Elements of the 6th SS Mountain Division took part in Operation Nordwind in January 1945 along the French–German border, where they took heavy losses in several failed attempts to break through the U.S.

[1] Shortly after the German invasion of Norway, Norwegian volunteers were used to form police and security units of the Allgemeine-SS,[2] the general service branch of the Nazi Party militia,[1] becoming known as the Norges-SS.

[2] On 24 February 1941, two SS infantry regiments in German-occupied southern Norway, the 6th and 7th SS-Totenkopf-Standarten, were ordered to form a Kampfgruppe (battle group) ahead of the anticipated German invasion of the Soviet Union, Operation Barbarossa.

[3] Under the command of SS-Brigadeführer Richard Herrmann, the Kampfgruppe received a full headquarters, including a cartographic section, two pioneer (combat engineer) companies, a reconnaissance battalion, and other support units in March 1941.

[3] When Operation Barbarossa began on 22 June 1941, Finland initially chose not to attack the Soviet Union unless it was provoked, and so the German-Finnish invasion of Karelia and the Kola peninsula did not begin for another week.

[3] Soviet aircraft bombed the Finnish side of the border shortly after the start of Barbarossa, causing Finland to enter the war.

One of the Nord Division's infantry regiments, the 9th, was sent to the most northern sector near the Arctic Sea coast, where it was part of Mountain Corps Norway.

The Soviets then launched an armored counterattack that pushed back the remaining SS troops, who abandoned their positions and fled in panic.

[4][6][7] The terrible performance damaged the Nord Division's reputation among Wehrmacht and SS leaders, including Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler and the head of Army Command Norway, Nikolaus von Falkenhorst.

In late August and early September, Army Command Norway sent all of the remaining SS troops to III Corps, recreating the division as a unified formation.

The Finnish III Corps and the Nord Division advanced together in the Loukhsky District in a last attempt to sever the Murmansk railway.

Although they made progress and inflicted losses on the Red Army, the SS and Finnish troops also sustained casualties from the strong Soviet resistance.

[4] The high casualties taken during Operation Barbarossa led to almost all of the Nord Division's original members being replaced by new reinforcements by January 1942,[10] including by Volksdeutsche Germans from Hungary and Romania.

Under the corps commander, General of Mountain Troops Franz Böhme, the Nord Division and other German units were to hold the sector from the Loukhsky District area to the Arctic Sea coast in the north.

On 23 August 1944, Krüger was assigned to another unit and relinquished command to SS-Standartenführer Gustav Lombard until 1 September, when his replacement arrived, SS-Gruppenführer Karl-Heinrich Brenner.

The Nord Division staff then received word of the 20th Mountain Army's plans for Operation Birke, the evacuation of all troops from Finland into Norway.

The Germans, led by Günther Degen, were able to break through the Finnish encirclement and reached Muonio, and continued the rest of the 320 kilometres (200 miles) into Norway without any more disruptions.

The Norwegian ski battalion did not join the rest of the division when it was sent back to Germany, and other units also got reassigned, bringing down its strength to about 15,000 from the previous 22,000.

[17] After arriving in Denmark the 6th SS Mountain Division Nord was immediately sent to reinforce the Western Front, where a German operation known as the Ardennes offensive failed to break through American positions in France in late 1944.

[16] On 29 December 1944 the lead elements of the Nord Division arrived near the French–German border by train from Denmark, marching to the villages of Ludwigswinkel and Eppenbrunn.

The division was to take part in Operation Nordwind, an attack on the U.S. 7th Army of Lieutenant General Alexander Patch in southeastern France, which held a relatively weak position in the Allied line.

This was the last offensive action by the Nord Division before the end of Operation Nordwind, and it failed despite making initial advances.

[21] With the failure of the last German offensive in the West, the 6th SS Mountain Division Nord and the rest of Army Group G was tasked with holding the Rhineland in southwest Germany.

Meanwhile, the Nord reconnaissance battalion reached the Moselle river ahead of the rest of the division, where it fought against American troops on 14 March.

[25] The regiment that remained behind with the LXXXII Corps continued to fight separately from the rest of the Nord Division before dissolving in mid-April 1945.

[24] The rest of the Nord Division, which remained the most intact unit in the LXXXIX Corps, remained in the Rhine valley until it was ordered by Field Marshal Albert Kesselring to move southeast to Wiesbaden shortly before 24 March, in preparation for a counterattack against General George Patton's troops crossing the Rhine near the city.

[26] Kesselring then changed his order, sending the 6,000 survivors of the Nord Division eastward to Limburg an der Lahn to hold the river crossing there.

On 27 March the American division broke through the line of defense that the Nord troops had established south of Limburg before advancing to the southeast.

[28] On 30 March, Brenner led those who were left in an attempt to break out of the American encirclement as units of the 5th and 71st Infantry Divisions were tasked with finishing them off.

[29][30][31] In the early days of April 1945, the SS Mountain Division Nord was in an area near Büdingen, where there was fierce fighting against U.S. troops with the use of Sherman tanks and other captured American weapons.