Battle of the Corinth Canal

During the German invasion of Greece on 6 April 1941, Allied forces were sent reeling from Macedonia and Thessaly, Greece. The British fleet stood by at various ports in the south of Greece to evacuate any remaining Allied troops, the Allied ground forces in the face of dangerous German ground and air units. A critical point was the Corinth Canal that divided the Peloponnesus from the Greek mainland.

Operation Hannibal
The attack on the Corinth Canal was named Operation Hannibal and was focused around the Corinth Canal Bridge. The Germans considered that if the bridge could be captured and held, Allied evacuation plans would be delayed if not stopped. The bridge was defended by British troops and had been wired for demolition, but the Germans wanted to capture the bridge intact rather than in bits and pieces.

A simple plan was devised. German Fallschirmjäger assault engineers would seize both ends of the canal in a surprise glider assault. Both battalions of the 2nd Fallschirmjäger Regiment were to parachute to the north and south of the bridge in order to neutrilaze any Allied forces stationed at the canal.

The Air Assualt Forces consisted of: total German soldiers: about 800
 * 80-100 Bf-110's
 * unknown number of Ju-88's
 * unknown number of Ju-52's
 * 20-30 Ju-87's
 * 2nd Fallschirmjäger Regiment under command of Lt. Teussen
 * 6th Company under command of Hauptmann Schirmer
 * 230 gliders under command of Lt. Wilhelm Fulda
 * 52 Fallschirmpionere under command of Lt. Häffer

The Battle
On 26 April 1941 at 5:00AM, the gliders took off and after them a "V" shaped assault group of three Ju-52s. The day was clear and bright which was perfect for an airborne operation. The Germans were able to surprise the defenders, as they had began with a high altitude bombing of the Canal Zone in the morning hours in order to eliminate all anti-aircraft weapons that were stationed near the canal. Then the dive bombers arrived, escorted by heavy fighters Bf-110.

After flying for two hours at 7:00AM, the assault troops began landing near the canal. Both battalions of the 2nd Fallschirmjäger Regiment were to parachute to the north and south of the bridge. The bridge was in sight and the gliders began their descent and landing maneuvers, a group of 54 paratroopers engineers landed with closely around the bridge. But two enemy anti-aircraft batteries had survived the earlier bombing and were still deployed along the southern end of the bridge. They opened fire on the incoming aircraft and hit one of the gliders, which fell from a height of about 8 meters.



Meanwhile, other paratroopers had arrived and were deployed north and south of the bridge, Allied machine guns and rifles immediately opened fire on them. They had landed several hundred meters from the bridge in a valley. The paratroopers hunters took cover after freeing themselfes from their parachute.

Lieutenant Teussen stormed the AA batteries located at the south end of the bridge. Meanwhile on the north end, the German engineers had reached the bridge and began to remove the explosive charges. The fight on the bridge had ended and on the north side of the Isthmus of Corinth, paratroopers cleared the field of the Allied forces which were either killed or captured. Alfred Sturm had arrived and ordered Hauptmann Schirmer to pursue the enemy and take over the nearby towns of Argos and Nauplia. The British troops of the Isthmus Force (4th Hussars with three light tanks, a company of New Zealand and the New Zealander cavalry squadron) bore the weight of the assault but could do little against the determined attackers.

Lieutenant Teussen’s Platoon went to the town of Corinth on board British military vehicles which were left behind by the retreating British. Shortly after the paratroopers entered the town, the civil and military authorities surrendered, thereby saving many civilians lives. Having captured the town of Corinth, Hauptmann Schirmer ordered Lieutenant Teussen to act as an advance guard and to press ahead with his platoon towards Nauplia. Corinth Canal fell into German hands shortly after noon.

Suddenly there was a great flash on the bridge. An explosion rocked through the Canal and the bridge collapsed, dragging down the engineers and any paratroopers who were still on it. War reporter Sonderführer E. V. Der Heyden was also killed in the explosion, his camera was recovered afterwards from one of the Canal banks. The German commandoes had piled all of the Allied demolition charges (which were not disable yet) that they removed in the middle of the bridge. A stray round fired from an AA piece of a 40mm Bofors set-off the entire pile, blowing the center out of the bridge.

Several Allied units that were trapped on the north side were forced to abandon valuable equipment in their crossing and retreat, but the Germans were unable to pursue until repairs were made, by which time the Allies were already long gone.

Aftermath
It is believed that the destruction of the bridge was due to the inexperience of the German engineers, particularly their commanding officer. Considering that they had piled up all the explosive charges on the superstructure of the bridge instead of throwing them out of harms way which resulted in those charges blowing up when they were impacted by a stray round of an AA piece of a 40mm Bofors.

Although the Allied forces in the area reacted quickly and put up a very brief fight, the Germans still took 12,000 Allied prisoners in just a few hours. The operation was not a complete success for the Germans since the bridge had been demolished.