There was no other way to take the island. The Germans and Italians had no capacity to invade an island with purely seaborne forces in the teeth of opposition by the Royal Navy.
The only thing that wasn't on the plan of Operation Mercury was the ammount of casualties suffered by the German Paratroopers, because the outcome of this operation was a Crushing and Hummiliaiting defeat of the british. The british High Command never thought and expected to lose so many men ( including POW'S) in the battle for Crete. A devastaiting blow ( among others)on the british army and british moral. Some months later the british did suffer another crushing defeats at Tobruk and specialy in Singapore.
This documentary glosses over the German invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940, which coincided with the Battle of Fort Eben-Emael. In the former, Student's forces didn't fare quite so well, suffering heavy losses, be it mostly in materiel rather than casualties. He lost 224 out of the 430 Ju 52s assigned to him. To top it all off, Student suffered a near-fatal head wound a few days later, in Rotterdam, from friendly fire.
*You know, I always assumed that they just depicted German officers in movies as having scars because it makes him look more like the bad guy, but they didn’t always explain why they had them in real life. Learning that there was actually a legitimate dueling reason for the scars was actually pretty cool! learn something new every day!*
Yes, especially if you stop watching ‘movies’, especially American ones, and expecting or believing that they are going to teach you any reality or explain the truth. Better to at least read books for yourself. With regard to the Schmiss (dueling scar), there have been several attempts to outlaw the university duels that caused them and the practice has all but died out today.
Because after WW2, the world's militaries were moving away from purely airborne operations. The disastrously high casualties suffered in Operation Merkur were reproduced in the very high losses the Allies suffered to their airborne forces on June 6, 1944. No matter how good they are, soldiers armed with nothing much more than small arms and grenades have little chance against conventional forces. This lesson was repeated in the near disaster of Operation Market Garden in September 1944. The French army attempted to defeat the Viet Minh in 1954 by an airborne landing at Dien Bien Phu. They were defeated finally and completely. Israel attempted an airborne assault by parachute in Sinai in 1956. This was Israel's worst battle in terms of casualties since the War of Independence. And the Mitla operation would have failed if not relieved rapidly by Israeli tank forces. The world's last, purely airborne operation was the relief of Khe Sanh in 1968. It succeeded only at the cost of prohibitive losses in men and aircraft. The North Vietnamese antiaircraft forces were far too effective for this operation to be undertaken without heavy lossed. And since then, no one in the world has undertaken a purely airborne military operation. Airborne forces are far too fragile to antiaircraft defenses. And besides, Student was a war criminal guilty of ordering the murders of thousands of civilians.
Yes that's right and after WW2 there was a denazification. The newly formed Bundeswehr was keen to distance itself from the Nazi military structure. Because of his role during the war Student was not really a politically viable figure for the new West German state. His war record and war crimes made him a controversial figure.
@@HistoryInsideWW2 There has been a continual downgrading of purely airborne forces since Vietnam. The US experimented for a while during the 1970s with a TRICAP concept: combining airmobile, conventional armoured and infantry forces. However, it was concluded that the 1st Cavalry Division needed more tanks and less airborne or heli-borne infantry, and the TRICAP organization was discarded. This was confirmed when US Stinger missiles extracted huge losses from Soviet airborne operations in Afghanistan after 1979. It was confirmed again when the 1979 hostage rescue attempt failed so badly in Iran. Finally, the vulnerability of airborne forces was shown when the Spetsnaz insertion teams were massacred by Ukrainian air defences during Putin's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. A swift air assault operation turned into WW1. 'Parachute' is an Israeli military designation of elite infantry formations in its army. But since Mitla in 1956, it has never attempted a parachute assault anywhere. In a very real sense, Mitla confirmed that the airborne operations of WW2 were a thing of the past. In that sense, Mitla was no different than Operation Merkur: airborne operations were only possible with enormous casualties among a nation's best trained and motivated soldiers. Kurt Student was wrong; airborne would not ultimately revolutionize land warfare.
Altho crete was costly it was taken as the germans landed Close to.objectives something the british didnt do at arnhem Also there were armour supporting the british But wrongly deployed
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Operation Mercury was both a triumph and a disaster for Student. Do you think the high casualties justified the strategy, or was it a reckless gamble?
There was no other way to take the island. The Germans and Italians had no capacity to invade an island with purely seaborne forces in the teeth of opposition by the Royal Navy.
The only thing that wasn't on the plan of Operation Mercury was the ammount of casualties suffered by the German Paratroopers, because the outcome of this operation was a Crushing and Hummiliaiting defeat of the british.
The british High Command never thought and expected to lose so many men ( including POW'S) in the battle for Crete.
A devastaiting blow ( among others)on the british army and british moral.
Some months later the british did suffer another crushing defeats at Tobruk and specialy in Singapore.
This documentary glosses over the German invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940, which coincided with the Battle of Fort Eben-Emael. In the former, Student's forces didn't fare quite so well, suffering heavy losses, be it mostly in materiel rather than casualties. He lost 224 out of the 430 Ju 52s assigned to him. To top it all off, Student suffered a near-fatal head wound a few days later, in Rotterdam, from friendly fire.
*You know, I always assumed that they just depicted German officers in movies as having scars because it makes him look more like the bad guy, but they didn’t always explain why they had them in real life. Learning that there was actually a legitimate dueling reason for the scars was actually pretty cool! learn something new every day!*
Yes, especially if you stop watching ‘movies’, especially American ones, and expecting or believing that they are going to teach you any reality or explain the truth.
Better to at least read books for yourself.
With regard to the Schmiss (dueling scar), there have been several attempts to outlaw the university duels that caused them and the practice has all but died out today.
Fencing scars. Most gentlemen of that Era had one on his face.
Why didn't Kurt student training the Early Bundeswehr paratroopers too (or someone under him)?
Because after WW2, the world's militaries were moving away from purely airborne operations. The disastrously high casualties suffered in Operation Merkur were reproduced in the very high losses the Allies suffered to their airborne forces on June 6, 1944. No matter how good they are, soldiers armed with nothing much more than small arms and grenades have little chance against conventional forces. This lesson was repeated in the near disaster of Operation Market Garden in September 1944.
The French army attempted to defeat the Viet Minh in 1954 by an airborne landing at Dien Bien Phu. They were defeated finally and completely. Israel attempted an airborne assault by parachute in Sinai in 1956. This was Israel's worst battle in terms of casualties since the War of Independence. And the Mitla operation would have failed if not relieved rapidly by Israeli tank forces.
The world's last, purely airborne operation was the relief of Khe Sanh in 1968. It succeeded only at the cost of prohibitive losses in men and aircraft. The North Vietnamese antiaircraft forces were far too effective for this operation to be undertaken without heavy lossed.
And since then, no one in the world has undertaken a purely airborne military operation. Airborne forces are far too fragile to antiaircraft defenses.
And besides, Student was a war criminal guilty of ordering the murders of thousands of civilians.
Yes that's right and after WW2 there was a denazification. The newly formed Bundeswehr was keen to distance itself from the Nazi military structure. Because of his role during the war Student was not really a politically viable figure for the new West German state. His war record and war crimes made him a controversial figure.
@@HistoryInsideWW2 There has been a continual downgrading of purely airborne forces since Vietnam. The US experimented for a while during the 1970s with a TRICAP concept: combining airmobile, conventional armoured and infantry forces. However, it was concluded that the 1st Cavalry Division needed more tanks and less airborne or heli-borne infantry, and the TRICAP organization was discarded.
This was confirmed when US Stinger missiles extracted huge losses from Soviet airborne operations in Afghanistan after 1979. It was confirmed again when the 1979 hostage rescue attempt failed so badly in Iran. Finally, the vulnerability of airborne forces was shown when the Spetsnaz insertion teams were massacred by Ukrainian air defences during Putin's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. A swift air assault operation turned into WW1.
'Parachute' is an Israeli military designation of elite infantry formations in its army. But since Mitla in 1956, it has never attempted a parachute assault anywhere. In a very real sense, Mitla confirmed that the airborne operations of WW2 were a thing of the past. In that sense, Mitla was no different than Operation Merkur: airborne operations were only possible with enormous casualties among a nation's best trained and motivated soldiers. Kurt Student was wrong; airborne would not ultimately revolutionize land warfare.
I think there will always be an Airborne.....if used properly & in cooordination with other units in an operation, they are the tip of the spear...
Altho crete was costly it was taken as the germans landed
Close to.objectives something the british didnt do at arnhem
Also there were armour supporting the british
But wrongly deployed
Really enjoyed this. This guy was he a Nazi or just a soldier ?
Why was he acquitted ? Who ordered Kondomari if not him ?
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