SS Foreign Divisions & Volunteers of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, 1941-1945: Images of War Series

1-229150

Offers a superb collection of rare and unpublished photographs. Unlike her Latvian neighbor, Lithuania had no plans to provide Germany with a National Legion. Although volunteers came forward, the majority did not. This was not the case for Latvia and Estonia, which undertook huge recruitment programs, and thousands of men were drafted into their own foreign legion of Waffen-SS Grenadier divisions. After intensive training, these divisions saw action on the Eastern front, around Leningrad, and in the Ukraine before defensive operations in the Baltic States in 1944.

Even in the last dying weeks of the war, what was left of the Baltic soldiers of the 15th, 19th and 20th Waffen-SS Grenadier Divisions continued to fight alongside their Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS counterparts until they were destroyed or surrendered.