Why did Skorzeny do it?

Why did Skorzeny do it?

Was it life insurance against his own assassination? Was it an internalized sense of guilt? Was it just for the lulz?

haaretz.com/israel-news/1.711115

The Lulz. You have to understand Skorzeny fucking loved his work. If someone wanted to give him another job, he was going to take it regardless of who the paymaster was.

So he basically turned his back on the very ideology he swore his life to for amusement?

Yeah, he's basically /pol/. /pol/ used to hate Jews, now they love them, because Trump is more amusing than neo-nazism.

Most German soldiers were not ideologues, stop thinking like a retard.

He was all about adventure and doing cool crazy commando shit

Look at what Skorzeny actually did during WWII: assassination plots, rescue operations, disinfo, next level subterfuge

After the war he trained right-wing safety squads in Spanish-speaking countries that were not on the Axis side in WWII.

I think Skorzeny knew that war was a thing in itself, and was not bound to ideology or even a staunch German nationalist (he was from Austria, after all, and not an autist like Hitler)

Working with Mossad b/c they were going to assassinate him otherwise is possible: look at how U.S. intelligence/FBI gives hackers the option to work for the government instead of throwing them in jail

Anyway, we need a biopic in our lifetimes. Dude was an IRL supervillain

He told the Americans that he would have fought for Hitler to the death if Hitler hadn't suicided. Hitler's suicide meant his oath was fulfilled.

I like the rumour that he was Evita Peron's bull for quite some time.

>That time the Americans worked with Klaus Barbie to take down Che

Except Skorzeny wasn't your average soldier. He was Waffen-SS. The military arm of the Nazi Party's premiere paramilitary organization. Even discounting that, he often received his assignments from Hitler himself.

Skorzeny started the war in the Wehrmacht as an engineer. He wanted to be in the Luftwaffe but he was too much of a big guy for that. He caught the attention of Ernst Kaltenbrunner - an old friend back in Austria - after he came within days of blowing the dams around Moscow with the intention of flooding the city in the dead of winter, but the withdrawal forced him to abandon the plan. A little later after that while under heavy rocket fire, he distinguished himself by his mechanical repairs. At one point a rocket landed nearby and peppered him in the head. He requested a drink of Schnapps, a bandage and a bottle of aspirin. He continued his work for three more hours before he finally passed out and evacuated.

Back in Germany Kaltenbrunner finally convinced his friend to join the Waffen-SS and gave him an assignment to infiltrate the French resistance under direct command of Heydrich. While Skorzeny was learning French and finishing his recuperation, Heydrich went for an open top car ride and the mission was scrubbed. By the time Skorzery was ready, Mussolini had been captured. Kaltenbrunner recommended Skorzeny to Hitler and so Hitler summoned Skorzeny. He asked the man one question, a question he asked other SS men picked for a potential leadership. The question was: "What do you think of our Italian allies?"

Everyone before Skorzeny gave kiss ass answers: Exulting the Italians and Mussolini. Skorzeny stood there and answered: "I'm Austrian, my Fuhrer."

Skorzeny got the job, and so began his career.

>big guy

4u

kek this

>Heydrich went for an open top car ride and the mission was scrubbed

I kek'd pretty hard to that one

>"I'm Austrian, my Fuhrer."
What did he mean by this?

He meant that he didn't have Italian allies because Austria wasn't allied with them

And he was still just a soldier. Do you think Putin should also be a diehard communist being a KGB colonel and all?

After the Gran Sasso raid, and Mussolini's rescue was completed, Skorzeny became restless an took on the impossible: Tracking down and killing or captured Tito. He came close on several occasions but Tito slipped out of his traps or simply did not show up. By 1944 he was pulled out and was reassigned to a new task. Hungary was close to revolt. There was talk of turning to the Soviets. Skorzeny was assigned to join in making sure Budapest was suppressed. What he found bothered him. The Local Waffen-SS commander had brought in seige equipment, including the Karl-Geratt mortar to deal with them. So Skorzeny devised a plan and brought in his newest friend: Brandenburger Adrian von Folkersam.

Adrian von Folkersam was Volga German noble stock. IT was for this reason he was recruited into the Brandenburgers and asigned to Special operations in the east. In early August 1942, a Brandenburger unit of 62 Baltic and Sudeten Germans led by von Fölkersam penetrated farther into enemy territory than any other German unit. They had been ordered to seize and secure the vital Maikop oilfields. Disguised as men of the dreaded Soviet security police, the NKVD, and driving Soviet trucks, Fölkersam's unit passed through the Soviet front lines and moved deep into hostile territory. The Brandenburgers ran into a large group of Red Army deserters fleeing from the front. Fölkersam saw an opportunity to use them to the unit's advantage. By persuading them to return to the Soviet cause, he was able to join with them and move almost at will through the Russian lines.

>Operating under the false identity of NKVD Major Truchin, based in Stalingrad, Fölkersam explained his role in recovering the deserters to the Soviet commander in charge of Maikop's defences. The commander not only believed Fölkersam, but the next day gave him a personal tour of the city's defenses. By August 8, the German spearheads were only 12 miles away and the Brandenburgers made their move. Using grenades to simulate an artillery attack, they knocked out the military communications centre for the city. Fölkersam then went to the Russian defenders and told them that a withdrawal was taking place. Having seen Fölkersam with their commander and lacking any communications to rebut or confirm his statement, the Soviets began to evacuate Maikop. The German spearhead entered the city without a fight on August 9, 1942.

Dude, being Waffen SS is essentially meaningless - by the end like half of it was various European nations, from Ukrainians to Bosniaks. Even had conscripts (Estonian, Latvian).

With his new friend in tow, Otto Skorzeny and Adrian von Folkersam devised a dastardly plot, which only these two mad men could come up with. First they reqiustioned 200 men, 5 Tiger II's and half a dozen trucks. They drove all night and right through the middle of the rioting city. They arrived at the castle of which the Horthy family occupied. After a brief firefight, the Hungarian guards were forced to surrender and together, Skorzeny and Folkersam stormed up the castle. Skorzeny kicked in the door to Miklos Horthy's room and found the Hungarian standing there in shock. Together, Adrian and Otto goaded and insulted the Hungarian until Horthy was so mad that he charged at them. Otto stepped forward and one punched the man unconscious. They rolled him up into a carpet. dragged him back to the trucks, drove him to the airfield and he was in Berlin, a captive of the Reich and his father kept Hungary loyal until after the war. They saved Budapest from meeting a fate not unlike Warsaw.

Picture is Skorzeny (big guy) and Adrian (middle guy, field cap) touring Budapest

Same here. Well done.

Next up was the Ardennes Offensive. We all should know what happened during Operation Gref. German Commandos disguised as American Troops caused havoc at every step. It got so bad and trollish, that one of Skorzeny and Folkersam's menn introduced himself as Montgomery at a number of checkpoints. Later the real Montgomery tries to get through, starts to rage. He got his tires shot out and was detained for hours before they confirmed his identity.

Skorzeny decided that if his men were to fight, they would have to identitfy themselves as Germans in accordance to the rules of war. In spite of this, when they were caught the Germans were still shot as spies, following their own Commando Order which got many Germans hung and imprisoned after the war.

This broke Adrian. He had been friends with many of the men who were executed. He swore off Commando work, got reassigned to fight as a regular Heer unit and died in Poland a few weeks before the end of the war.

Fölkersam was a Baltic German not a Volga German for fuck's sake. There was no "noble stock" among Volga Germans, they were all peasants.

Sorry, Volga Germans under his command*

No need to be mad.

Austria was part of the Reich

Austrians have a long standing antipathy for Italians. By telling Hitler he was Austrian, he was implying that He held the same grudged Austrians held for Italians.

Hitler, being an Austrian by birth, admired the answer.

This notion wasn't quite absent from mainstream Reich propaganda, pic related.

EVERYONE /pol/ loves turns out to be a zionist agent

>Donald Trump
>Putin
>Pinochet
>Apartheid South Africa

Skorzeny was captured shortly after the end of the war. His answer was simple: His oath to die for the Fuhrer and the Fatherland ended the moment Hitler took his life. If Hitler stayed alive, it would be a different matter.

It wasn't long before he was charged with war crimes for what happened during Operation Gref. Skorzeny was assigned an American defense lawyer who grilled the Commando for three days. At the end of this, the Lawyer was satisfied that his client was no better or worse then the average Allied specials operation leader. He said he would be honoured to lead his defense. So they went about conducting their defense. And as the trial begun, the lawyer brought in a surprise witness. F.F.E. Yeo-Thomas - a noted British Commando who spent a significant portion of the war in a concentration camp being tortured by Gestapo men. At one point he died for several minutes. When he was called in, he was still recovering from damaged legs. This man hated Germans.

In spite of this, Yeo-Thomas calmly recounted a time were he had to rescue some comrades using captured German uniforms. The Lawyer asked how he got the uniform. He said he killed the Germans for them. Skorzeny's uniforms came from POW's. The prosecution fell apart and as the Brit struggled to get back to his feet, Skorzeny and the rest of the defendants in unison stood up and snapped to a state of attention out of respect. Yeo-Thomas and Skorzeny remained friends for the rest of their lives. Yeo-Thomas and even convinced Skorzeny to escape from the denazification program he was assigned to keep him in line after the war.

What happens next is more shrouded in mystery. In exile Skorzeny did a variety of jobs. From farming in Ireland, construction in Spain, bodyguarding Evita Peron and in his spare time, setting up the ratlines that got his old comrades to Argentina. Eventually he went back to Germany unnoticed for the most part and spent some time raising his daughter. Eventually he started contracted his ol services out to the world. There is rumours that Skorzeny spent some time in Lybia, training military men there, including a young Ghaddafi. Some figured he was involved in helping the Americans and French battle communism in Southeast Asia, but that's unlikely. He would be getting up there in age and Commando tactics had evolved by then.

Ironically one of his most ardent admirers was fucking Che Guevara,

>open top car ride

Forgot picture: Otto and daughter.

In 1970, a cancerous tumour was discovered on Skorzeny's spine. Two tumours were later removed while he was staying at a hospital in Hamburg, but the surgery left him paralyzed from the waist down. Vowing to walk again, Skorzeny spent long hours with a physical therapist; and, within six months, he was back on his feet. Skorzeny died of lung cancer on 5 July 1975 in Madrid. He was 67 years old.[48] At no point in his life did Skorzeny ever denounce Nazism.

He was given a Roman Catholic funeral Mass in Madrid on 7 August 1975. His coffin was draped in the Nazi colours. His body was cremated afterwards, and his ashes were later brought to Vienna to be interred in the Skorzeny family plot at Döblinger Friedhof. His funeral "was attended by dozens of German military veterans and wives, who did not hesitate to give the one-armed Nazi salute", according to former Mossad agents who attended the funeral.

Some folks like to do the best they can at their job when on shift
that's german work ethic right there isn't it

>villain

Pffft.
Skorzeny joined the Austrian Nazi party that wanted union with germany in 1932 and after unification he volunteered to join the SS, which at the time was nothing more than Hitler's personal body guard group like the secret service.

He loved Hitler and Nazism.

I'm sure after the war he went more into an evolian, why even try to fix the world type of mindset.

Austrians hated Italy becuase it was formed at the expense of austria and for the next 100 years italy was always agitating to take more from austria.

I never said he didn't love being a Nazi. I said he loved the work, and if someone out there wanted to give him a taste of the old days, he was going to do it.