An further knowledge that soldiers and officers from an ss officer training school successfully threw back the americans on their first attempt to cross the elbe further down stream - forgive the pun - before the americans officially met the soviets several days later.
Most accounts of Allied troops fighting Officer trainees (ie. Market Garden) mention their combat skill. This is rather obvious, since these officer trainees were often combat veterans and former senior NCOs.
The allies werent quite fitting officer trainnees they were also fighting naval and airforce regulars that had just been drafted in the two ss panzer divisions - requiping and training recruits. the event im referring to happend april/may time...months after market garden. but thanks for your input..though i got the impress these officers were like green horns...lacking combat experience.
I think it was a required part of German training doctrine that fresh Officers had to serve on the front lines and actually prove themselves as a junior NCO with a significant combat achievement (maybe something worth an Iron Cross II) before being posted for continuing education as an officer candidate. So officer candidates were rarely green.
If I remember correctly, a SS and a Heer officer training class was mobilized to counter Operation Market Garden. They were formed into two weak ad hoc battalion sized battlegroups and were an unusually potent opponent for Allied paratroops.
don’t forget this is 45...beggars cant be choosers, what may have been sound military doctrine six months earlier had to be abandoned when you scrapping the barrel for officer material. Strongly got the impress from reading this account that these guys were totally green; though maybe the unit may have been padded out with old sweats. On reading an account from a German soldier who fought at Arnhem he recalls that naval and airforce personnel were instructed in twos and threes to attach themselves to an experienced soldier i.e. himself and others.
