Waffen SS allowed non-Germans?

Question

Why were Slavs and Arabs allowed in the Waffen SS, if the Nazis considered them inferior, and the SS had mostly blond/blue eyed "Aryans"?

Answer 1

Toward the end of the war, all the strict aryan eligibility standards were thrown out the door, in favor of survival and getting as much cannon fodder into the field as possible

Answer 2

Absolutely, all those considered aryans were alowed, and not only by the end of the war, but almost since the begining. I mean, the Germans were not stupid, they realized that in almost every country they conquered there was a white minority or majority and many of them willing to cooperate. There was even a French SS unit that defended Berlin until the last days of the war. Not to mention Dutch, Scandinavians, Chechs, Romanians, Hungarians, Italians and Croatans...

Remember guys, Nazism is dangerous because their ideals were extremely appealing. Imagine you have been poor and miserable all your life and all of a sudden somebody tellls you you are special and superior to all, and invites to join a mighty army, it has great appeal, that is why they had so many followers.

Answer 3

As the war wore on the Germans were desperate for more combat troops. It has also been reckoned that maybe as much as 60% of the troops facing the Allies on D-Day were of non-German origin. No doubt the German High Command found it easy to rationalise allowing "inferior" races to join up, after all Heinrich Himmler (the leader of the SS) was hardly your typical "Aryan" either and as for Hitler! Well, enough said :)

Answer 4

I am not aware of Slavic unit of Waffen SS- only Croatians ( but they were historical allies and furthermore it was pretty easy, due to their former Austro-Hungarian citizenship, that they could have a German origin) and Bosniac (Muslim) units.
Muslims were recruited because of strategy but also because Nazism as well as Fascism had always maintained relations with the Muslim world, mainly because they were trying to stir up insurrections in the British and French Colonies. Two famous example: Iraq 1941 & the well-known story of Hadji Amin al-Husayni great muftì of Jerusalem.

Answer 5

SS Nordland and Viking were made up of Dutch, Nowegian and Danish Ayarans.
Other SS detachments were made up of Germanic tribes from Transyvania the Dneiper and even along the Volga. The Area around Stalingrad had a large german population, which Stalin had "relocated".

Answer 6

Because they were using them to attack Jews in such places as Palestine. An example of this was Sadam Husain's uncle Kharaillah Tulfah who was an officer in the Waffen SS and brought 20,000 Arabs with him.

Answer 7

Yes, as WW2 developed and German casualties grew alarmingly, especially after the invasion of Russia, the Nazis got more desperate, putting older soldiers into front-line units and recruiting foreign sympathisers and trying to enlist foreign prisoners of war for 'national' SS units. They were extensively used for propaganda purposes but some of them saw little front-line action as they were poorly thought of by the professional military.

Answer 8

Yes spanish British Arab Muslim italian French Norwegian many more join ss volunteer units

Answer 9

Like the last poster said - the SS needed bodies.

Answer 10

Shortage of manpower.
The losses on the Eastern Front meant that the Germans were desparate for able -bodied men to serve in their army