SS Charlemagne: The 33rd Waffen-Grenadier Division of the SS

At about 2000 hours I returned to the Corps command post to get my instructions for our future employment. There the chief of staff gave me the orders to engage the Nordland next day in the central Defence Sector ‘Z’, whose commander was a Luftwaffe-Lieutenant-Colonel Seifert with his command post in the Air Ministry.

I immediately went to the Air Ministry, where I was received by Lieutenant-Colonel Seifert in the presence of his liaison officer, who constituted his whole staff! Straight away he told me that he had no need of my regimental commanders, or their staffs, because the effectives of their respective units did not amount to more than a single battalion. I retorted that more grenadiers were rejoining every day, that they were Scandinavian volunteers confident in their normal superiors and that it would be dangerous to separate them in the present situation. Moreover, Sector ‘Z’ would become the core of the defence. The more one deployed experienced officers the greater would be the strength of the resistance.

Lieutenant-Colonel Seifert refuted my argument and told me that in his sector everything had been prepared in such a way that we would not need any support. He showed me a map on which were featured command posts, machine-gun nests and other combat positions. When I finally asked him if he would like to have one or two of those accompanying me to reinforce his command post, he refused in an arrogant manner. He would not change his mind, even when in order to overcome his prejudice, I told him that I had only been with Waffen-SS for a year and that during the First World War I had served in Army Headquarters. He dodged my question about what had already been done in this sector, saying that everything was being organised.

I returned to my command post in the Opera most annoyed. After a short rest, I informed the commanders of the Regiments Danmark and Norge about the orders from Corps and the attitude of Lieutenant-Colonel Seifert, asking them to use the next morning to reassemble their units and put them into order.

It should be noted here that, although Seifert had been appointed Defence Sector commander of this central sector that included the Reichs Chancellery, SS-General Wilhelm Mohnke was responsible for the defence of the Reichs Chancellery and regarded all SS troops in the immediate area as subordinate to him, a situation that only added to the general confusion at this stage of the battle.

27 April

Krukenberg continued: