GERMAN AIRBORNE TROOPS

German Airborne Troops is the first full-length study, and certainly the most Comprehensive account so far published in pany language, of the parachute and air-landing troops, Fallschirmjäger, of the Third Reich.The systematically arranged text, with a foreword by Generaloberst Kurt Student a.D., creator of the Fallschirmjager, deals comprehensively with uniforms, weapons, equipment, training, organization, air transport, military operations, unit histories and personalities of the German Airborne Corps, a fighting formation that, with a handful of men astounded the world by its y daring capture of the strongest f Europe fortress in Eban-Emael. 

The German plans for airborne attacks on Norway, Denmark, Holland, the Corinth Canal and Crete are lucidly explained and illustrated with photographic material from German war archives. Unfulfilled plans for a skyborne invasion of Britain and for the occupation of Malta and Gibraltar, as well as for the capture of the French fleet in Toulon, are included in the narrative. The attack on Crete, the first ever strategic employment of parachute troops, highlighted both the strength and weakness of German airborne warfare. Many readers will perhaps find this the most fascinating part of the study. Paradoxically, this hazardous military operation, succeeding by only the narrowest of margins, led to the demise of the Fallschirmjager battalions and their further debilitation in wasteful battles in Russia. 

Following their rehabilitation they were to campaign as infantry on all fronts in the Second World War and, whenever danger threatened, were frequently employed in the role of fire brigade. Speaking of their staunchness at Cassino, Field-Marshal Earl Alexander of Tunis said of the Fallschirmjager: 'The power of resistance of these peopleis extraordinary.' Much of the photographic material in the book is taken from German war archives and hitherto unpublished. Other archive material abstracted from war-time battle reports is contained in the text.