With the invasion of Russia on June 22ND 1941 the German army quickly occupied large tracts of territory resulting in ever extending rear areas that required policing to maintain order amongst the population and to secure open transportation and communication lines to the front. Originally the army had established small auxiliary police units for these purposes which were followed by SS action groups. The territories occupied proved to be too large for these small auxiliary units to police effectively which resulted in recruitment of local anti-communist personnel which were formed into Schuma, Schutzmannschaften (Protection Troops) units in November 1941. The Schuma personnel fell under the control of the regional Höhere SS und Polizeiführer (Higher SS and Police Leader). These Schuma personnel wore a wide variety of uniforms headgear and insignia including surplus black Allgemeine-SS uniforms and assorted field-gray and police green items. Schuma personnel serving as non-combatant administrative personnel were subordinate to the SS-SD SS-Sicherheitsdienst und Sicherheitspolizei (SS-Security Service and Security Police) and were issued with field-gray uniforms with no insignia until an identifying armband was introduced on August 18TH 1944 to be worn on the upper right sleeve of the tunic.