Panzer Grenadier Parachutes over Crete Heraklion

German planning for the airborne invasion of Crete, conducted hastily in the days following the collapse of Allied resistance in mainland Greece, concentrated on the airfields on the big island’s western end. Those could be covered, just barely, by German fighters operating out of newly-captured bases in Greece.

But of the seven operable airfields on Crete, only one boasted a concrete runway and revetments to protect aircraft from enemy air attack. Heraklion, the island’s capital, lay well to the east of the other German landing zones, outside the range of Bf.109 fighter cover though German bombers and longer-ranged Bf.110 heavy fighters could reach it. Maj. Gen. Kurt Student, commander of the German IX Flying Corps charged with conducting history’s first large-scale airborne assault, couldn’t leave such a relatively well-appointed airfield out of his invasion plan despite the difficulties imposed by spreading his forces thin. The forces assigned to take Heraklion would be much too far away from the other landing zones to expect any support from the troops landed there.

To defend the capital, New Zealand Lt. Gen. Bernard Freyberg, commander of the Cretan garrison, assigned Brigadier Brian Chappel’s British 14th Infantry Brigade. The brigade staff and its two infantry battalions – regular outfits previously assigned to garrison duty in the Middle East - had not seen action in mainland Greece. They arrived on Crete in November 1940, and garrisoned the Maleme airfield until 27 April, when they moved to Heraklion and Freyberg replaced Chappel as the island’s Allied commander.