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The Battle of Crete (, (ギリシア語:Μάχη της Κρήτης), also ''Unternehmen Merkur'' (Operation Mercury), was fought during World War II on the Greek island of Crete. It began on the morning of 20 May 1941, when Nazi Germany began an airborne invasion of Crete. Greek forces and other Allied forces, along with Cretan civilians, defended the island.〔(New Zealand History online )〕 After one day of fighting, the Germans had suffered very heavy casualties and the Allied troops were confident that they would defeat the invasion. The next day, through communication failures, Allied tactical hesitation and German offensive operations, Maleme airfield in western Crete fell, enabling the Germans to land reinforcements and overwhelm the defensive positions on the north of the island. Allied forces withdrew to the south coast. Over half were evacuated by the Royal Navy; the remainder surrendered or joined the Cretan resistance. The Battle of Crete was the first battle where ''Fallschirmjäger'' (German paratroops) were used en masse, the first mainly airborne invasion in military history, the first time the Allies made significant use of intelligence from the decrypted German messages from the Enigma machine and the first time German troops encountered mass resistance from a civilian population. Due to the heavy casualties suffered by the paratroopers, Adolf Hitler forbade further large airborne operations. In contrast, the Allies were impressed by the potential of paratroopers and started to form both airborne assault and airfield defence regiments. ==Background== (詳細はItalians attacked Greece on 28 October 1940,〔,〕 enabling the Greek government to employ the Fifth Cretan Division in the mainland campaign. This arrangement suited the British: Crete could provide the Royal Navy with excellent harbours in the eastern Mediterranean, from which it could threaten the Axis south-eastern flank, and the Ploieşti oil fields in Romania would be within range of British bombers based on the island. The Italians were repulsed, but the subsequent German invasion of April 1941 (Operation Marita), succeeded in overrunning mainland Greece. At the end of the month 57,000 Allied troops were evacuated by the Royal Navy. Some were sent to Crete to bolster its garrison until fresh forces could be organised, although most had lost their heavy equipment.〔.〕 On 4 June 1940, Winston Churchill sent a telegram to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff on 4 June 1940: "''To lose Crete because we had not sufficient bulk of forces there would be a crime.''" ''Oberkommando des Heeres'' (OKH, German army high command) was preoccupied with Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union and was largely opposed to a German attack on Crete.〔.〕 However, Hitler remained concerned about attacks in other theatres, in particular on his Romanian fuel supply, and ''Luftwaffe'' commanders were enthusiastic about the idea of seizing Crete by a daring airborne attack. The desire to regain prestige after their defeat by the Royal Air Force (RAF) in the Battle of Britain the year before, may also have played a role in their thinking, especially before the advent of the much more important invasion of Russia. Hitler was won over by the audacious proposal and in Directive 31 he asserted that "''Crete... will be the operational base from which to carry on the air war in the Eastern Mediterranean, in co-ordination with the situation in North Africa.''" The directive also stated that the operation was to be in May.〔 must not to be allowed to interfere with the planned campaign against the Soviet Union.〔 Before the invasion, the Germans conducted a bombing campaign to establish air superiority and forced the RAF to move its remaining aeroplanes to Alexandria. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Battle of Crete」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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