Among roughly 150,000 men of Jewish descent who fought in Hitler’s army, the stories of 10 Jews who served on the front lines reveal a paradox: while their families were being forced into ghettos and sent to death camps, these soldiers were stationed in Poland, France, or Russia, helping spread the very system that was slaughtering their own people across Europe.
Why 10 Jews Who Joined the Nazi Ranks?
10 Werner Goldberg
A familiar poster plastered throughout Nazi Germany showed a soldier with a swastika emblazoned on his chest, hailed as “The Ideal German Soldier.” Ironically, the model soldier was not a pure‑blood Aryan at all – he was half‑Jewish.
Werner Goldberg grew up unaware of his Jewish roots; his father never mentioned it. The truth hit him at fourteen when his school principal announced a “Jew‑free” policy and singled Werner out as the problem, publicly exposing his heritage.
Shunned overnight, Werner became desperate to belong again. He enlisted at the earliest opportunity, managing to join before the invasion of Poland, hoping military service would restore his place in society.
Back home, his father endured the horrors of the Holocaust. Werner leveraged his position to intervene repeatedly, even breaking into the prison holding his father when he learned of an imminent transfer to Auschwitz, rescuing him from certain death.
In the war’s aftermath, the Goldberg family suffered devastating losses—only his father survived. The reunion between Werner and his rescued father stands as a stark reminder of the personal stakes hidden behind the propaganda.
9 Nachemia Wurman
Debates have long swirled about how much ordinary Nazi soldiers knew about the atrocities in the camps. In the 72nd Infantry, one man certainly had a front‑row seat: Nachemia Wurman.
A Polish Jew, Wurman survived a 1944 labor camp where he witnessed his father’s execution and was forced to bathe in soap crafted from the bodies of fellow inmates.
After escaping and heading west in hopes of meeting Soviet troops, he instead ran straight into a German battalion. Knowing he couldn’t slip past them unnoticed, he boldly approached, shook hands, and introduced himself as “Marion Schmidt,” a German‑born chef.
He was promptly accepted into the unit, spending the remainder of the war with a swastika on his arm, cooking for the soldiers while keeping his true identity a secret. “The best hiding place was in the mouth of the wolf,” he later reflected.
8 Arno Spitz
Arno Spitz earned three Iron Crosses, the highest German decoration for bravery, making him one of the most decorated men in the Wehrmacht.
His father, a Jew, fled to the United States as persecution intensified. Arno, however, stayed in Germany and proved so valuable that when Himmler ordered half‑Jewish soldiers expelled in 1940, he was allowed to remain.
Spitz later insisted that fighting for Germany was not the same as supporting Hitler, telling Dateline NBC in 2002, “There is a difference.” His daughter later accused him of betraying his own people, but he refused to apologize, saying, “I didn’t do anything that is a crime.”
7 Hans‑Geert Falkenberg
“I did not want to join the army,” Hans‑Geert Falkenberg recalled. “I had to join the army.” He enlisted as soon as war was declared, hoping to prove his worth to a society that was already targeting Jews.
His teachers had been preaching Jewish inferiority, and he spent his teenage years excelling at everything the Nazis prized, seeing military service as the next logical step.
While fighting in France, he received letters from his grandmother describing the unfolding Holocaust. When the letters ceased, he learned she had been sent to a concentration camp, a blow that shocked him and his acquaintances alike.
His family had already fled to England, but trapped in occupied Europe, Falkenberg concluded that staying in the army was the safest way to survive, stating, “No question.”
6 Helmut Kopp
Helmut Kopp, the son of a German father and a Jewish mother, felt most alienated by his maternal side. His grandfather openly dismissed him, referring to him as a “goy” rather than a grandson.
When war erupted, Kopp filled out his enlistment papers as “full Aryan” and served in an artillery unit. He claimed to have been aware of the camps but chose to focus solely on his own survival, saying, “You didn’t think about the Fuhrer or the nation; I thought only about myself.”
5 Friedemann Lichtwitz
“In the German army, I was in a pretty good situation,” Friedemann Lichtwitz recalled. He felt accepted among his comrades, unaware of the growing persecution of Jews at home.
When the 1940 purge expelled half‑Jewish soldiers, he was sent to a forced‑labor camp and later, after a failed escape, to Dachau. Asked by an NBC reporter how it felt to transition from soldier to prisoner, he could only reply, “I can’t say; I don’t know how to answer that.”
4 Major Leo Skurnik
Major Leo Skurnik served as a doctor with Finland’s 53rd Infantry. Though Jewish by birth, his Finnish nationality placed him alongside German SS troops against the Soviet Union.
He tended to every wounded combatant, regardless of uniform, and even helped clear paths for German assaults. When a German soldier needed aid, Skurnik braved no‑man’s land to rescue him.
He organized the evacuation of a field hospital under Russian bombardment, carrying over 600 wounded—including SS men—across 8.9 km of bogland. Though offered an Iron Cross, he famously rejected it, telling his commander, “Tell your German colleagues that I wipe my arse with it!”
3 Harry Matso
Harry Matso, a Finnish Jew, fought for Finland’s army, an ally of Nazi Germany. He asserted, “We’ve been called ‘fascist,’ which is a lie,” emphasizing his opposition to Nazi ideology.
He explained that Finnish Jews fought for their nation’s independence, not for Germany’s war aims. Conscription forced him into service, even as rumors of the Holocaust filtered through.
Fearing Soviet domination as much as Nazi oppression, Matso chose to defend his homeland, refusing to salute German soldiers whenever he encountered them.
2 Emil Maurice
Emil Maurice, listed as SS Member #2—second only to Adolf Hitler—was, by Himmler’s own standards, a Jew.
He joined the National Socialist Party in 1919, rose to lead the Sturmabteilung, participated in the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch, and even helped Hitler draft Mein Kampf while imprisoned.
Despite his Jewish ancestry being exposed, Hitler declared Maurice an “honorary Aryan,” shielding him from expulsion after Himmler demanded his removal.
1 Erhard Milch
Erhard Milch rose to the upper echelons of the Nazi war machine, serving on the German War Cabinet and as chief of staff of the Luftwaffe, despite the public knowledge that his father was Jewish.
His friendship with Hermann Göring secured his “full Aryan” status after Göring arranged for Milch’s mother to sign a statement denying his Jewish lineage.
During the Nuremberg trials, Milch faced accusations of conducting lethal experiments on Jewish prisoners in Dachau, including high‑altitude and hypothermia tests. He never expressed remorse, defending Göring and refusing to apologize for his role.