20th SS Grenadier Division (Ger. 20. Waffen-Grenadier-Division der SS ) was formed in January 1944 from Estonian volunteers and Estonians serving in various subunits within the Waffen-SS. The first commander of the unit was SS-Brigadeführer Franz Augsberger. It began its combat route with fighting in Livonia, in February 1944 taking part in the battle on the Narva River as part of the 3rd SS Panzer Corps. In the spring of 1944 she was moved to Silesia, and in 1945 she took part in the Battle of Prudnik in Upper Silesia. Then she fought in the city of Brzeg and on the Nysa Kłodzka river. After these battles, she broke through to the Czech Republic, where she was surrounded by the Red Army and almost completely destroyed. Only a few of the division's soldiers managed to break through to the West. Interestingly, in 1950, one of the US government agencies granted the soldiers of this formation the right to apply for political asylum in the United States.
The first paramilitary unit to have the abbreviation SS (German: Schutz Staffel) in its name was the personal protection of the dictator of the Third Reich called Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, which was officially formed in 1933. From 1934, the SS was an independent formation headed by Heinrich Himmler. With time, further SS units were formed, including the SS-Totenkopfverbände and the SS-Verfügungstruppe. It is worth adding that the latter was trained similarly to regular Wehrmacht infantry units. On a relatively small scale, SS units were used in combat during the fighting in Poland in 1939 and in the French campaign in 1940. The first units intended from the beginning to fight at the front were created in mid-1940, giving them the name of the Waffen SS. Initially, they were recruited on a voluntary basis, also among non-German people, but over time, compulsory recruitment began to apply. Within the Waffen-SS, many divisions of different combat value were formed. Nevertheless, a few of them (e.g. the 1st SS LAH Panzer Division, the 2nd SS Das Reich Panzer Division or the 12th SS Hitlerjugend Panzer Division) can be considered elite units, with very high combat value and often equipped with the best available equipment. They demonstrated their considerable advantages not only on the Eastern Front (1941-1945), especially during the battles near Kharkiv in 1943, but also during the battles in France in 1944. Another thing is that the quality of the commanding staff of these units was in many cases debatable, and many Waffen-SS soldiers committed war crimes during World War II.