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The Night Witches and Other Warrior Women of World War II

Lyudmila Pavlichenko - World War II
WWII Red Army snipers. Pintrest

19. Luring Horny Nazis to Their Doom

A WWII Dutch Resistance cell. For God and Country

Truus Oversteegen received military training, and was to taught how to operate a firearm. Her early assignments required no shooting on her part, however. She was sent to flirt with and seduce German soldiers, then lead them into the woods, where they would be killed by her comrades.

As Freddie described it decades later: “[Truus] was like: ‘Want to go for a stroll?’ And of course he wanted to. Then they ran into someone — which was made to seem a coincidence, but he was one of ours — and that friend said to Truus: ‘Girl, you know you’re not supposed to be here.’ They apologised, turned around, and walked away. And then shots were fired, so that man never knew what hit him. They had already dug the hole, but we weren’t allowed to be there for that part“.

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A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.

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