The SS Panzer Division "Wiking" (5. SS-Panzer-Division "Wiking") was rightfully considered one of the most combat-ready SS formations, the first and best of the "foreign" units of the Third Reich, the leader of the "Hitler International". Created before Hitler's attack on the USSR, this division was staffed not only by Germans, but also by volunteers from Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Sweden and Switzerland - in full accordance with the Nazi slogan of the “European Crusade against Bolshevism.” From the first and until the last day of the Great Patriotic War, the SS men from the “Viking” fought on the Eastern Front - Zhitomir and Stalino (Donetsk), the Mius Front and the Don, the battle for the Caucasus and fierce defensive battles in Ukraine, the defeat near Cherkassy, where the division lost more than half of its personnel composition, and the last German offensive on Budapest... But neither volunteers from all over Europe, nor the accumulated combat experience, nor the latest military equipment saved the “crusade to the East” from failure, and the Viking division from final defeat and shameful surrender in May 1945