Airbourne Mountain Troops. These men are from the 5th Mountain Division, whose units parachuted from Ju52 transports during the invasion of Crete (code named Unternehmen Merkur) 20 May 1941.
Fucking. Airbourne. Mountain. Troops. Okay, I’m really showing my ignorance on this one, but the picture I’m getting here is jumping out of a plane where you have a 10-13% chance of dying in an ideal drop (much higher than American fatality rates) and then once you land, you go and hike over mountains, travel through dense alpine forests, battle freezing cold temperatures at high altitudes, and climb sheer cliff faces (depending on location). All while in combat. Yeah I can safely say this ISN’T something I’d want to be doing. Ever.
These troops where flown in JU-52 transport planes, and landed on the heavily disputed airfields on the island. The Fallschirmjäger who suffered heavy losses during their parachute drop, fought tenaciously to secure them to be reinforced by the air-landed mountain troops.
Crete was a sweltering hell hole for these troops; Heavily disputed by enemy soldiers and civilian partisans alike. The Gebirgsjäger performed extremely well even in the hot, dusty, rocky climate so far opposite of their alpin heimat.
Gebirgstruppe did parachute in the war, during siege on Narvik.
You can check out more Kreta photos here.