Iron Cross - Issue 18

What's in this Issue?

THE U-BOATS’ ‘LUCKY TIME’ 
The Kriegsmarine’s effective and deadly U-boat campaign on Canada’s doorstep in the sea area around the St Lawrence River from 1942. An audacious operation, it saw the sinking of a colossal tonnage of Allied shipping, but at the cost of U-boats and crew members.

MEPHISTO: THE LAST SURVIVOR
An in-depth look and a unique photographic study of the last surviving A7V tank which was captured by Australian forces in 1918 and remains preserved in an Australian Museum.

LUFTWAFFE ‘PEST CONTROL’
In the second part of the feature by Chris Goss, we examine the final operations of the Luftwaffe’s intruder night fighter sorties over Britain, including details of their successes and losses.

MURDER AT KONDOMARI
When Crete fell to German forces, several reprisal massacres were carried out against civilians. This included a particularly brutal war crime by Fallschirmjäger at the village of Kondomari.

ROMMEL’S NIGHTMARE
At first, it might well have seemed to Erwin Rommel that he had the upper hand when it came to gathering intelligence on the enemy. The tables were very soon turned, however.

THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY
The story of POW escaper Franz von Werra is one that became well-known through the medium of book and film. We look at the back story of von Werra and the aircraft he flew in 1940.

THE STOCKDORF FIASCO
When Hitler suspected that the Vichy French Fleet might fall into Allied hands, he ordered German military intervention. However, the operation failed to prevent the fleet’s large-scale scuttling. 

DIE GLÜCKLICHE ZEIT – KANADA
Our newest regular contributor, Alex Bowers, details the Kriegsmarine’s effective and deadly U-boat campaign right on Canada’s doorstep in the sea area around the St Lawrence River from 1942 onwards. It was an audacious operation which saw the sinking of a colossal tonnage of Allied shipping, but it also came at the cost of U-boats and crew members who had bravely operated very much in the enemy’s own back yard.

NOTES FROM THE ARMOURY – THE FLAK 37
In our regular series, Mark Khan presents a study of the Wehrmacht’s ubiquitous Flak 37 anti-aircraft weapon which was employed to good effect in all of Germany’s theatres of operation.

REVIEWS
We review a selection of new German military history titles and give ‘Editor’s Choice’ to Daniel Taylor’s Villers Bocage book from After the Battle/Pen & Sword Books.

EQUIPMENT IN COLOUR
Our piece of German military hardware featured in this issue is a Junkers 87-B Stuka in the Western Desert which has suffered a landing mishap and is being worked on by its ground crew.

ORDERS, MEDALS, AND DECORATIONS – THE GERMAN ORDER
In his continuing series on the ostentatious awards of the Third Reich, Dietrich Maerz looks at a unique German decoration that very quickly became dubbed The Order of Death