[narwan]

The SS was a murky organisation at all times with many different levels and suborganisations. All the above don't even go into the different levels and taks of the Allgemeine SS. But still, the ORIGINAL task for the SS was VIP protection.

A good example for the confusion is the VT units. Some of these were merged into a SS-VT division which has caused some historians to refer to these exclusively as VT troops while others include all the SS 'combat' troops (including the Leibstandarte). This latter seems to be the correct use as for example service in the VT became equivalent for fulfilling the militairy service with the armed forces as early as 1936, long before the formation of the division.

The nuances of the VT aren't terribly relevant though while that between the VT and TV is. They had different recruitment criteria, training and organisation. TV service didn't count for militairy service either as the army considered this a 'police' organisation.

There were in fact 5 TV verbände (each about battallion strength) in october 1939 when the Theodor Eicke, Inspector general for the concentration camps gained permission to organise an SS field division too (note that he was in charge of the TV part, NOT the VT part of the SS and it seems he wanted his own little army too). These verbände were No1 Oberbayern, No2 Elbe, No3 Sachsen, No4 Ostfriesland and No5 Brandenburg, based at Dachau, Sachsenhausen, Frankenberg, Buchenwald and Mauthausen respectively. About 6500 out of a total of 7400 TV troops were assigned to the division (so over 80% of all TV troops which can hardly qualify as the 'best' of the TV). Experienced officers from the VT were transfered in and the combat experienced former TV standarte Götze added (that had started out as a unit meant to conduct 'police' operations in the danzig area on the heels of the german armed forces but it had ended up in the front lines itself fighting the polish armed forces).
Still service in the division was not considered militairy service (until the first half of 1940) and they held on to the lower recruitment standards compared to the VT units.

The SS standarten Nordland (Danes and Norwegians, not Swedes) and Westland were in fact only battallions when they were merged with the Germanina regiment from the VT division to form a second VT division (which did become the Wiking division) but the did become regiment sized later on.

I have no idea what to make of this:
"5th and 6th Totenkopf regiments become Kampfgruppe Nord
8th and 10th Totenkopf regiments becomes the 1st SS Motor brigade.
4th and 14th Totenkopf regiments becomes the 2nd SS Motor brigade.
SS cavalry regiments formed."

What year are these referring too?

And as to the high percentage of desertions, I'd have to dig up some specific numbers, but from my head these were high for normal german standards, not to mention the normal figures for SS units.

Sources for the origins of the SS divisions is Bruce Quarries 'Hitler Teutonic Knights' and for the Das Reich in frnace 44 is Max Hastings 'Das Reich; the march of the 2nd ss panzer division through france, june 1944'.