Wehrmacht (Nazi Germany)

Wehrmacht
Wehrmacht
Active	16 March 1935 – 8 May 1945
Country	Nazi Germany
Type	Armed forces
Engagements	Second World War

The Wehrmacht was the armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 until the German surrender in May 1945. It replaced the Reichswehr during German rearmament. The Heer formed its land component. Naval forces were organized as the Kriegsmarine, while the Luftwaffe controlled military aviation.

The Wehrmacht carried out Germany's military campaigns during the Second World War. Its forces occupied much of continental Europe before sustained Allied offensives forced Germany into retreat. Wehrmacht commands and units also participated in occupation crimes, the mass death of Soviet prisoners of war and the implementation of criminal orders on the Eastern Front.

The Wehrmacht was also part of the wartime history of people who later affected the principal families and the Tanoa Einsatzgruppen. Angelo van Noord and Martin Paap I served together during the German invasion of the Netherlands. Jan Paap served in the Heer from 1936 until deserting in January 1944, months before he founded the Argentine Einsatz.

Formation and expansion

Germany entered the 1930s with the Reichswehr, whose size and equipment were restricted under the settlement following the First World War. After Adolf Hitler became Chancellor in 1933, the German government accelerated rearmament. Military conscription was restored in 1935 as restrictions on German armed strength were openly rejected.

On 16 March 1935, the German government announced the restoration of military sovereignty and reorganized the armed forces under the name Wehrmacht. The former Reichsheer became the Heer. The Reichsmarine was reorganized as the Kriegsmarine. The Luftwaffe emerged publicly as Germany's air service after having been developed in secret.

Expansion continued through the second half of the 1930s. New formations were raised while existing units received more personnel and equipment. The army expanded particularly quickly after the return of conscription. German rearmament also increased aircraft production and naval construction.

Angelo van Noord had entered German military service on 1 November 1934 with Kraftfahr-Abteilung Cannstadt. He remained in service through the 1935 reorganization and later served with Aufklärungs-Abteilung 5. By 1939 he was an officer in the 2. Panzer-Division and participated in the invasion of Poland.

Jan Paap entered 2./Infanterie-Regiment 39 at Münster in March 1936, aged 17. His father, Martinus Antonius Johannes Paap, had used military contacts to arrange his early voluntary entry after repeated problems with Jan's behaviour in Warendorf. Paap transferred with his battalion to 2./Infanterie-Regiment 78 later that year and remained in the Heer when the Second World War began.

Organization

The Wehrmacht was divided between the Heer and two other services. The Kriegsmarine commanded German naval forces. The Luftwaffe operated the air arm and also controlled formations such as the Fallschirmjäger.

Adolf Hitler became supreme commander of the armed forces in 1938. The Oberkommando der Wehrmacht was created that year under Wilhelm Keitel after the removal of the Reich War Ministry. It acted as Hitler's principal armed-forces command staff, although the individual services retained their own high commands and continued to exercise substantial authority over their forces.

Military intelligence was handled by the Abwehr under the armed-forces command until its wartime reorganization. The Abwehr also controlled special-purpose formations used for infiltration and the seizure of important positions. Baulehr-Bataillon z.b.V. 800 was one of these units and later developed into the Brandenburg formations.

The Waffen-SS was separate from the Wehrmacht. It belonged to the SS and developed from armed Nazi Party formations. Waffen-SS units nevertheless fought alongside Wehrmacht forces and were placed under military operational commands during campaigns. Otto Hoos, for example, served in the Waffen-SS rather than the Wehrmacht, while Angelo van Noord spent most of his wartime career in Wehrmacht formations before a final posting to the SS-Jagdverbände in 1945.

Second World War

Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939. Wehrmacht ground forces advanced into Poland while the Luftwaffe attacked Polish military positions and transport routes. The campaign ended with the defeat of organized Polish field forces after Germany and the Soviet Union occupied the country from opposite directions.

Angelo van Noord served with the 2. Panzer-Division during the invasion. He remained with its reconnaissance formation until March 1940, when he transferred to the Abwehr.

In April 1940, German forces invaded Denmark before completing the occupation of Norway after fighting that continued into June. The western offensive began on 10 May 1940 when German forces entered the Netherlands and Belgium. The main advance into France passed through the Ardennes and crossed the Meuse.

Van Noord had received command of 4./Baulehr-Bataillon z.b.V. 800 shortly before the attack on the Netherlands. His company was ordered to seize bridges over the Maas and the Maas–Waal Canal before Dutch troops could demolish them. Small groups crossed the border using disguises that included civilian clothing and forged Dutch uniforms. Van Noord personally led the attack on the railway bridge at Gennep. Martin Paap I served in his company as an Unteroffizier.

After the western campaign, Baulehr-Bataillon z.b.V. 800 was expanded into Lehr-Regiment "Brandenburg" z.b.V. 800. Martin Paap remained with the Brandenburg formation. Van Noord received battalion command and later held regimental appointments as the formation expanded further.

The Luftwaffe also used airborne formations during the early campaigns. Antonie Ronald Paap entered German service in September 1939 after completing parachute training. He fought as a Fallschirmjäger during the invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940. In 1941 he took part in the Battle of Crete before Fallschirmjäger formations were increasingly employed as ground infantry.

Eastern Front

Germany invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941. The Wehrmacht initially advanced across large parts of the western Soviet Union, but German forces failed to capture Moscow before the winter. The Eastern Front became the largest land theatre of the war.

Jan Paap moved east with the 26. Infanterie-Division in June 1941. His regiment was later redesignated Grenadier-Regiment 78. On 6 January 1943, Paap encountered Antonie Ronald Paap at a recently recaptured airfield near Rzhev. Their argument over Jan's refusal to become Great Paap developed into a fight before officers separated them. Jan was temporarily transferred to the divisional supply troops as punishment.

Angelo van Noord also served in the east with the Brandenburg formation. He commanded its 1st Battalion from November 1941 until March 1943. Records place the battalion near Kursk and Voronezh. It later operated along the Don before moving into the Caucasus.

German forces suffered a major defeat at Stalingrad during the winter of 1942–1943. The Battle of Kursk followed in July 1943. Soviet offensives then forced German units progressively westward, with Operation Bagration destroying much of Army Group Centre in 1944.

Jan Paap was court-martialled after leading an unauthorized attack west of Kursk in July 1943. His one-year prison sentence was suspended while the war continued, and he was transferred to 1./Infanterie-Bataillon z.b.V. 500. On 17 January 1944, he decided to desert. SS-Untersturmführer Georg Schäfer helped him move away from the front after Paap paid him and obtained forged civilian papers. Paap crossed occupied Europe before entering Spain and eventually travelling to Argentina.

Occupation and war crimes

Wehrmacht operations were closely connected to German occupation policy. Military authorities controlled large territories behind the front and cooperated with Nazi police and SS organizations. German occupation used forced labour and mass execution. Reprisals were carried out against civilians in areas where partisan activity occurred.

The invasion of the Soviet Union was accompanied by orders that rejected established protections for captured Soviet personnel and civilians. Wehrmacht units carried out the Commissar Order, under which captured Soviet political commissars were to be executed. German military authorities also subjected Soviet prisoners of war to starvation and lethal conditions while cooperating with SS killing operations.

Wehrmacht forces participated in the persecution and murder of Jews in occupied Soviet territory. Military commands supplied transport and logistical assistance to SS killing units. Army units also carried out shootings themselves and took part in anti-partisan operations in which civilians were killed.

Jan Paap's Heer record contains documented examples of these crimes. After returning to Grenadier-Regiment 78 in March 1943, he repeatedly shot Soviet soldiers after they had surrendered. Officers knew of some of the killings but did not punish him. His conduct continued after his transfer to Infanterie-Bataillon z.b.V. 500, where he killed captured or wounded Soviet soldiers after German forces took positions.

Paap also killed his Gruppenführer on 28 August 1943 after repeated disputes with the NCO. The death was believed at the time to have occurred during fighting with Soviet troops. Paap admitted responsibility only in a later memoir.

The Wehrmacht's participation in these crimes later contradicted post-war claims that German military forces had fought separately from the criminal policies of the Nazi state. Responsibility differed between units and individuals, but military participation in mass violence was extensive, particularly on the Eastern Front.

Collapse and dissolution

By 1944, German forces were retreating in both eastern and western Europe. The western Allies landed in Normandy on 6 June and advanced toward Germany after breaking out of the beachhead. Soviet armies continued their advance from the east.

Germany launched its final major western offensive in the Ardennes in December 1944. The offensive failed by January 1945. Allied forces crossed the Rhine in March while Soviet troops advanced toward Berlin.

Martin Paap I remained with the Brandenburg formation through the war and stayed in German military service until 1945. Antonie Ronald Paap was serving in Italy during the final period of the conflict. Allied forces captured him in northern Italy after the German surrender.

Berlin fell during the final weeks of the war. Adolf Hitler died on 30 April 1945. German representatives signed an unconditional surrender at Reims on 7 May, with the surrender taking effect in western Europe on 8 May. German forces in the east ceased organized resistance under the final surrender arrangements shortly afterward.

The Wehrmacht stopped functioning as an armed force with Germany's defeat. Allied occupation authorities disarmed German formations and dismantled the military institutions of the Nazi state. The remaining legal structures of the Wehrmacht were formally abolished by the Allied Control Council in 1946.

Aftermath

Allied investigations after the war examined German commanders and the conduct of military formations. Senior officers were prosecuted for crimes committed during the war. Post-war accounts by former officers often presented the Wehrmacht as an ordinary professional military force separate from Nazi crimes. This interpretation became known as the myth of the clean Wehrmacht and was later rejected as evidence of military participation in occupation crimes became more widely documented.

Angelo van Noord was arrested in Austria in June 1946 after living under false identities. Dutch authorities sought his extradition over the bridge operations of May 1940. He was extradited to the Netherlands in October 1947 and remained under investigation until the public prosecutor ended the case on 4 March 1950. The decision stated that any likely sentence would not exceed the time he had already spent in detention.

Antonie Ronald Paap was questioned by Dutch authorities after his release from prisoner-of-war detention in 1947. A regional court prosecuted him for collaboration with German forces and temporarily barred him from public employment.

Jan Paap had already left the Wehrmacht before Germany's defeat. He reached Rada Tilly on 13 May 1944 and founded the Argentine Einsatz that day. The organization reached Tanoa on 9 August and was reorganized as the Tanoa Einsatzgruppen, with Paap becoming its first Führer.

German surrender later became directly relevant to Paap's new regime. On 8 May 1945, he authorized Operation Sternzug to obtain German rocket personnel and technical records. The first copied V-2 archive reached Tanoan custody in June.

See also

• Nazi Germany
• Second World War
• Waffen-SS
• Angelo van Noord
• Martin Paap (father)
• Jan Paap
• Antonie Ronald Paap
• History of the Tanoa Einsatzgruppen