Much has been written about the capture of the island of Crete by the Germans. In principle, everyone who is versed in the history of the Second World War knows about a major operation of the German airborne troops. But there was another phase, the naval one, where the British navy, the Italian navy and the Luftwaffe clashed. And this will be discussed today.
Will there be a place for everything? Drama, heroism and the ability to squeeze the maximum out of the situation.
In fact, despite the rather large losses, the Cretan operation is something that the British sailors could rightfully be proud of. It was in those conditions that the fleet became the last bastion of defense, moreover, the last hope for the ground forces.
So, 1941, spring, Crete.
There are approximately 30,000 British soldiers evacuated from Greece on the island. That is, not in the best condition in terms of morale, without heavy weapons, experiencing problems with equipment and equipment.
Plus, geographically, Crete is located very close to Greece, which is already occupied by Germany. "Stukas" fly half an hour, no more. Plus, Italy is not so far away with its navy and aviation.
In general, the threat to the British fleet was very real and tangible. Especially the Luftwaffe, which concentrated near Crete an armada of 228 bombers, 205 Ju.87 dive bombers, 114 Me 110 fighters and 119 Bf 109 fighters. Plus over 50 scouts of various types.
Against all this, the British had 6 (Six) Hurricane fighters, 6 seaplanes on ships and 17 aircraft of various types (frankly outdated) in Crete itself.
On May 20, the German invasion of Crete began. For this, more than 500 Ju.52 transport vehicles and almost a hundred landing gliders were also involved. About three thousand paratroopers were landed on the island during the day.
The amphibious assault did not appear, although the ships of the British fleet were waiting for it. At night, they took up positions north of the island and patrolled there, during the day, fearing attacks from the Luftwaffe, they went south. But if the mountain does not go to Mohammed … In general, the Germans decided that it was time to complicate the life of the British sailors. And simultaneously with the landing of the airborne assault, they began to catch the ships and attack them.
So during the day on May 20, the destroyer Juno was sunk by bombs, and on May 21, Ju.87 hit the cruiser Ajax with a bomb. The cruiser was damaged, but remained in service.
The next night it all happened again. British ships again went out to intercept the amphibious assault forces of the Germans. British intelligence in Greece reported that the Germans were loading ships and planning to go to sea.
Two detachments were formed to intercept the convoys. Rear Admiral Glennie led the cruisers Dido, Orion and Ajax, plus four destroyers. Rear Admiral King commanded a detachment of the cruisers Naiad, Perth, Calcutta, Karlisle and three destroyers.
Rear Admiral Glennie was fortunate enough to be the first to find the enemy. Just 18 miles from Crete, his ships stumbled upon a convoy of an Italian destroyer and 25 Greek sailing ships. The convoy was carrying nearly 2,000 German soldiers. The massacre began, which, as expected, ended with the complete destruction of the convoy. British ships fired on the ships of the convoy for four hours. Having used up the ammunition, Glennie ordered to retreat south, fearing that German aircraft would appear at dawn.
King's compound at night did not find the enemy. At dawn, realizing the danger of his position, King nevertheless ordered to follow courses to the northeast in order to detect enemy convoys. And at about 10 am the radars of his ships spotted a convoy of 35 sailing ships guarded by an Italian destroyer. King's squadron went to intercept.
The defeat of the convoy was a matter of time, but alas, German aircraft appeared. An unpunished carnage, like Glennie's, did not work out. The Italian destroyer hid behind a smokescreen and just fled home, and the sailboats began to scatter chaotically.
King faced a difficult choice - to chase small kaiks within a large square, constantly being attacked from the air, or to break contact and move away.
The choice was made for the Briton by the Germans. First, one of the destroyers received the bomb, and then the cruiser "Naiad" fell under the distribution. King decided to go south and meet with Glenny's compound and the approaching detachment of Rear Admiral Rollings (battleships Worsyth and Valiant). After meeting, the British admirals decided to move north again in search of landing convoys. Nobody canceled the order.
This was a huge mistake. Finding the squadron, the guys from the Luftwaffe said "Wow!" and lifted everything that was at hand into the air.
Considering that King's ships had pretty much emptied the cellars of anti-aircraft shells by that time, there was almost no sense from them. The rest had to dodge as best they could.
Destroyer "Greyhound". 13.51. Two bombs from dive bombers simply tore it apart and the ship sank. Two destroyers, "Kandahar" and "Kingston", as well as two cruisers, "Gloucester" and "Fiji", which practically ran out of ammunition for anti-aircraft guns, were sent to the rescue. It was the second folly to make unarmed ships worthwhile targets.
The cruiser "Gloucester". 15.30. Seven bombs in 15 minutes and the cruiser, falling on board, goes to the bottom.
The battleship "Worspite". 16.13. One bomb in the area of the second pipe, the armor withstood.
Battleship Valiant. 16.45. Two bombs aft, but the battleship is tough.
Cruiser "Fiji". 18.44. First, the dive bomber's bomb explodes under the bottom, "diving" under the ship, then three more bombs caused an explosion in the boiler room. At 20.15 the cruiser sank.
King ordered to withdraw. The ammunition for the anti-aircraft guns was actually used up, and based on the timing, the Germans were going to stop only at night. But under cover of darkness, the battered British squadron fled south.
In the morning of the next day, the Luftwaffe continued to replenish their combat account by sinking the destroyers Kashmir and Kelly.
As a result, in three days of raids, the Germans were able to achieve simply excellent results: 2 cruisers and 4 destroyers were sunk, a battleship, 2 cruisers and 4 destroyers received damage of varying severity.
The situation around Crete continued to be very tense. The British command decided to attack the airfield in Scarpanto, from which the Germans mainly carried out their sorties. All the British had at their disposal was the aircraft carrier Formindeble. 36 aircraft.
A detachment of ships undamaged by German aircraft was formed to guard the Formindebla. Battleships Queen Elizabeth, Barham and 8 destroyers.
On May 25, the ships approached the set distance and the aircraft struck. In general, the raid could be called successful, but … But the Germans responded quickly, and, most importantly, efficiently. The Formindeble was hit by 2 bombs, which inflicted very heavy damage on the aircraft carrier. Formindeble went out of order and went into repair, leaving the British Mediterranean grouping of ships without aircraft.
And in Crete, things were getting worse. The German paratroopers captured the airfield, it did not work to knock them out immediately, and the German command was able to organize a real air bridge from Greece to Crete. And by May 26, the British command decided to evacuate troops from the island.
This was very difficult to do. There were few ships left. In fact, 5 cruisers and 4 destroyers were fully operational. The rest of the ships required repairs lasting from several weeks to several months.
But it was required to take out 22 thousand soldiers and officers from the island. Or leave them there, condemning them to surrender.
We can endlessly talk about the traditions of the Royal Navy, and some of them were literally thrown overboard during that war, but … but in this situation, the ships, already battered by the Germans and two-month battles, went to Crete. Bail out your soldiers.
The plan established the following schedule: the ships were to arrive in Crete by 23 o'clock, 4 hours were allotted for unloading and loading and not a minute more, then the ships were to go to Egypt, to Alexandria. And the dawn was supposed to meet them already outside the range of German aviation.
On the night of May 29, the first 4 destroyers arrived in Crete. Having delivered ammunition and food to those who were still on the defensive, they took 700 people and at dawn set off on their way back. However, the German bombers caught up with the ships and the destroyers had to fight back. However, the Germans blundered and the destroyers entered the harbor of Alexandria without loss.
The next night, a unit under the command of Rear Admiral Rollings left Alexandria. 3 cruisers and 6 destroyers.
The crews were faced with a difficult task: they had to go around almost the entire island of Crete and evacuate almost four thousand soldiers and officers from the Heraklion region, cut off from their own. And take it out in an amicable way at a time.
The ships approached Crete early, around 17:00 on May 30. The Luftwaffe, naturally, "greeted" the detachment of ships. The cruiser "Ajax" and the destroyer "Imperial" were damaged by bombs that exploded near the sides and the cruiser was forced to withdraw to the base.
The Imperial continued on its way. At 23.30 the ships entered the harbor of Heraklion, at 3.20 the squadron returned. Literally half an hour later, the steering wheel was tightly jammed on the Imperial. The destroyer miraculously did not crash into the cruiser "Dido" on the circulation. There was no time for repairs, and Admiral Rollings passed the order to the destroyer Hotspur to remove the men and finish off the damaged Imperial.
As a result, the ships were delayed by almost an hour and a half, and at the time of dawn the compound was still in the Crete region. The Luftwaffe began operations at 6 am and the raids continued for 9 hours. The Luftwaffe did a very good job.
6.25. The bomb hits the destroyer Hereward. The ship sharply reduced speed and turned towards Crete, which was 5 miles away. However, the destroyer did not reach Crete; in the evening, Italian ships raised part of the crew and fighters from the water. The ship was lost.
6.45. The bomb hits the destroyer Dekoy. Because of him, it was necessary to reduce the speed of the detachment to 25 knots.
7.08. The bomb damages Orion's vehicles. Unit speed drops to 21 knots. The cruiser receives another bomb in the conning tower, the commander of the ship Beck is killed, the commander of the Rollings squad is wounded.
8.15. The bomb destroys the second main battery turret of cruiser Dido.
9.00. The bomb destroys the bow turret of the main battery on the cruiser Orion.
10.45. Again Orion was hit. The bomb pierced the bridge and exploded in the sailors' quarters, where the evacuees were. The explosion killed 260 people and injured 280. Out of 1100 taken on board. That is, every second.
Then the Luftwaffe calmed down somewhat. Until 15:00, several more raids were made, but they did not bring any results. At about 20 pm, the battered ships entered the harbor of Alexandria.
On the evening of May 28, a detachment of Rear Admiral King left Alexandria for Sfakia. The squad included the cruisers Phoebus, Perth, Calcutta, Coventry, the destroyers Jervis, Janus, Hasty, and the Glendzhill troop transport. And three escort destroyers that were not supposed to participate in the evacuation, "Stewart", "Jaguar" and "Defender".
The detachment took out 6 thousand soldiers with practically no losses. The only ship the Germans were able to hit with bombs was the cruiser Perth. But the crew dragged him to the base on their own.
On June 1, acting as part of the detachment of Admiral King, before reaching Alexandria some 85 miles, the cruiser "Calcutta" was killed by German bombs.
In total, the British fleet managed to take 16,500 British, Australian and New Zealand soldiers to Egypt.
The fleet paid a very high price for their evacuation from Crete.
Were sunk:
- cruisers "Gloucester", "Fiji", "Kolkata";
- destroyers Juno, Greyhound, Kashmir, Kelly, Hereuard and Imperial;
- 10 transports and 10 auxiliary vessels.
Damage that took one to four months to fix:
- battleships "Worspight" and "Barham";
- aircraft carrier "Formidebl";
- cruisers Dido, Calvin and Nubian.
Damage that took 4-6 weeks to fix:
- cruisers "Perth", "Naiad", "Karlisl";
- destroyers Napier, Kipling and Dekoy.
The losses of the crews amounted to more than 2 thousand officers and sailors.
The losses are comparable to a major squadron battle. As a result of the operation, the British Mediterranean Fleet lost its combat capability for some time. The cost of saving soldiers.
General Wavell, who commanded the troops in Crete, sent a radiogram to Admiral Cunningham as follows:
The cost of saving soldiers and officers by the fleet. The price paid by the lives of the officers and sailors.
Now you can ask: yes, the British sailors were great. But why? Why are we talking about them?
Literally a year later, in July 1942, one of the shameful pages in the history of the Soviet fleet ended. Sevastopol fell. And 80 thousand of our fighters were abandoned on the Chersonesos peninsula. And they were captured.
And if Gordey Ivanovich Levchenko and Philip Sergeevich Oktyabrsky at that time acted at least a little in the image and likeness of Andrew Cunningham?
