Himmler's SS: Loyal to the Death's Head

463 Pages·2010·15.59 MB·English

by  Robin Lumsden

HIMMLER’S
HIMMLER’S
LOYAL TO THE
DEATH’S HEAD
ROBIN LUMSDEN
First published in 1997 as Himmler’s Black Order 1923-45
This edition first published 2009
The History Press
The Mill, Brimscombe Port
Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 2QG
www.thehistorypress.co.uk
This ebook edition first published in 2013
All rights reserved
© Robin Lumsden, 1997, 1999, 2005, 2009, 2013
The right of Robin Lumsden to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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EPUB ISBN 978 0 7524 9722 8
Original typesetting by The History Press
C
ONTENTS
Introduction
1. Origins and Early Development
2. The AllgemeineSS
General Organisation of the AllgemeineSS
SS Duties and Conditions of Service
The Racial Elite
Guardians of the State
The Industrial Empire
The SS Society
Noble Ancestors
The Next Generation
The Germanic-SS
Symbolism and Regalia of the Black Order
3. The Waffen-SS
Origins and Organisation of the Waffen-SS
The Waffen-SS at War
Waffen-SS Uniforms
Epilogue
Bibliography
I
NTRODUCTION
The SS is one of the best known, yet least understood, organisations in history.
To most people, it was simply a brutal arm of the Nazi state which had
subjugation by terror as its sole purpose. Consequently, it will forever be equated
with concentration camps, torture and mass extermination, and on that basis is
fated to be almost universally loathed and detested for generations to come.
Yet this dark side is only part of the SS story. The whole saga is considerably
more complex and, in many ways, almost defies belief. In ten years, the SS grew
from a small, unpaid bodyguard for a minor politician to a force which
dominated the racial, cultural and professional spheres of the most powerful
empire mainland Europe has ever seen. All the domestic police agencies of the
occupied territories were controlled by the SS, and a network of monopolistic
business enterprises gave the organisation’s hundreds of factories direct access to
their own raw materials, labour and internal markets. People in all walks of life,
from farmers and soldiers to academics and members of the aristocracy, flocked
to join the SS for their own selfish ends.
At the centre was Himmler, a ruthlessly ambitious idealist. From the day he
took command, Himmler was the SS and the SS Himmler. The organisation’s
progress became bound up with the career of its Reichsführer, who obtained one
important post after another until by 1945 he had concentrated more power in his
person than any other man except Hitler. Wherever Himmler secured a position,
he took the SS with him. The SS became both the basis and the instrument of his
strength. At the height of his influence, Himmler was Chief of Police, Reich
Minister of the Interior, an NSDAP Reichsleiter, a Member of the Reichstag,
Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of Germanism, Commander-in-Chief
of the Home Army, Chief of Military Armament and Commander of Army
Groups on the Rhine and Vistula. In effect, he and his SS controlled all forces,
military, paramilitary and police, on the German home front during the Second
World War.
Yet, with his crippling fascination for genealogy, medievalism and Germanic
lore, the Reichsführer-SS exercised total control over a juggernaut which he
regarded not as a political vehicle but as a racial Order. So far as Himmler was
concerned, the SS was first and foremost a multi-national family, a nordic clan
which would eventually unite the Germanic peoples of Europe so that they
would never again come into mutual conflict. Himmler planned that after the
victorious conclusion of the war, that last great war of extermination in which
the SS would prove itself through the achievements of its own battlefield units,
he and his successors would build up the Order and produce the leaders to direct
industry, agriculture, politics and the activities of the mind in a new pagan
Europe, policed and guarded by the SS.
For his part, Adolf Hitler was content to allow his loyal follower’s fancies
free rein, since he never needed to threaten would-be troublemakers with
anything other than being ‘handed over to Himmler’. The knowledge that the all-
powerful Reichsführer was lurking around as a sort of bogeyman was usually
enough to ensure that Hitler received only fawning adulation from all but the
strongest willed. As a result, Himmler’s personal hopes and dreams for the SS,
however unrealistic, were permitted to shape the development of the entire
organisation.
In writing this book, I hope to clear up some misconceptions and show that
the SS had many more facets than those generally known. Within Germany itself
during the Third Reich, the SS held a unique position. It was feared, yet it was
also genuinely respected and, in some cases, even revered. SS membership was
something to be highly valued, and the carefully designed uniforms and
accoutrements intended to set the new élite apart became instant status symbols
in the emerging empire. The extremely powerful influence of badges and regalia
should never be forgotten when trying to seek answers to the often-asked
question of why ordinary, law-abiding citizens happily subscribed to what is now
generally regarded as a murderous organisation.
Robin Lumsden
Cairneyhill, March 1997