By Richard Rule
In May 1941, General Kurt Student’s elite paratrooper forces descended like an anvil on the British garrison defending Crete. Instead of winning a quick and decisive victory, the airborne troops found themselves locked in brutal battle against some of the toughest veterans in the British Army. Here, on the sun-parched Mediterranean island of Crete, the Germans appeared to be on the brink of their first military defeat of the war.
As part of Germany’s peripheral strategy against the British Empire in the Mediterranean, Hitler invaded Greece in early April 1941, with a provision for General Kurt Student’s airborne troops to seize the Greek island of Crete. Within weeks, Hitler’s panzer columns had decisively smashed all opposition in their path and were relentlessly streaming toward central Greece. Allied forces sent to the mainland had been completely outclassed and were soon left contemplating the prospect of another Dunkirk.
While German troops were enjoying incredible success in the Balkans, General Student feared that Hitler had changed his mind regarding the deployment of airborne forces in the Greek campaign. Desperate to get his men into the fight, Student decided to present the case for an air invasion of Crete directly to Hitler.
On April 21, he expansively outlined the many threats that Britain’s advanced air bases on Crete posed to German interests in the Balkans. Not the least of these were bombing raids against the vital Romanian oil fields at Ploesti, the German Army’s main source of oil. Hitler, immersed in the planning of Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, reluctantly agreed to the invasion of Crete on the provision that he be delivered a swift and decisive victory.
NO CREDIT CARD NEEDED
Read this article now for Free!
Enter your email address and a password to finish reading this article now.
— OR —
Subscribe Now!
Subscribe now to All Access Digital for only $3.99 a month and finish reading this article. Unlimited Website Access, Thousands of Searchable Articles, Warfare Newsletter, and more.
Students should have issued his troops with stronger parachutes enabling them to jump with weapons and a night time drop or early dawn. Also why didn’t he jump with them.