gliders, engineless aircraft used to carry airborne troops, tanks, artillery, and supplies. They were usually towed singly, but sometimes in pairs, behind specially converted bombers. Made of wood, or constructed from a tubular steel frame covered with fabric, they were towed to their targets and then released to glide down to a predetermined landing area.
The USSR pioneered gliders for military purposes, and glider units were formed there during the mid-1930s, but during the
German–Soviet war the Soviets used them only to supply their partisans. Germany was the first to employ them to transport troops, and was the only Axis country to do so, though Japan did develop a glider assault force. To acquire suitable military personnel, gliding was fostered by the Nazis as a sport between the wars, and the DFS230 ‘attack glider’ was developed. It was this type which, at the start of the German offensive of 10 May 1940 (see
FALL GELB), was used to capture the Belgian
Eben Emael fortress and the three vital bridges across the River Meuse. The Germans also used gliders to seize the Corinth Canal bridge in Greece during the
Balkan campaign and then for the airborne invasion of
Crete. The heavy losses incurred during this last operation turned Hitler against large-scale airborne assaults, but the Germans continued to use gliders in smaller operations. They were used to deliver supplies on the Eastern Front;
Skorzeny employed them in his daring operation to liberate Mussolini; and they were also used to attack French resistance fighters in the
Vercors. The Germans built the largest glider of the war, the 24-ton Messerschmitt 323. Called the Gigant (Giant) it could carry 200 fully equipped men, but it needed three aircraft, or two welded together, to tow it and though 200 were built they never proved satisfactory.
The Allies developed several types, notably the British 30-man Horsa, the larger Hamilcar, which could carry a light tank, and the American Waco. The British first used gliders, against
Vemork, in November 1942. But their first large-scale use by the Allies took place at the start of the
Sicilian campaign in July 1943 when 69 gliders out of the 137 used landed in the sea. More successful was their use by the
Air Commando which, in March 1944, landed some of the
Chindits by glider behind Japanese lines in Burma. This led to their being employed in large numbers to place Allied airborne troops on the flanks of the Normandy landings in June 1944 (see
OVERLORD). They were also used successfully during the
French Riviera landings that August; during operation
MARKET-GARDEN in September 1944 where more than 2,500 gliders delivered British, Polish, and US units to their targets at Arnhem and elsewhere; and when British and US units were dropped beyond the Rhine in March 1945 during the
battle for Germany.
Attempts by the Americans to develop an amphibious glider for the US Marine Corps in the
Pacific war were curtailed, and the only use made of American gliders used in that theatre was when seven landed supplies and jeeps in northern Luzon (see
Philippines campaigns) in June 1945. They were also similarly employed in the last phase of the
Burma campaign. See also
air power.
Bibliography
Mrazek, J. , The Glider war (New York, 1975).
