This extraordinary photograph shows that history still has many surprises to offer. Although colorized, the photograph is authentic and comes from the period of World War II. It was taken in Świętoszów in 1943. Who is in the photograph? Waffen SS soldiers—Muslims from Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as from Sandžak and Kosovo.

The Third Reich’s First Non-German Division

The first “non-German” foreign division in the armed forces of the Third Reich was a mountain unit consisting largely of Muslims from Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The division’s creators intended it to consist of one-third Germans and two-thirds Muslims. They also planned to establish a Croatian division that, alongside Muslims from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sandžak and Kosovo, would include Catholics living in the territory of the Independent State of Croatia. This project was an important element of a recruitment strategy intended to win the support of the population in occupied areas and use them in military operations.

The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Mohammad Amin el-Husseini, played a significant role in creating the new unit. The support of this cleric, associated with anti-Jewish and anti-British activities, proved crucial.

While in Germany during the war, el-Husseini actively promoted the idea of a Muslim division, providing it with religious and propaganda support. Moreover, he put forward a number of proposals aimed at accommodating the religious needs of Muslim soldiers. A ban on alcohol and pork was introduced, and soldiers were guaranteed the opportunity to pray five times a day, in accordance with the requirements of Islam. Mullahs were assigned to the regiment, and each battalion received an imam.

This was unprecedented in the Waffen SS, marking a significant presence of clergy in military units.

Why Was a Muslim Military Unit in Świętoszów?

The recruitment campaign for the formation ended on July 18, 1943. Fearing partisan activity and desertion, a decision was made to move the training center outside the territory of former Yugoslavia. The division staff and recruits were relocated to Le Puy in France, in the Massif Central region, whose landscape resembled Yugoslavia.

Communist agents and agitators infiltrated the division. On the night of September 16–17, 1943, a mutiny broke out in an engineer battalion stationed in Villefranche-de-Rouergue. The main organizer of the rebellion was SS-Untersturmführer Ferid Džanić, a communist who convinced the soldiers that the Germans had deceived the Bosnians by recruiting them into the division and that, instead of returning home, they would be sent to serve on the Eastern Front.

Claiming to be acting on orders from British intelligence, Džanić called for desertion preceded by the elimination of the German command staff. The mutiny was suppressed. Because of the unprecedented nature of the armed uprising in a Waffen SS unit, the captured rebels were interrogated, after which the divisional court handed down death sentences by firing squad.

After the mutiny was suppressed, the division was transferred to Lower Silesia, to the training ground in Świętoszów (Neuhammer-Westlager), where its command staff was replenished and training began.

Individual training was completed in November, marked by Himmler’s visit with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem on November 21, 1943. In the following months, training for squads (December 1943), platoons (January 1944) and companies (February) was finalized. By mid-February, the trained division numbered 21,000 men, and on February 16 it set out in 93 trains for the area around the town of Brčko on the Sava, in northern Bosnia.

During its stay in Świętoszów, the soldiers’ appearance changed. The previously empty black collar tabs were replaced with specially designed tabs featuring a hand holding a white weapon (a yataghan) and a swastika. A shield in Croatian colors appeared on the sleeve—a red-and-white checkerboard with 25 squares—which was worn even by the Albanian soldiers of the 1st Battalion of the 28th Mountain Infantry Regiment.

A Dark Wartime Period and the Fight Against Tito’s Partisans

In March 1944, the Croatian division took part in Operations “Kugelblitz” and “Osterei.” After “Osterei,” it took control of the area bounded by the Sava, Drina, Spreča and Bosna rivers, and in May it participated in Operation “Maibaum.”

Further operations, codenamed “Maiglöckchen,” “Vollmond,” “Fliegenfänger,” “Heiderose” and “Hackfleisch,” were conducted in cooperation with the “Prinz Eugen” division and Army units. These actions involved not only fighting Tito’s partisans and the Chetniks, but also pacifying Bosnian villages suspected of cooperating with the partisans.

During one such operation, 218 people were killed, including 100 women, 100 men and 18 children, mainly from the villages of Jablanice, Mačkovac, Tobut, Vukosavci and Lopare.

The fighting in the Balkans was characterized by exceptional brutality, an echo of which could be seen during the conflicts that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s. At that time, too, people were murdered and robbed, particularly those of different ethnic origins or religious beliefs.