WW II Question

[Tiger_mate]

Does anybody know if the Luftwaffe carried out covert insert / extractions during the Second World War.? What types if any, or were such events U boat tasks. I am working on the theory that what we did with the Lysander, they probably did with a Storch, but the war films are always biased to us giving the jerries a good hiding, worst still the Americans winning it on their own. Incidentally, Fantasy of Flight in Florida is dreadful for that attitude.

[Tocsin]

Tiger_mate,

The only one I know of was Hess's one-way in a Me-110 in 1941(?).

He was detected and tracked by the Observer Corps - overland and at night - which may be one reason why it wasn't tried much!

I've a book somewhere which describes this in detail - let me know if you want me to dig it out

[SPIT]

There is a very good book called Kg 200 and it describes all the inserts/extractions into the USSR mainly. I dont know if it is still in print though??

[pigboat]

Here's a site that has all kinds of little known facts about WWII. There may be something there.

[rotornut]

That site - Duncan's Lesser Known Facts... is interesting. However, I was able to find two inaccuracies after an incomplete look through it. Perhaps it should be taken with a bit of caution.

[RabbitLeader]

I have a novel called KG200, not sure if it's about the same thing, but it certainly is a good read!

[OutsideLookingIn]

There were half a dozen or so insertions of German agents into Ireland during the war, but all were captured fairly quickly.

Most were landed by u-boat but I know of at least one who parachuted in but gave the game away by asking directions to a town that was on the other side of the island!


I'll try and find the book detailing the incident.

[Milt]

That parachutist who landed in Ireland asked the question

"how do you get to xxyz?

The answer was

")rrrr You Can't get there from here!"

[corsair]

I've never heard of spies being landed in Britain by aircraft. Remember with the Lysander flights there was always a friendly reception committee in occupied France. The only practicaly way to land spies in an enemy country was to parachute in or by sub. Spies were caught in Britain during the war. They must have come in by some means.

Going back to the German spies landed in Ireland. One they dropped in was Indian!!??? Even today an Indian wandering around rural Ireland would cause comment. What were they thinking?

[OutsideLookingIn]

Ah no, not any more... shure we've even had an Indian TD (MP)!

Dr.Moosajee Bamjee was elected in the early nineties as an Independant. He served one term then stood down.

At the time a wag remarked "Now there's one Indian in amongst all the cowboys!"

[Kermit 180]

I suppose you could include the extraction of Mussolini by Storch as a covert operation. Not sure if it was a Luftwaffe operation though. Otto Skorzeny I believe was the German commanding that.

Kerms

[Pronto]

The operation (Op EICHE or Oak) to free Mussolini at Gran Sasso was hardly covert - save in its planning stages where Skorzeny (who was Waffen SS) was required to wear Luftwaffe uniform.

At Gran Sasso, Skorzeny was leading a force comprising men from his Friedenthal Battalion and Fallschirmjager (paratroops) from 1st Kompanie, 1st Battalion, 7th Regiment, (the Fallschirm - Lehr Battalion), under the command of Oberleutnant Georg von Berlepsch. In WW2 Germany, the paratroops were part of the Luftwaffe and the mission was under the overall command of (Luftwaffe) General Student.

They were inserted by glider (twelve DFS-232) and Mussolini was extracted by (a heavily overloaded) Storch flown by Haupt Heinrich Gerlach, General Student's personal pilot. The Storch was not designed to carry three men (Gerlach, Mussolini and Skorzeny - who was a big man himself) and Mussolini's luggage...

Skorzeny was awarded the Knights Cross as was Haupt Gerlach.

A photo of Gerlach is at http://www.3squadron.org.au/sasso.htm
and there are plenty of accounts of the Gran Sasso affair available via Google.