potnoodle
seem like otto has borrowed Tony Manero’s cuban heels
seem like otto has borrowed Tony Manero’s cuban heels
Just a short note on Otto Blasé. By the way the Tiger B (King Royal or the misnomer Tiger II) that is painted on the Tamiya 1/35 Tiger, number 332, is Otto Blase’s tank.
Although Blasé was a commander in the 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler Blasé wanted to be a Luftwaffe pilot and went through training and became an officer, but there was a huge pool of pilots waiting for planes. At the same time the SS had a shortage of heavy tank officers because of the heavy fighting in the East. The SS got whatever they wanted, confiscating brand new Tigers made for the Heer Tiger battalions before they could be delivered. It was the same when they needed personnel. So the Luftwaffe agreed to send some of their unassigned officers and that is how Blasé got into the SS.
He was of course in Michael Whittmann’s company and on the day Whittmann was killed, other Tigers were destroyed and Blase’s Tiger was one. However, Blasé is photographed at the apparent last pre battle conference led by Whittmann. It is debatable if this is the actual LAST conference, but I do note that every officer including Whittmann is paying attention to whoever the officer who is speaking, except Blasé. He is looking at the camera and is slumped over, and the photo of Blasé is the one used to make the sculpture. The story goes that Whittmann saw that Blasé was sick and ordered him to go to the field hospital. His Tiger was taken over by another commander. So Blasé is know to have been sick and in hospital when the ba battle took place.
Blase’s Tiger E (correct designation, not Tiger I) was not replaced and from August until October he did not command a tank that he was permanently assigned. He was supposed to get a replacement at the end of September but due to Allied bombing, work at the tank factory was disrupted. In October, the 1st SS Heavy Tank Battalion was supposed to be reoutfitted with new Tiger B’s but the problem in the factory caused there to be a slowdown. So in October, the SS confiscated a new Tiger that was being shipped to the Heer division previously noted. That Tiger, had already been painted and given a turret number and I don’t know if it just happened to coincide with Blase’s position in the group he was with, or if 332 was the intended number for the Heer. It would seem that tank maintenance crews would have been Abel to speedily repaint numbers and symbols on SS tanks. So perhaps that is where the number 332 comes from. However, the story about the tank being painted with numbers and markings for the Heer unit is also a true fact well documented.
So Watch on the Rhine happens and Pieperr is using Panters but he also has his detachment of the 101 Heavy Tanks as well,. On the advance, Blase’s 332 experienced a mechanical problem and he had to stop on the road near Petit Spa. I suspect that the forward gears had broken. And at the time the Tigers were on the march, not retreating in the face of the enemy, so there was no need to destroy 332 to keep it from being captured.
It was also policy for the crew, especially the commander, (according to a conversation in 2004 that I had with Wolfgang Schneider who wrote Tigers in Combat). On Christmas Day, American tanks from the 740th independent tank brigade were advancing toward the fighting when at a distance, they see a Tiger B, number 332, parked on the side of the road near Petit Spa. They fired a phosphorus shell which landed right in front of the Tiger. German crews feared being hit from a phosphorus round because the molten phosphorus would leak in through any opening and burn the men inside. AND, when Germans saw phosphorus it meant that their position had been marked and either artillery or a fighter would be coming shortly.
The Americans saw men getting out of the Tiger and running away. Blasé was never seen again by the men of the SS, never attended any veterans’s reunions.
And his 332 is at Fort Banning, Georgia.
Here are pictures of the Tiger that Blase commanded with Schwere Panzerabteilung 501., from the Patton Armor Museum at Ft. benning, Ga.
Sadly, the left side of the turret and hull were cut open to show the interior details.
Panzerkampfwagen VI Königstiger - WalkAround - NET-MAQUETTES
