death sentence at his tril in Nuremburg

After the war the job was not quite finished for the SAS, they stayed in Europe to track down SS and Gestapo and they were very successfull

Von Poop · #7 (**permalink**) April 10th, 2008, 08:59 AM

Those last 2 lines intrigue me, I knew of NKVD teams and other Allied units 'rounding up' postwar, but had never heard of anything specifically SAS-related. Any more known on these Nazi-hunters?

wtid45 · #8 (**permalink**) April 10th, 2008, 10:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Von Poop

Those last 2 lines intrigue me, I knew of NKVD teams and other Allied units 'rounding up' postwar, but had never heard of anything specifically SAS-related. Any more known on these Nazi-hunters?

see the book the secret hunters by antony kemp sas teams went after ss that had commited war crimes. even when sas was disbanded they carried on search for up to three years after the wars end