HEADQUARTERS 8TH ARMORED DIVISION
Office A. C. of S., G-2
APO 258, U. S. Army.

7 June 1945.          

AFTER ACTION REPORT, MAY 1945

1. Enemy Situation at End of Period:

There was no organized of discernible unorganized resistance on 31 May 1945. Germany surrendered 7 May 1945.

2. Enemy Operations During Period:

There was no organized or discernible unorganized resistance in the Div area during the entire period.

3. Section Operations:

The Div was notified of Intelligence Targets by means of information sheets, Divisional Unit Rcn and Intelligence Target reports from Corps and Army. The Combat Commands concerned were notified and the targets were placed under guard. A target report giving the status of the target was submitted to this section by the Combat Commands and Division Artillery. The report was forwarded to the Target Section, Ninth US Army, which in turn notified the agency concerned.

The interested agency sent technical experts and specially trained army officers to exploit the targets. Documents and technical data were removed from the targets and taken to Camp Dentine which was established as a depot for all such materials. Following the thorough exploitation of each target orders were received from higher headquarters that the installation had ceased to be an intelligence target and that guards were no longer necessary.

Targets of opportunity were discovered by the Air Disarmament Activities, 8501 Wing RAF. Many of these new targets were dispersal plants of large, well known German war industries. Information obtained from these satellite installations proved to be of high intelligence value.

On the 3d of May files from the German Office of Foreign Ministry were found near Eland, Germany. The files were chiefly political culture propaganda for use in foreign countries. Specific items found were: newspaper files (English, Swedish and others), limited files from Swiss Consular Offices in some neutral and allied countries, speeches of Hitler and henchmen for propaganda purposes, a file of several thousand photographs for all countries, and various rosters of teachers in foreign countries. Also found on the 3d of May in a church at Drubeck, Germany were several thousand records of German and Allied casualties. A few British and American Air Corps casualties were included.

On 9 May, the 53rd Armd Engr Bn located a technical library, Bibiohek der Technicher Hochchule Hannover, at Levershausen, Germany. This library contained patents and blue prints covering a period from 1903 to 1943. It was evident that the library had been recently moved from Hannover to escape the bombing. Hq Ninth US Army established the library as an Intelligence Target.

On 11 May the Division was relieved of a portion of the assigned area by elements of the 83d Infantry Division with a resulting transfer of 43 Intelligence Targets to that Division.

On 31 May, there were 168 Intelligence Targets in the Division area, 35 of which were under guard and 133 were posted "off limits".

During the period, the 508th Counterintelligence Corps Detachment made 367 arrests and screened 75 German towns. A complete report of Counterintelligence Corps activities within the Division area is found in Annex B.