HITLER'S BODYGUARD: Caesar had his Pretorian Guard, and Napoleon, the Old Guard. Hitler's equivalent was the Leibstandarte, which grew from a small hand picked battalion, to a complete Panzer Division twenty thousand strong. Naturally, the Leibstandarte received the best and most modern equipment, but they needed it. As the situation deteriorated, the division became a mobile fire brigade, deployed wherever the fighting was fiercest in Russia and France. Even the end of the war brought no respite, as the survivors marched into captivity from which few returned. (thetvdb.com)