Battle of Crete - Casualties

Casualties

Official German casualty figures are hard to determine with exactitude due to minor variations between different documents produced by the various German commands on various dates. Davin has calculated an estimate of 6,698 based upon an examination of various sources. This total excludes the 8 Fliegerkorps as well as any casualties suffered by the Kriegsmarine in the aborted seaborne landings. Davin also notes that his estimate might exclude several hundred lightly wounded soldiers. Other minor omissions are possible. However, Davin states in regard to the Battle of Crete:

Reports of German casualties in British reports are in almost all cases exaggerated and are not accepted against the official contemporary German returns, prepared for normal purposes and not for propaganda.

These exaggerated reports of German casualties began to appear almost immediately after the battle had ended. Taylor cites a report published in the New Zealand newspaper Press on 12 June 1941 that:

The Germans lost at least 12,000 killed and wounded, and about 5,000 drowned

Winston Churchill claimed that the Germans must have suffered well over 15,000 casualties, while Admiral Cunningham felt that the figure was more like 22,000. Buckley, based on British intelligence assumptions of two enemies wounded for every one killed, gave an estimate of 16,800 total casualties. Despite the enduring popularity of these rather fanciful estimates, the United States Army Center of Military History, citing a report of the Historical Branch of the British Cabinet Office, concludes military historians largely accept estimates of between 6,000 and 7,000 German casualties as correct.

The Australian Graves Commission counted a combined total of roughly 5,000 German graves in the Maleme-Suda Bay area, at Rethymno and at Heraklion. Davin concludes that this total would have included a sizeable number of deaths during the German occupation due to sickness, accidents or fighting with partisan forces.

The German casualties included a lengthy list of commissioned officers. Leading this list is Major General Wilhelm Süssman, commander of the 7th Flieger Division and Group Centre in the assault, who died when his glider detached and crashed in an accident on 20 May whilst en route to Crete. Also prominent on this list is Major General Eugen Meindl, commander of Luftlande Sturmregiment and Group West in the assault, who was shot in the chest on 20 May and evacuated the following morning. According to Davin, the only German prisoners evacuated to Egypt were 17 captured officers.

Prominent among the German dead were a trio of brothers, relatives of the Prussian general Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher of Waterloo fame. The first to fall was Count Leberecht von Blücher, who was attempting to resupply his brother, Lieutenant Wolfgang von Blücher, with ammunition when the latter and his platoon were surrounded by members of the Black Watch. The 19-year-old Leberecht had commandeered a horse which he attempted to gallop through British lines; he almost reached his brother's position, and in fact was shot before his brother's very eyes. The next day, 24-year-old Wolfgang was killed with his whole platoon, followed by the youngest brother, 17-year-old Hans-Joachim, who was reported killed in action a few days later but whose body was never recovered. For years afterward, Cretan villagers report seeing a ghostly rider galloping at night down a road near the spot where Leberecht was shot; yet until they were told the story of the von Blücher brothers, they had assumed that he was British.

The Luftwaffe also lost heavily in the battle; 220 aircraft were destroyed outright and another 64 were written off due to damage, for a total of 284 aircraft lost, with several hundred more damaged to varying degrees. 311 Luftwaffe aircrew were listed as killed or missing, and 127 more were wounded. These losses were later to impact negatively German attempts to defend Stalingrad.

The Allies lost 3,500 soldiers: 1,742 dead, with an equal number wounded, as well as 12,254 Commonwealth and 5,255 Greek captured. There were also 1,828 dead and 183 wounded among the Royal Navy. After the war, the Allied graves from the four burial grounds that had been established by the German forces were moved to Suda Bay War Cemetery.

A large number of civilians were killed in the crossfire or died fighting as partisans. Many Cretans were shot by the Germans in reprisals, both during the battle and in the occupation that followed. One Cretan source puts the number of Cretans killed by German action during the war at 6,593 men, 1,113 women and 869 children. German records put the number of Cretans executed by firing squad as 3,474, and at least a further 1,000 civilians were killed in massacres late in 1944.

Attacks by German planes, mainly Ju-87 and Ju-88, destroyed three British cruisers (Gloucester, Fiji and Calcutta) and six destroyers (Kelly, Greyhound, Kashmir, Hereward, Imperial and Juno). Damage to the aircraft carrier Formidable, battleships Warspite and Barham, destroyers Kelvin and Nubian, and cruisers Ajax, Dido, Orion, and Perth kept these ships out of action for months. While at anchor in Suda Bay, northern Crete, heavy cruiser HMS York (90) had been badly damaged by Italian explosive motor boats and beached on 26 March 1941. She was later wrecked by demolition charges and abandoned when Crete was evacuated in May. By 1 June the effective Mediterranean strength of the Royal Navy had been reduced to two battleships and three cruisers to oppose the four battleships and eleven cruisers of the Italian Navy.

Royal Navy shipborne AA claims for the period of 15–27 May amounted to: "Twenty enemy aircraft...shot down for certain, with 11 probables. At least 15 aircraft appeared to have been damaged..."; from 28 May – 1 June, another two aircraft were claimed shot shot down and six more damaged, for a total of 22 claimed destroyed, 11 probably destroyed and 21 damaged, during the entire campaign.