:::Well, no, that's not what I was trying to get across at all- especially since the Waffen-SS was absolutely, positively not a branch of the Armed Forces (Wehrmacht). I was simply pointing out that direct translations, even of cognates, doesn't always work (for example, we use "engineers" to translate both Ingenieure and Pioniere; "pioneers" in that sense is found archaically but is misleading today).  Waffe is cognate with "weapon," but also means a "branch" with weapons, not unlike English "arm"; hence Luftwaffe, and for that matter the more comfortable "Armed-SS" as opposed to the more cognate "Weapon-SS."