By Charles Whiting
After the 1st gorgeous victories of Germany's Parachute Corps, Churchill and different Allied leaders ordered the formation in their personal paratroopers, copying the German version. The purple Devils, the Screaming Eagles, Les Paras and others established their gear and reckless bravado on Germany's 'hunters from the sky,' a hugely profitable staff of infantrymen until eventually 1941, whilst their large losses through the invasion of Crete decreased their effectiveness within the eyes of Hitler's generals. Whiting tells the entire tale of the Parachute Corps and their founder, basic Kurt pupil, who commanded the paratroopers on their preliminary victories in Europe, their Pyrrhic conquest of Greece, their venture to rescue Mussolini, and their final drop into Allied-surrounded territory.
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Extra info for Hunters from the Sky: The German Parachute Corps, 1940–1945
Sample text
The old town, particularly the ware- selves right in the The results houses packed tight with petroleum products for the docks, went up in flames at once. Fires started everywhere. The inhabitants, many with their clothes aflame, ran into the streets in panic. Refugees started to pour out of the suburbs. ^ Rotterdam had been bombed But the German defeat after the fighting (for the bombing tremendous Allied propaganda victory) in 3 Dutch Rotterdam was a moment the of victory rumour that 30,000 people had been killed in the than 1,000, naturally a terrible enough figure.
They could hardly miss. It would not be long before they had zeroed in on the pillbox and all the other strong-points, obviously well-marked on their fire map, held by the paras. He made up his mind. They would blow their way into a howitzer casemate below them and find shelter there. It was a risky business. God knows how many of the enemy might be waiting for them in the dark concrete corridors below, but Witzig knew he had to take the risk, hoping that the Belgians, as he wrote later, 'felt captives in their own fortress' so that 'their fighting spirit was stifled'.
The Dutch were armed too! Immediately they had started firing. The confused Dutch did not know what to do. They had come to surrender. Some raised their The Dutch stared out. looked at Student, A newly arrived squad who strode to the of the premier hands. Others, in desperation, began to return the German fire. Student shouted at the SS men to stop firing. The result was a sudden burst of machine-gun fire in his direction. The slugs pattered and before he could duck a bullet struck him As he recalled many years later: 'I received a terrific blow on the head as if someone had struck me with a sledgehammer.