Romanian units trained by Germans, 1940-1941

[Skarn]

Hello there,

I'm curious to know more about the Romanian units trained by the German Deutsche Heeresmission from October 1940 to May 1941.
I read that several Romanian divisions were incorporated to the German training program: 5th, 6th, 13th, 18th and 20th Infantry Divisions, and the newly-raised Armored Division.

My questions are the following ones:
1) was there any other unit involved in this program?
2) what was the exact schedule of this training program?

Cheers,

Skarn

[Victor]

Very late reply.
The first divisions to start training programs with the German Military Mission were the 6th, the 7th and the 8th Infantry Divisions, the 1st Armored Division and the 1st Mountain Brigade.

[Petre]

https://ndupress.ndu.edu/Portals/68/Documen...-98_DiNardo.pdf

[Skarn]

Hello Petre,

Yep, I found my answer in the German archives. DiNardo text is very good though!

For anyone's information, German Deutsches Heeresmission in Rumänien started to train a first batch of Romanian units as of November 1st, 1940, using the 13. Panzer-Division (Lehrstab "R", later "R I") for that.
Were mainly concerned: 5th, 6th and 13th Infantry Divisions, motomecanized brigade.

During winter 1940-1941, with the 16. Panzer-Division (Lehrstab "R II"), they trained also 18th and 20th Infantry Divisions according to all appearances (even if there are far less archival material as evidences for that).

I don't think that they particularly trained any mountain brigade, because there was no "Gebirgskrieg" experts sent in Romania for that purpose. The only mountain units sent in Romania were only transiting towards Bulgaria to participate to "Marita". Moreover, the Italians took the challenge, sending "Alpini" officers to train the Romanian mountain troops.
Never heard that 7th and 8th Infantry Divisions were trained neither, even if some of their troopers could have been sent as rotating units in the "Ausbildungszentrums" (training camps) set up by the 13. Panzer-Division. No centralized training was provided to these two units, though, unlike what was done for the 5th, 6th and 13th Divisions.

Regards,
Skarn

This post has been edited by Skarn on April 17, 2021 10:37 am