On 10 May 1940, German Fallschirmjäger stormed the Dutch fort of
Eben-Emael, south of Maastricht. The brilliantly executed operation was
the first signal success by airborne troops in the Second World War and
it made the military world sit up and take notice. Improved parachutes
and the creation of gliders that could carry troops meant that assault
forces could be dropped or landed behind enemy lines. This was a
significant new tactic which had a dramatic impact on several of the key
campaigns, and it is the subject of Simon and Jonathan Forty's in-depth,
highly illustrated history.
They tell the story of the development of airborne forces, how they were
trained and equipped, and how they were landed and put into action in
every theater of the global conflict. The results were mixed. German
airborne forces were victorious on Crete, but the cost was so great that
Hitler vowed never to use them in the same way again. The Allies saw
things differently. After Crete they built up elite units who would play
important roles in later battles - in Normandy, for example, where the
British 6th Airborne Division took vital bridges prior to the D-Day
landings.
These are just two examples of the many similar operations on the
Western and Eastern Fronts and in the Pacific which are covered in this
wide-ranging book. It offers the reader a fascinating insight into
airborne warfare over seventy years ago.
