Kurt Student (12 May 1890 – 1 July 1978) was a Colonel-General in the Luftwaffe of Nazi Germany during World War II. He was the highest-ranking commander of German paratroops during the war, commanding the fallschirmjaegers during the war.
Biography[]
Kurt Student was born in Birkholz, German Empire (now Borow, Poland) on 12 May 1890, and he enlisted in the Imperial German Army in 1910, serving in the Imperial German Air Force during World War I. During the Interwar period, he became a commander of gliders, and he attended Soviet Air Force maneuvers and was inspired to reestablish airborne operations. In July 1938, he became commander of the Luftwaffe's airborne forces, and he commanded the German 1st Parachute Division during the invasions of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Greece, and further airborne operations were banned by Adolf Hitler due to the heavy losses sustained at the Battle of Crete. On 31 May 1941, Hermann Goering had Student give orders for reprisals against the local Greek populations, which included shootings, fines, total destruction of villages by burning, extermination of the male population of the territories in question, and a lack of tribunals for murderous German troops; the destruction and extermination orders would have to be given with Goering's supervision. In 1943, he oversaw the rescue of Benito Mussolini from Gran Sasso, and he later fought at the Battle of Normandy, Operation Market Garden, and the fighting in Mecklenburg, and he was captured by British troops in Schleswig-Holstein in April 1945 before he could take command of Army Group Vistula. In 1947, he was sentenced to five years in prison for war crimes, but he was released the next year due to medical reasons. He died in Lemgo, West Germany in 1971.