page_title: Operation Osprey
section_title: Mission plan and training
hierarchical_section_title: Operation Osprey / Mission plan and training
context_page_description: Operation Osprey was a plan conceived by the German Foreign Ministry and Abwehr II. mid-1942. The plan was an enlargement of Operation Whale. Planning took place in the context of American troops landing in Northern Ireland 26 January 1942, and Hitler's immediate fears surrounding this.
context_section_description: The mission plan and training schedule for Osprey was drawn up by Director of Amt VI, Walther Schellenberg, who held his brief with the Foreign Political Information Service.
  Training took place at the Totenkopf Barracks in Berlin-Oranienburg and consisted of the selection of around 100 volunteers from various SS troop sections. The unit was designated Sonder Lehrgang Oranienburg and consisted of seventy NCOs and thirty private soldiers under the command of Hauptsturmführer Pieter Van Vessem (reportedly a Dutch national). Brandenburg regiment NCO Helmut Clissmann was to test the suitability of these volunteers against Abwehr set benchmarks of foreign language skills and cultural awareness of Ireland/Britain. Each volunteer was given English language training, and British weaponry, sabotage, and explosives training.  Clissmann did believe that on the whole the unit would be able to fulfil its mission of providing close tactical support and training for any parties resisting an American invasion.
  The Waffen-SS unit was to be inserted into Ireland by parachute using a Focke-Wulf Fw 200 'Condor' once the American invasion began.  In addition, as part of Osprey, consideration was given to using selected regular 'Brandenburgers' and two captured Irish Prisoners of War recruited from Friesack Camp.  The unit and plan was not put to the test in Ireland because the feared American invasion of Éire territory did not occur.
  Despite being cancelled this mission did mark the first entrance of the SS's intelligence service, the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) into Irish affairs.
caption: Walter Schellenberg as an SS-Oberführer
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