By James E. Mrazek
Read or Download Airborne Combat: The Glider War/Fighting Gliders of WWII PDF
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Additional info for Airborne Combat: The Glider War/Fighting Gliders of WWII
Sample text
Narvik at that time had no airfields usable for making air landings with Ju 52’s to bring in artillery and other heavy equipment to support the parachute infantry. Glider pilots, and those who were to fly to Narvik, grew beards, and the gliders carried boxes containing a change of civilian clothes for each man. Orders were to change into civilian clothes after the operation, cross over into neutral Sweden, and return to Germany. Because Britain controlled the sea and access by land was difficult, Narvik had to be captured by airborne assault.
On the other hand, the British had developed a rich background of experience with sports gliders in the prewar years. During the early 1920s, soaring had taken hold in England, and a gliding association had been formed by 1929. Three years later, there were enough enthusiasts flying gliders for the association to sponsor a national championship. By 1937, British gliding techniques and glider construction had progressed enough to earn respect in international circles and to draw a group of young German glider enthusiasts to England, ostensibly to obtain instruction from British experts.
The British had no transport aircraft in military or commercial use in large numbers that could be converted to tow gliders, such as the Germans had in the Ju 52. For the time being, glider-towing aircraft were going to have to be bombers, then in short supply, or old biplane fighters, of which the Hart was one. The largest glider it could tow, according to calculations, was about an eight-seater with a wing span of somewhere between 50 to 60 feet. A Short Stirling taking off with a Horsa glider.
