![]() ![]() ![]() He relayed an order from Sixth Panzer Army headquarters, signed by its commanding officer, SS general Josef “Sepp” Dietrich. On December 15, 1944, Peiper briefed his officers on the upcoming attack into Belgium. Transferred to the Eastern Front in 1941, Peiper had earned fame as a daring combat commander, and his men had gained notoriety for their brutality. ![]() From 1938 to 1941, he had served as an aide to SS chief Heinrich Himmler. Peiper’s command, the 1st SS Panzer Regiment, was assigned to lead the Sixth Panzer Army’s assault and capture the bridges over Belgium’s Meuse River.Īt 29, Peiper was the Waffen SS’s youngest regimental commander. Americans would call it the Battle of the Bulge. ![]() In December 1944, Germany planned a surprise offensive to win a war that already seemed lost: a lightning thrust through the Ardennes to split the British and American armies and seize the Allied supply port of Antwerp. THE MASSACRE that had set these events in motion occurred in another December-12 years before Peiper strode out of prison. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Joseph H. How a Convicted Nazi War Criminal and 72 of His Men Walked Free Close ![]()
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