Chapter 280: The Fortress

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The German paratroopers also served as the vanguard in the invasion of Belgium. Acting at almost the same time as the paratroopers in the Ne

The German paratroopers also served as the vanguard in the invasion of Belgium. Acting at almost the same time as the paratroopers in the Netherlands, the German paratroopers blossomed everywhere within Belgian territory. They opened a path for the German ground forces. The 1st Cavalry Corps of Army Group A entered Belgian territory from the north of the city of Liège. That place, extending south between Germany and Belgium, was known as the “Maastricht Appendix.”

At the junction of the two countries is the famous Meuse River, and not far away, inside Belgium, is the Albert Canal. These rivers, like fortresses, guarded Belgium’s fragile border defense line.

In 1914, the German army had entered Belgium from the same place, along the same road. To resist a possible next German invasion, the Belgians had begun to build a magnificent fortress project here as early as the 1930s.

This fortress, located in a small village called Eben-Emael, three miles south of Maastricht, was the strongest fortress in all of Western Europe. This Fort Eben-Emael could be called the northern pivot point connecting all the key locations. The south of the fortress pointed directly to Liège and was the only way to the Belgian heartland.

They had invested a large sum of money in the fortress, making it impregnable. But ironically, they had hired a German engineering team to complete the entire construction of the fortress. The meticulous German engineers had built the entire fortress to be exceptionally strong but had also made a copy of the blueprints and sent it to the German Wehrmacht.

To capture this important fortress, the Germans had committed 500 well-trained paratrooper assault troops. The mission of these troops was to hold this line of attack for the German 1st Cavalry Corps of Army Group A.

This time, the German paratroopers decided to use an even more novel method of attack—they would land directly by glider. The reason Student had chosen gliders instead of parachutes for the airdrop was, first, he was afraid that the huge noise of the Ju-52 transport planes’ engines would expose the operation in advance. Second, he was afraid that the paratroopers would be scattered in the air and unable to form an assault force. He needed these soldiers to be able to land in a concentrated group and attack together.

In the early morning, they had used 50 gliders, which had been released from their Ju-52 transport tow planes at an altitude of 7,000 feet over Aachen. Each glider carried 10 fully armed paratroopers, equipped with MP-44 assault rifles or MG42 machine guns and flamethrowers.

Just as the sky was beginning to brighten, with the first ray of dawn, these transport gliders, which were like boxes made of tin, wood, and coarse canvas, with landing skids, landed silently and ghost-like just seven miles away from their target. They had made all preparations. These paratroopers had secretly trained for this operation for a full three months. The training content was exceptionally harsh, and two paratroopers had even been sentenced to death for disciplinary violations.

The glider force was divided into four detachments, codenamed Concrete, Steel, Granite, and Iron. Their targets, within a five-mile radius, were the Albert Canal and three bridges.

The Steel detachment landed on the west bank of the Albert Canal and quickly captured the northernmost crossing: the Veldwezelt railway bridge. The Concrete detachment occupied the middle bridge, the concrete viaduct at Vroenhoven.

The men of the two detachments, together with the paratroopers who came later, guarded these two large bridges. They established bridgeheads on both sides, and the Belgian army’s counter-attack was quickly repulsed.

At the southernmost bridge, the German paratroopers ran into trouble. At Kanne, less than a mile from Fort Eben-Emael, which was the target of the Iron detachment, the gliders were spotted by the Belgian defenders a few minutes before landing. They fought back desperately, killing more than 30 German soldiers. But the Germans had the last laugh. They captured the bridge and drove the Belgians away in one go.

And the mission of the detachment codenamed Granite was the most unusual. They were ordered to directly capture Fort Eben-Emael. This fortress occupied a full 175 acres and was a pentagon. Normally, 1,200 Belgian soldiers were stationed here, but this morning, due to a troop rotation, there were only 750 soldiers inside the walls.

The cliffs along the canal guarded the northeast side of the fortress, and the other four sides were also defended by anti-tank ditches and a 20-foot-high wall. Inside the fortress, tunnels extended in all directions, and gun emplacements were numerous. The rotating turrets were equipped with a variety of weapons. The only flaw was that there were not many anti-aircraft guns, and the wide surface of the fortress was not mined.

Fort Eben-Emael was very vulnerable to an air attack, which was why Germany had chosen it as a target. Under the ineffectual anti-aircraft fire of the dumbfounded Belgian machine gunners, 15 German gliders landed safely on the large lawn on top of the fortress. The German paratroopers bravely jumped out of the planes, carrying their explosives and charging toward their targets.

All the Germans were demolition experts. They had brought two and a half tons of explosives, a considerable portion of which had a new device on them, a concave hemisphere. This device could concentrate the force of the explosion downwards and could easily destroy thick concrete fortifications.

Each of these charges weighed 100 pounds and could blow through several feet of thick steel plate in one go. Since studying the aerial photos and the fortress map, the combat engineers had known exactly where to place their explosives. In less than 10 minutes after landing, they had blown up more than half of their selected targets.

And in the process of the explosions, they discovered that the Belgian defenders had cut corners. Two of the gun turrets were just for show and had no attack capability at all. They opened fire fiercely, and the Belgian defenders were forced to retreat into the trenches to seek cover. They called in artillery forces from outside the fortress to shell their own positions.

The German paratroopers were forced to hide in the shelters they had just destroyed. After the shelling stopped, they came out to kill again. They threw their remaining explosives into the Belgian defenders’ tunnels, blowing the Belgian army inside to smithereens.

However, because the Belgian defenders were numerous and were resisting to the death, the German army was unable to control the entire fortress for a time. They had to wait for reinforcements to arrive to complete what had originally seemed an impossible mission.

The reinforcements arrived even faster than the best-case scenario. These troops had crossed the Meuse River with unimaginable speed. Akado and his generals had planned a small spy plan of their own. The purpose of this plan was to cross the bridges over the Meuse River at the fastest possible speed.

A special operations team, wearing imitation Belgian army uniforms, had arrived near these bridges, feigned a routed unit to approach the target, and then had opened fire at close range, capturing several important bridges.

Thus, the German infantry and cavalry were able to cross the Meuse River at the fastest speed. A few hours later, the German paratroopers were waiting for their own reinforcements. However, these supporters were blocked on the road by an important gun emplacement of Fort Eben-Emael, number 17. The German paratroopers trapped on top of the fortress had to destroy this gun emplacement to be rescued.

But this turret was very cleverly designed. The German paratroopers could not reach such a low position and thus could not place explosives. So the Belgian defenders were able to continue to hold on, firing one shell after another at the mule-transported infantry units of the German 1st Cavalry Corps.

The sappers among the paratroopers quickly found a way. They had someone tie explosives to the end of a rope, attach a fuse detonator, tie it around their stomach, and then be lowered by others to the top of the turret. They then used these explosive charges to block the embrasure of the fortress’s observation post. Soon, the explosive charges detonated, destroying some important fortress components and making the gun emplacement inoperable.

The German paratroopers were actually very nervous. They were afraid that the Belgians would launch a counter-attack because their own forces were so limited. But until evening, the Belgian defenders did not have the courage to come out of their shelters to counter-attack, but only held on in their trenches, making a final struggle.

Soon, the German infantry caught up. They began to use flamethrowers to clear the obstacles. As they approached the shelters, the soldiers pulled the triggers. The flames were particularly conspicuous in the dark night, soaring into the air under the moonlight. The guns in the Belgian defenders’ bunkers were instantly silenced.

The sound of the flamethrowers awakened the exhausted German paratroopers on top of the fortress, who had already fallen asleep. When they realized that their reinforcements had arrived, they rushed down the slope, shouting to greet their comrades. They sang and danced with the arriving German combat engineers. Two daredevils even danced in a dangerous place.

The next morning, more reinforcements arrived. The German infantry surrounded Fort Eben-Emael. Stuka bombers flew over and dropped even larger bombs, destroying more fortifications.

A short while later, the defenders’ loudspeaker rang out. The Belgian defenders walked out of their fortifications, waving a white flag, and surrendered to the brave German paratroopers. In this battle, the Belgian defenders had only suffered 75 killed in action, with another 50 or so wounded. The remaining 600 or so were unharmed. And the German paratroopers had miraculously only suffered five killed in action.

The Germans had once again completed an offensive at a running pace. The entire 1st Cavalry Corps had actually passed in two days the road that had not been completed in twenty days in the past. The German Army Group A had firmly taken control of its area of advance, creating the most favorable conditions for the launch of Operation Sickle Cut.

Akado decided to commend this airborne operation. Student received the decoration on behalf of all the paratroopers. All the paratroopers who had participated in the battle for Fort Eben-Emael were promoted one rank, and the officers would be allowed to enjoy a long vacation of one month.

Of course, what made Akado even more gratified was that Sedan was already completely in the hands of the German armored forces. That army of wolf-like tanks would appear behind the Anglo-French coalition forces and advance toward the English Channel at the fastest possible speed.