Kurt Student
Silent Blitzkrieg: the Battle of Fort Eben Emael
By Robert Barr SmithBelgian Fort Eben Emael was as close to impregnable as modern defense works could be—or so it seemed. Read more
Kurt Student
Operation Biting: the Bruneval Raid to Capture German Radar
By Robert Barr SmithThrough the long, lovely days of the summer of 1940, almost two years before Operation Biting or the “Bruneval Raid,” Royal Air Force Spitfire and Hurricane fighter planes turned back the might of the Luftwaffe over southern and southeastern Britain. Read more
Kurt Student
The Forgotten American Airborne of Operation Market-Garden
By Major General Michael Reynolds (ret.)“In the years to come everyone will remember Arnhem, but no one will remember that two American divisions fought their hearts out in the Dutch canal country,” wrote U.S. Read more
Kurt Student
The Invasion of Crete: Descent Into The Inferno
By William E. WelshBy May 1941, the German Luftwaffe’s fortunes had risen to great heights and plummeted to equally startling depths in the course of a single year of blitzkrieg warfare in Western Europe. Read more
Kurt Student
The Lions of Carentan Part III: Operation Cobra
By Volker GriesserBackground: In this, the third and final installment of a three-part series excerpted from The Lions of Carentan, the 2011 book by a respected German military historian, Fallschirmjäger Regiment 6 (FJR 6) has been pushed out of Ste.-Mère-église, Read more
Kurt Student
The Lions of Carentan Part II: Defending Carentan
By Volker GriesserBackground: Fallschirmjäger Regiment 6, under the command of Major Friedrich August Freiherr von der Heydte, had the fortune (or misfortune) to be stationed in Normandy at the time of the Allied invasion of France on June 6, 1944. Read more
Kurt Student
The Lions of Carentan Part I: Paratrooper vs Paratrooper on D-Day
By Volker GriesserBackground: Fallschirmjäger Regiment 6 was organized in February 1943, under the command of Major Egon Liebach. It was part of the 2nd Fallschirmjäger Division and was stationed in France, where it trained in parachute and glider operations. Read more
Kurt Student
101st in Operation Market-Garden: Taking the Bridge at Best
By Richard A. BerantyOn the veranda of his temporary headquarters in a Dutch country house outside Veghel, Holland, renowned Luftwaffe General Kurt Student played lunch host to an old comrade, the chief of staff of the German Seventh Army. Read more
Kurt Student
A Pyrrhic Parachute Victory in Crete
By Richard RuleIn May 1941, General Kurt Student’s elite paratrooper forces descended like an anvil on the British garrison defending Crete. Read more
Kurt Student
Fallschirmjagers: The German Paratrooper Corps
by Richard RuleBetween 1940 and 1945, the outstanding fighting spirit and courage of the elite German paratroop forces earned the admiration of friend and foe alike. Read more
Kurt Student
Operation Stösser: Last Airborne Offensive of the Fallschirmjägers
By Rob KrottOperation Stösser was launched during Germany’s last gamble: Wacht am Rhein (Operation Watch on the Rhine), Hitler’s offensive in the West which Americans know as the Battle of the Bulge, had as its ultimate objective the Belgian port of Antwerp. Read more
Kurt Student
General Kurt Student: Serving in Both World Wars
by Richard RuleKurt Student, the founding father of Germany’s elite parachute forces, was born on May 12, 1890, and served with distinction as a fighter pilot and squadron leader in World War I. Read more
