Scarcely were the lights out on WW2 when we started recruiting “ex”-Nazis for our military and intelligence agencies.
We started setting up Operation Gladio or the Stay Behind Network, composed almost purely of Nazis and other fascists, to defend Europe after a possible Soviet invasion and conquest. They would form the behind the lines resistance against the new Soviet Order in Europe.
We started setting up and funding “ex” Nazis and Nazi collaborators all over Eastern Europe to serve as similar stay behind networks to wage guerilla war in parts of the USSR, especially the Baltics (the Forest Brothers) and Ukraine. These guerrilla wars lasted until 1956 and were very brutally put down, mostly by the NKVD.
This is another good article:
https://www.salon.com/2014/11/09/you_dont_protect_my_freedom_our_childish_insistence_on_calling_soldiers_heroes_deadens_real_democracy/