In the early morning of the 5th, Student airborne 600 paratroopers stranded at the airport landed at Marama Airport. At 16 o'clock, the 5th Mountain Division arrived by plane, and by sunset, a regiment of the 5th Mountain Division had landed with planes, and the strength of the German army was markedly enhanced, and the tide of the battle began to change in favor of the German army. The British communications system was severely damaged by heavy German air raids, and Freiberg was not informed in time of the loss of the Marama airfield, and missed the opportunity to recapture the airfield. When he learned of the situation in Marama, he ordered a counterattack to be carried out overnight. Unfortunately, the order was not delivered in time, and the British army launched a counterattack at dawn on the 22nd. The road near the airfield was heavily attacked by German aviation, and the counterattack was ineffective.

At Rethymnon and Erachrin, the Germans still did not turn around, and even the commander of the 2nd Paratrooper Regiment, Colonel Slim, who was commanded by Rethymnon, was captured in battle. After dawn on the 7th, the Luftwaffe forced the British Navy to withdraw to Alexandria. The Germans then sent heavy equipment and troops to Crete from the sea, and the situation on the island was further favorable to the Germans. On the 24th, the Germans completely occupied the Marama area and began an offensive on Chania. Major General Lingel, commander of the 5th Parachute Division, arrived on the island and took over command of the Western Battle Group. On the same day, the Western Combat Group and the Central Combat Group joined forces. On the 25th, Lingel commanded a regiment of the 5th Mountain Division, the Gliding Assault Regiment, and the remainder of the 3rd Parachute Regiment to attack Chania with all their might.

On the 5th, the Germans broke through the Chania Line. On the 11th, the Germans captured the city of Chania. On the 12th, the Germans occupied Suda Bay. At the same time, a reinforced regiment of Italian troops landed on the eastern shore of Crete. On the 13th, the Germans occupied Rethymnon and joined up with the Airborne Forces near Erachrin. On April 15, 1940, the Germans completely occupied Crete.

The Cretan Airborne Campaign lasted 12 days and ended with the German occupation of Crete. In the battle, the Germans suffered a total of 14,000 casualties in battle and missing, including Major General Sussman, commander of the 7th Airborne Division, and lost 220 aircraft, including 179 transport aircraft. The German airborne division, which suffered huge losses in the battle, lost more than 15,000 people, nearly three-quarters of the three paratrooper divisions; A total of 9,500 people were wounded in the airborne troops who participated in the battle, accounting for a third of the total. Due to the huge losses of the German Airborne Forces in this campaign, Crete was called the "grave of the German paratroopers". The British Commonwealth troops on Crete suffered 1,700 killed and 15,000 wounded, and the navy suffered about 2,000 casualties, totaling about 18,000. The Greek army suffered about 6,000 prisoners and about 3,000 casualties, for a total of nearly 10,000 casualties. The total Allied casualties were about 28,000. Three cruisers and six destroyers of the British Navy were sunk, and one aircraft carrier, three battleships, six cruisers and seven destroyers were damaged. The British resistance in Crete actually saved Malta, because after the fighting in Crete, the Wehrmacht had no airborne troops left to fight.

The Battle of Crete continued the myth of German invincibility, and the Germans paid 1/2 of the casualties. The loss of personnel was not the most terrible, but the real fatal thing was that this battle completely lost the confidence of Hitler and his generals to fight with paratroopers, and for more than two years after that, this devil's army was reduced to the embarrassing situation of being in the company of ordinary infantry. At present, only Zhang Jun still has three formed paratrooper divisions in his hands, and although the Wehrmacht retains the number of four paratrooper divisions, it no longer uses them as paratroopers, but as elite infantry. This is the most tragic part of the Battle of Crete.

In fact, Zhang Jun still admires the group of grandsons of the Wehrmacht, even if there are all kinds of disadvantages, but throughout the battle of Crete, the performance of the German Wehrmacht is still remarkable. At the beginning of the war on the 4th, the situation was already extremely unfavorable for the German army, and many airborne landing points were subjected to unexpectedly heavy ground anti-aircraft fire and stubborn resistance, and the planned outwitting completely turned into a strong attack, which was completely different from the nature of the operation of the German airborne troops before that. At the same time, the commander of the Central Brigade died in an accident before he reached Crete. However, the troops still insisted on fighting according to plan, using the ammunition and light weapons that were not abundant in their hands to confront the British troops who were on the alert, and this had a lot to do with the outstanding performance of the replacement commanders at the front. At the same time, it is also very important for combat units to have excellent tactical attainment and good psychological quality.

The part of the transport unit responsible for the airlift obviously lacked experience in organizing large-scale airlift (the Germans were still relatively best in the technical situation at the time), and the confusion of the air transport force also made the offensive to some extent more difficult. The disadvantage of the German fighters' short range was once again exposed in this battle, so that they could not provide the landing force with full air support, and had to make up for it by increasing the number of sorties. In air-to-sea operations, the Luftwaffe undoubtedly had absolute air supremacy and dealt heavy damage to the British Royal Navy, but it lacked large surface ships to cooperate to consolidate the results of the battle.

On the other hand, the British army, with its efficient intelligence agencies, fully grasped the German army's combat intentions before the start of the war and made targeted deployments, which did cause great trouble to the attacking side in the subsequent battles. The British army, as a master of the layout of the position and an expert in camouflage, also has a lot of interest in the layout of the defensive position in Crete, the position is not only cleverly set up, the firepower is reasonable, the excellent camouflage hides its own strength, but also successfully deceived the German reconnaissance plane, until the German paratroopers landed on Crete, only to find that they have been deeply encircled.

Compared with the above advantages, the combat capability of the British army is not worth boasting about, with a total of 42,640 soldiers defending the island, even if you do not count the 10,258 Greek soldiers who were demoralized, there are still 32,382 British troops, which is not counting the troops that have been supported after the war. The Germans were only 22,000 men and had no tanks or other heavy weapons. In this advantage, the British army would only be passively defensive, hiding in positions and waiting for the Germans to attack. Only on the 22nd did the British launch a slightly more modest counterattack in the Iracolin area, which only resulted in the cutting off of the German Central Brigade, and the divided Central Brigade continued to fight, holding its ground even in the weaker part of the German army.

Before that, when the German army had not yet gained a foothold, the British did not take advantage of the situation to launch a counterattack was the biggest mistake. The loss of Malim airfield was a turning point in the battle for Crete, and after the garrison lost contact, the commander Lieutenant Colonel Andrew began to waver, and finally abandoned his position that night. In addition, the British army's communications and command system was also an obvious weakness, and the situation at Malim Airport was irreparably difficult by the time Freiburg received the news of the loss of Heights 107.

It should also be mentioned that the British Royal Navy, the construction is conformist, the operational thinking is greatly backward, and the attention to aircraft carriers is not enough, and in the memory of the successful use of aircraft carriers by the Royal Navy in the entire World War II, there is only the surprise attack Taranto commanded by Cunningham. In the Battle of Crete, the British Royal Navy participated in the battle of more than 40 large and medium-sized surface ships of the naval fleet, but the aircraft carrier was only one "Dreadnought", and only 4 aircraft could be lifted into the air at any time! The effect is simply negligible. The direct consequence of this was that although the British army had a powerful fleet, it could only be a "silent lamb" in the face of the fierce offensive of the Luftwaffe. However, the organization of the Royal Navy was impressive, and from Greece to Crete this time, there were always large numbers of troops that could be withdrawn from the sea, leaving a valuable force for future battles, and in any case it gave the British a little comfort after each defeat.

It should also be noted that the navy and air force are united in operations. A fleet without air supremacy, no matter how powerful your fleet is, will also die at the bottom of the sea. In the same way, relying solely on air superiority can only achieve local superiority in a specific environment, but cannot turn local superiority into total victory. In the German-British air-sea battle in this battle, although the Luftwaffe achieved excellent air supremacy and suppressed the daytime operations of the British fleet, as long as the German planes left, the Royal Navy was still the master of the sea, and the Germans were ultimately unable to make full use of the sea lines of communication to transport a large number of reinforcements and heavy weapons, which greatly increased the difficulty of victory. Despite the heavy losses of the British Navy, its performance proved its relevance, especially the successful withdrawal in the end, which was arguably the only bright spot of the Royal Navy in the campaign. Although the German army was strong, it lacked a strong navy, it was a lame giant, and success seemed like one step away, but it was out of reach. Soon after, the multi-front battle doomed the German army to be exhausted and unable to escape the fate of tragic heroes.

On January 17, 1940, at the award reception for the Battle of Crete, Hitler told Student: "The Battle of Crete proves that the era of paratroopers is over. The paratroopers are a branch of the army that relies entirely on suddenness, but this factor of suddenness no longer exists. Hitler's pessimistic judgment put the German paratroopers in the cold and cut off the continued development of this new method of warfare in the German army, for which Hitler did have an unshirkable responsibility, and this was actually the most direct loss to the German army caused by the Battle of Crete. The United States, as the most dispassionate spectator of this battle, actually drew the greatest inspiration from this battle.

U.S. military attache to Egypt Bonna? Major Ferrers, at the beginning of his famous report on the Battle of Crete, summed up the Battle of Crete of the Germans with the most wonderful description.

"The dramatic battle of Crete composed an epic of war. The operational thinking is bold and novel, and it has a high degree of imagination. The troops proceeded from Central Europe and drove accurately into funnel-shaped Greece. Here they change form, coordinate forces, put on wings. The battle had the tones, melodies, and harmonies of musical masters, and on May 20 and in the days that followed, this force flew through the sky. Its fighting units rushed into the skies over Crete with a thunderous crescendo, obscuring everything. For the first ......time in history, the Airborne Forces landed in front of the enemy and defeated them with supplies and support from the air" (To be continued. )