my head

The attack was days late to cut off the British retreating from central Greece, but they still surrounded the 16th Australian Infantry and the 17th Australian Infantry. On December 12, about 30 soldiers had been evacuated, but they were severely damaged by the Luftwaffe. About 50,000 troop carriers were sunk. Puyes and Palestinians) and Yugoslav soldiers, while releasing many Italian prisoners of war from Allied camps.

The Wehrmacht took Yugoslavia in a month. It is reasonable to say that the victory of the Wehrmacht was brilliant, but the grandsons of the Wehrmacht compared their record with the SS, and they were immediately dissatisfied. The SS fought in 4 hours. Surrender to Denmark, and defeat the reinforcements of Norway, Britain and France within 17 days, thus completely occupying Denmark and Norway.The National Defense Force also used 30 people, but it took a whole month to completely take Yugoslavia and Greece, which made the grandsons of the National Defense Force very upset.

In addition, Greece still has a large island of 8300 square kilometers-Crete has not yet been taken by Germany, that is, the German Wehrmacht has not completely occupied the entire territory of Greece, and has left a "tail" on Crete. There are tens of thousands of British and Greek troops stationed on this island, and he is like a nail driven into the back of Germany.

Crete is located in the Eastern Mediterranean, at the junction of the Aegean Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. It is the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea and the largest island in the Aegean Sea.It is about 810 kilometers away from the island of Malta in the west, about 520 kilometers away from the island of Cyprus in the east, and 90 kilometers away from the Peloponnese Peninsula in the northwest.Tobruk, an important town in South and North Africa, faces each other across the sea.About 360 kilometers.The southeast is about 560 kilometers away from Alexandria, Egypt, and its strategic position is extremely important.If the German army occupied the island, it could not only control the Eastern Mediterranean, threaten the British positions in the Mediterranean region and the Middle East, protect Romanian oil fields from British air strikes, but also use the island as a forward base for invading the Middle East.For Britain, Crete was a defensive outpost in Egypt and the Suez Canal.

Both sides want to take Crete as their own, so it is destined that this Crete will be stained red with blood.Who will become its new owner depends on who is stronger and whose tactics are more suitable, everything is unknown.

After the grandsons of the National Defense Forces took Yugoslavia and Greece, they looked back and found that there was still an island of Crete that was not included in the bag. They hurriedly formulated a campaign plan to capture Crete. This was a complete strategic mistake. It was a temporary campaign plan, and I don't know if the grandsons of the German Wehrmacht have "tofu dregs" in their heads.

The Wehrmacht originally intended to capture three airfields on the island by airborne with one and a half paratrooper divisions.Two divisions were also used to attack by landing on the beach, and two other air forces assisted in the attack.At the same time, the Italian fleet provided escort protection for the landing force.Germany does not have any fleet in the Mediterranean Sea. Among EU member states, Italy has a fleet that can provide such protection. The Italian Navy was attacked twice by the British Navy at Taranto and Cape Matapan, and was unable to escort the landing forces at sea. The escort fleet, so the German transport ships can only be the dishes of British and French submarines. Tens of thousands of German troops will be ruthlessly sent into the embrace of the sea by those British and French submarines. For this reason the Wehrmacht Wehrmacht mobilized three paratrooper divisions for the Battle of Crete.

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The Germans are preparing to seize the island. Of course, the British and Greek defenders are preparing to defend the island with all their strength. Britain has absolute naval superiority in the Mediterranean, but Germany has air superiority. Churchill of the United Kingdom also ordered the British Mediterranean fleet to attack Crete as much as possible. The island sent troops and materials far away, and the British army sent 6000 troops to Crete.Including the Greek and British troops who retreated from Greece, the total number is about 6.4, of which about 1.4 are the Greek army and about 5 are the British Commonwealth army.Major General Freiberg, commander of the New Zealand Division, was appointed commander of the Crete garrison to unify the command of the troops on the island.

The British intelligence agency had mastered the details of the German airborne operations and the possible attack date, and immediately notified the defenders whether the British had deciphered the German Engel code. Now no one knows, maybe the British spies got the code.Freiberg believes that the main force of the German army landed from the sea, and the airborne assault was nothing more than seizing the airport and port.Therefore, Souda Bay and Marama Airport are the key points of defense, with them as the core to form a support point defense system, and the whole island is divided into four independent defense zones: Marama Defense Zone, Souda Bay Defense Zone, and Rethymnon Defense Zone and the Iraqi Klin defense zone.The Marama defense area and the Suda Bay defense area respectively deployed a brigade of the New Zealand Army and a battalion of the British Army as reserves.There are only 1 tanks, which are assigned to 1 airports. 36 light anti-aircraft gun companies and 3 heavy anti-aircraft gun companies are responsible for air defense.The British army camouflaged the support points, set up false positions and false targets, and made the best use of complex terrain to deploy firepower.Supplies were the biggest difficulty in the preparations for the defense of the British army. The daily unloading of materials at the port dropped from the initial 3 tons to only 2 tons.Based on the examples of the German invasion of Denmark and Norway's air landings on roads, airports, and beaches, Freiberg believed that the German army did not rely heavily on the airport, and the British army would use the airport, so they did not destroy the airport.

The German army’s campaign was divided into two attack waves, each assault about one and a half paratrooper divisions, with a force of 1.5, and a total of 3 in two waves. The first wave assaulted the Malim and Souda Port areas in the west; After the planes carrying the first wave of troops flew back, the second wave attacked the Rethymnon and Iraqi Klin areas.These two waves will be reinforced by paratroopers, supported by airborne forces, and then supported by landing forces by sea until the entire island is taken.The air forces invested by the German army include the 4th and 8th Air Forces of the 11th Air Force (433 bombers, 233 fighters, 500 transport planes, 50 reconnaissance planes, and 72 transport gliders)

At 1940:1 am on January 4, 4, the first German attack wave took off.At 30 o'clock in the morning, the German 5th Air Force made fierce aviation fire preparations to Marama, Iraq Klin Airport and the urban area of ​​Chania. At 8 o'clock, the western combat group composed of the gliding assault regiment (four battalions under its jurisdiction) under the command of Colonel Myndell flew to Malama Airport.After the 7st Battalion landed, the main force attacked the airport from the west, and the other part attacked the only bridge over the Tavelanitis River connecting the east and west coasts of the island. At 1:7, the German army captured the bridge.The 30rd Battalion happened to land at the preset positions of the 3nd and 22rd Battalions of the New Zealand Army. All the officers and soldiers of the 23rd Battalion were killed, completely losing combat effectiveness.The 23nd and 2th Battalions parachuted near the airport and were unable to assemble into an organic unit after landing, so the situation was passive.Colonel Myender, commander of the Western Battle Group, was badly wounded during the landing.Due to the loss of combat effectiveness of the 4rd Battalion, they had to change their plan and attack Height 3, the commanding height near the airport, first, and then seize the airport.The German paratroopers lost a lot, but made no progress.

The first batch of airborne troops also landed in the Galatus area near Chania. The 3rd Paratrooper Regiment of the Central Combat Group, led by Major General Sussman, the commander of the 7th Airborne Division.20 minutes after takeoff, the glider that Sussman and the division were on crashed, and Sussman and all members of the division were killed.The 3rd Paratrooper Regiment spread out too much on landing, and was subjected to intensive firepower during the landing, causing considerable losses.Among them, the 3rd Battalion landed in the defense area of ​​the 4th Brigade of the New Zealand Army and was almost wiped out.Under the attack of the British army, the 1st and 2nd Battalions were forced to build fortifications on the spot and turned to defense.Due to the communication interruption of the German army, Student did not know that the first attack wave was severely frustrated, and still organized the second attack wave as originally planned, carrying out airborne attacks on Rethymnon and Iraqi Klin.

The transport planes transporting the first attack wave returned to the departure airport one after another. Due to the disorderly landing order, several crashed planes blocked the runway, which even affected the landing of subsequent planes.At noon, Student knew that Malama Airport was still in the hands of the British army, and soon received a report from the airborne troops in Chania, and the central battle group stopped attacking due to heavy casualties.Student immediately organized a second attack wave of reinforcements.The organization of the second wave of the German attack was chaotic. Until 16:3, most of the planes were still at the airport.After arriving at the skies over Crete in pieces, the airdrops continued intermittently for more than three hours.Losses were compounded by delays in takeoff time and lack of air cover from fighter jets.The central battle group airborne Rethymnon, originally planned that the 2st and 1rd Battalions of the 3nd Paratrooper Regiment would land on the east and west sides of the airport respectively, and attack the airport centripetally.Due to the large spread of paratroopers landing, only one company of the 1st Battalion landed at the scheduled landing site. Colonel Slim, the head of the regiment, and two companies directly under the regiment landed at the Australian Army position. More than half of them were killed and injured. Until dusk, the regiment also The airfield was not captured.

The Eastern Combat Group was commanded by Colonel Brauer. The 1st Paratrooper Regiment and the 2nd Battalion of the 2nd Regiment consisted of 4 battalions in total. At the airport, the other two battalions provided flank cover on the east and west wings.But takeoff was delayed and 1 people were stranded at the departure airport due to the loss of the plane.The airborne lasted more than two hours, the landing was scattered, and the organization was chaotic.After Brower landed, seeing the situation was not good, he focused on attacking the airfield, but made no progress until dark.

Student, who was in Athens, realized that the battle situation was unfavorable. None of the three airports succeeded, and the landed troops lacked a unified command.At that time, the Germans had been attacking Malama Airport and its southern commanding height, Heights 107.The 22nd Battalion of the New Zealand Army defending the airport has jurisdiction over 4 infantry companies, and the troops are evenly deployed at the airport and 107 Heights.The battalion headquarters is located at 107 Heights.During the fierce battle, the airport lost contact with the two defenders on the high ground.In the afternoon, the highland defenders withdrew to the top of the mountain. Without reinforcements, the commander lost confidence in continuing to hold on, and withdrew after getting approval.

At this time, the German Western Battle Group was also very difficult and had to stop the attack.In the middle of the night, the German army, with less than 600 troops, tried their best to make a final blow, attacking from the west and south flanks. Unexpectedly, they touched the high ground and the British army had already withdrawn.After dawn, the German army condescended to capture Marama Airport in one fell swoop. The gains and losses of the 107 Heights directly affect the gains and losses of the Marama Airport, and the gains and losses of the Marama Airport determine the outcome of the Battle of Crete... (To be continued..)