Lite intressant om Holy Cross Mountains Brigade ur polska motståndsrörelsen Narodowe Siły Zbrojne (NSZ) (Nationella stridskrafterna), senare använd för att skapa polska vaktförband i den amerikanska ockupationszonen.
Halibutt skrev:[*]There was also *some* cooperation between particular units of the Wehrmacht and particular units of the Polish underground in the later stages of WWII, but it was mostly tactical ("we won't attack you and in exchange you'll let us escape from the Soviets"). This was the case of, for instance, the Holy Cross Mountains Brigade of the National Armed Forces (a minority group when compared to the Home Army, but a sizeable unit nevertheless).
/Marcushttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Cross_Mountains_Brigade skrev:The brigade used a four-month truce with German forces as well as questionable contacts with German Gestapo officials to march behind German lines several hundred kilometers to the southwest in an ultimately successful bid to make contact with U.S. forces.
In January 1945 it began a retreat through Silesia into the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia with the tacit approval of German forces who did not wish to have a second front open at their backs while they were trying to fight against the advancing Red Army. Between January 15, 1945 and May of the same year the brigade suspended all military operations against the German army. The brigade's movement to Czechoslovakia during this time was aided by the confusion reigning in the German Army's rear areas that had been created by the January offensive of the Red Army.
In April 1945, now in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, the brigade found itself in an area surrounded by substantial German forces and its German contacts began insisting on closer collaboration. As a result the commanders of the brigade agreed to a limited plan whereby small units of the force were to cross or be parachuted by the Germans back into Poland in order to carry out intelligence work and possibly sabotage at the rear of the advancing Red Army. According to former soldiers, they were all instructed by the brigade's command to ignore their German assigned tasks once in Poland and instead try to make contact with NSZ headquarters. Out of the units sent, two turned around and made their way back to the main force, while several ran into Soviet and Polish communist forces and were liquidated. During the same period, the second in command, Władysław Marcinkowski pseudonym "Jaxa", took part in a German sponsored conference involving various collaborationist and fascist organizations during which, according to Marcinkowski, the Germans made an offer of forming a Vlasov style formation out of the brigade. Marcinkowski refused the offer and tried to stall by claiming not to have the authority to agree to it.
Marcinkowski, along with Hubert Jura, pseudonym "Tom", who was the main liaison officer between the Germans and the brigade, were members of the extreme-right faction Szaniec within the NSZ-ZJ (which was itself a far right faction of pre-1944 NSZ). Jura's role in the actions undertaken by the unit during this time have not been fully explained. Jura was in fact a Gestapo or SD agent, he used internal politics of the NSZ-ZJ to settle personal scores (under the guise of "fighting communism within NSZ-ZJ"). There were outstanding death sentences on him issued by both the Home Army and the portion of pre-1944 NSZ which merged with it, for collaboration, although the leader of the brigade at the time, Szacki, may not have been aware of his identity.
Most of the controversy concerning the Holy Cross Mountains Brigade, and whether or not it actively collaborated with the Nazis, concern this period. However, during the same time, Col. Szacki made contacts with the anti-German Czech underground and became involved in clandestine plans for an uprising in Plzeň.
[...]
On August 6, 1945, the brigade was disarmed and moved to a displaced persons camp in Coburg. Ironically, this allowed Colonel Szacki to recruit from the Poles in the DP camp, and by November 1945, the brigade numbered some 4,000 personnel.
Subsequently, men of the brigade were used in the formation of 25 Polish guard companies in the American occupied zone of Germany. The U.S. CIC kept tabs on the brigade's leadership during this time as the U.S. Army did not want any incidents with the Soviet forces. The brigade headquarters was demobilized on June 17, 1946 and, under the pressure of diplomacy from the communists, most of the Polish guard companies were disbanded in 1947.