| Page Created |
| September 16th, 2023 |
| Last Updated |
| September 16th, 2023 |
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| Additional Information |
| Unit Order of Battle Commanders Operations Equipment Multimedia Sources |
| Operations |
| Europe |
| 1942 |
| German frogmen clashed with Soviet frogmen at a Tsemes Bay seaport at Novorossiysk. The skirmish resulted in some knife battles underwater. |
| Night September 28th – 29th, 1944 |
| Three groups of four German Kampfschwimmer. At this time, the Allies have captured the intact road bridge in Nijmegen and a railway bridge in Moerdijk, immediately installing strong anti-aircraft defenses there. To support the German counteroffensive against the Nijmegen salient, three groups of four German frogmen set off from a point 10 km upstream from the bridges. Their task was to place explosives under the bridges and then drift with the river’s current for another 24 km to return to their own lines. The railway bridge was blown up. The road bridge was only slightly damaged because the mine had been poorly placed. Of the 12 men, three were killed, seven were captured, and two returned to their own lines. In September 1944, the divers of the German Marine Einsatzkommando MEK 65 were given the highly dangerous task of blowing up the river bridges in Nijmegen. Of the 12 frogmen involved in the operation to destroy these two bridges, ten were captured by the British. Three of these men later died of wounds sustained during their attack. Two frogmen of the first group, whose target was the railway bridge, managed to escape capture. In the fast-flowing waters of the river Waal, the men lost touch with each other. Around 6 o’clock in the morning, the two divers heard a huge explosion – it was the railway bridge. The divers were later awarded high military honours for this action. The Germans charged to blow up the road bridge were less successful. The Waal river current was too powerful, and they were seen. Under heavy fire, they desperately tried to sink their bombs to the correct depth, and activate the detonator timing. They succeeded in the latter, but the bombs were too far out of position, and therefore only did minor damage. The frogmen, totally exhausted, floated to the banks of the river, where they were captured by the Allies. |
| There was also a Kriegsmarine Kampfschwimmer unit named “Puma”, under the command of Oberleutnant zur See Erich Dörpinghaus, ready to attack the Bridge at Remagen. There was a joint attempt together with the SS-Kampfschwimmern on March 12 on the Remagen Bridge but they came under heavy artillery fire from the beginning and had to abort the mission. |
| March 17th, 1945 |
| Destruction of the Rhine Pontoon Bridge near Linz, Germany |
| SS-Jagdeinsatz Donau |
| Seven men of the SS-Jagdeinsatz Donau, were SS-Untersturmführer Schreiber, SS-Rottenführer Kretchmann, Sturmmann Egelhoff, Sturmmann Holzmannhofer, Sturmmann Weidemann, Schütze Vogelsang, and Schütze Westbelt. The men enter the river, seventeen kilometers from the bridge. The water temperature is 7 degrees Celsius. They are equipped with twenty-eight packages of plastic explosives. They come under enemy fire right from the start, and the engagement ends after a while with four of them dead and the rest captured by American forces. |
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