Kurt Student (Birkholz, 12 mei 1890 – Lemgo, 1 juli 1978) was een Duitse generaal bij de Duitse luchtmacht. Tot laat in de vorige eeuw werd Student echter nog door het Duitse leger geëerd als ‘vader’ van de Duitse “Fallschirmjäger”, de luchtlandingstroepen.
World War I Student entered the Imperial German Army as an officer candidate in 1910 and was commissioned a lieutenant in March 1911. After serving initially with a light infantry (Jäger) battalion, he underwent pilot training in 1913. He served from the beginning of World War I until February 1916 with Feldflieger-Abteilung 17 on the Galician front, and then on the Western Front in aerial units of the Third Army, including Jagdstaffel 9 (Jasta 9) (which he commanded from October 1916 – May 1917). He scored six victories over the French aircraft between 1916 – 1917.
Interwar years During the interwar period, Student tried to keep German military aviation from becoming technologically obsolete, since under the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was forbidden to maintain an air force. In the immediate post-war years, he was assigned to military research and development. He became involved in military gliders, since gliding was not forbidden by the treaty. He also attended the Red Army Air Forces manoeuvres, where he first came in contact with the idea of airborne operations.
After Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, the Luftwaffe was secretly reestablished. Student transferred from the Army to the Luftwaffe and was appointed by Hermann Göring to be the head of its training schools, a position which became official when the Treaty of Versailles was renounced in 1935. In July 1938, he was named commander of airborne and air-landing troops, and in September commanding general of the 7. Flieger-Division, Germany’s first Fallschirmjäger division.
World War II Although the division played no part in the invasion of Poland, his troops proved their value during the Blitzkrieg of 1940 in the Low Countries, where troops under his command captured the Belgian fortress of Eben-Emael. He was accidentally shot in the head by other German troops in Rotterdam following the Battle of Rotterdam. The wound put him out of action for eight months.1 He was decorated with the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross for his leadership and bravery in these operations.
In January 1941, Student was named commanding general of the XI. Fliegerkorps, the newly formed command for the expanding German airborne forces. In this capacity, Student directed Operation Mercury (Unternehmen Merkur), the airborne invasion of the island of Crete in May 1941. In January 1941, he is known to have proposed a similar operation in Northern Ireland along the same lines of Plan Kathleen, at the time Göring told him that his focus should be on the airborne conquest of Gibraltar via Operation Felix.citation needed Crete was taken, but the high casualties caused Hitler to forbid future airborne operations. Acting as its temporary commander, immediately after the surrender of Crete on 31 May 1941, Student issued an order for launching a wave of brutal reprisals against the local population with Kondomari and Kandanos being typical cases.
In 1942, Student was identified as the commander of Operation Hercules (Unternehmen Herkules) the planned invasion of Malta. However, this plan was never carried out.
In 1943, Student ordered Major Harald Mors to plan Operation Oak (Unternehmen Eiche), the successful raid conducted by a special Fallschirmjäger unit to free Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. They landed with gliders and STOL aircraft on a hilltop. The well-known Waffen SS commando Otto Skorzeny took part in this operation. Student received the Oak Leaves to the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross for his role in the operation.
Student was transferred to Italy and later to France, where he was involved in the defence of Normandy in 1944. He was put in charge of the First Paratroop Army and took part in countering the Allied Operation Market Garden, near Arnhem. After a brief time at the Eastern Front in Mecklenburg in 1945, he was captured by British forces in Schleswig-Holstein in April of that same year, before he could take command of Army Group Vistula. He was held by the British as a prisoner of war until freed in 1948.
Foto:
General der Fallschirmjäger Kurt Student (rechts) vor einem Eisenbahnwaggon stehend (Befehlszug von Hermann Göring?) People in the image: Student, Kurt: General der Flieger, Ritterkreuz (RK), Luftwaffe, Deutschland (GND 118619616) For documentary purposes the German Federal Archive often retained the original image captions, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. Factual corrections and alternative descriptions are encouraged separately from the original description. Additionally errors can be reported at this page to inform the Bundesarchiv.
Door Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1979-128-26 / Onbekend / CC-BY-SA, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5621945
