Customer Reviews

The Fall of Crete

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When young (1964) I read Alan Clark's book Barbarossa and was quite impressed by, what I then thought, was it's scholarship and balance (though today it is rather dated and too opinionated, given the ever growing mass of new information available from sources such as the former Soviet Union and the volume of available memoirs and histories). I therefore expected to find in the 'Battle of Crete' a well researched historical narrative. Instead the author, far from supplying the reader with details on unit strengths, attrition rates by those involved, memories and details from both sides in the fighting, engages in disjointed flights of irrelevant and unsubstantiated whimsical fancy.

For instance he claims that the Australians were free men and thus militarily superior to their German counter parts, who suffered, we are told, from a mental mélange of Wagnerian fantasy, Nazi beastliness and general lack of 'moral Fibre'- they didn't perform to their usual standard of dedicated evil skill, but were just nasty, sloppy and silly. Though the Australian Army divisions (the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th in World war II) at times, even quite often, peformed very creditably, their soldiers winning numerous bravery awards with an alleged cheery disrespect for the turgid British authority and of couse we in Australia continue to maintain this myth - that the average Digger was always a better performer than for instance the repressed, spindly comic English or the overpaid, oversexed and overpampered American ally, in fact it is wise to remember that there were also instances of regretable collapse, such as at Singapore (the desertation and hooliganism by elements of the 8th are well documented) or the 6th division's performance in Greece, which proved that 'Aussies' could run with the best of them. I recommend Clark read 'The Myth of the Australian Digger'. It is absurd for Alan Clark, who does not appear to be across recent Australian and New Zealand military history (which does recognise that lapses of discipline as well as war crimes were committed by some of their men against their Japanese and German foes) to make such an extravagant claim about the nationalities engaged for the battle for Crete. Has he actually met any of the German, Australian or New Zealand service men involved? To suggest in 2002, after the terrible performance by White Australians during most of their history towards their indigenous Aboroginal charges, that those in Crete were imbued by a spirit of 'being free' (whatever this may mean and Clark does not bother to explain) is quite ridiculous.

There are quite a number of sensible and interesting books on the Battle of Crete, some written by New Zealanders and Australians!, but this is most certainly not one of them. Indeed I find it hard to recall in recent years a work that is as poorly researched and constructed, riddled with prejudice and lacking a sufficient skeletal frame to hang a text upon. Maybe he is looking for an academic post at the University of Dunedin!

He devotes a great deal of effort in decribing the fearful casualties suffered by the (poorly performing) Fallschirmjäger in their drop on Crete plus how vast amounts of their weapons as well as ammunition fell into the defenders hands and how fragmented as well as disorganized the various surviving units were on the ground (valid points) and then proceeds to tell us that the valiant, in tact, rested, cohesive, but 'out numbered?' superbly organised, trained, spirited and talented Commonwealth troops managed to do better than hold their own (false), causing great execution on the numerically greater Hunnish hordes! He does not even give us the unit strength of the Fallschirmjäger Division, 5th Gebirgs Division, the actual numbers engaged in the various skirmishes, when nor those of the Australians, New Zealanders nor English who actually greatly outnumbered the attacker but their generalship was inadequate. A not altogether consistent yarn. He also makes much of the cruelty by the Germans but fails to mention the atrocities committed by some of the defenders, or the peculiar mental horizons of some of the Commonwealth soldiers - ie: Upham for instance! (a relative of mine, who jumped in the afternoon, was treated extremely brutally and in a cowardly manner by his English captors when taken a wounded prisoner). Indeed it is hard to understand from his narrative how the Germans managed to win at all and collect such a booty of prisoners...

I will be more generous than other readers giving this books three stars. The shortcomings they mention, though probably well and fairly pointed, does not substract, but even perhaps adds to the book. We must consider that History is not and never has been an exhaustive scientific endeavour, so a degree -even high- of sheer speculation cannot be dismissed just like that. If well written, it can be at least entertainning. And Clark writes well enough to make -sometimes- of his dubious statements pieces of literary reading. The section about the flaws of german soldiery is noteworthy for that. The main defect of the book, in my opinion, is the almost absolute lack of maps to follow the operations. For a book about a battle developped in an unknown place for 99% of the readers, as Crete is, it is unacceptable. Even less if you consider that the geography of the island was and is very complex and that it played a very important role in the operations. Once and again the reader read about positions, natural accidents and features of the lanscape without not even a poor map to understand what's going on. In this I put blame mostly in the editor of the book. After all, Clark has been enough mauled by others reviews to date...

The author narrates and analyses the situation leading up to the invasion, the fighting itself, the decisions (in indecision) by the senior New Zealand commanders which led to the Allied withdrawal and the withdrawal itself. Other than an epilogue of stories of individuals, he ends his narrative there. The style is similar to Barbarossa (another of Clark's books) with a concentration on operational and command aspects rather than the emphasis on individual experiences and anecdotes favoured by several more modern popular historians. He seems particularly good on naval aspects.

He concentrates on the British and ANZAC experience with relatively little attention given to the Greeks and Germans. His limited analysis of the disastrous Allied decisions around Maleme was unsatisfying but Alan Clark is at a disadvantage here relative to more modern historians because at the time of writing (1962) important primary sources were unavailable.

In several places he makes some fairly silly claims about the national characteristics of the protagonists involved which he doesn't bother to substantiate. I found his criticism of the German capability of fighting in small groups before being able to form an organised front particularly unfair, especially considering the heavy casualties experienced by the German invaders who were after all able to eventually prevail.

A major failing is that there are only two large scale maps, one of the Eastern Mediterranean, one a single page map of the island. This makes following some of the fighting difficult since the text references many places too small to appear on this map; I found myself continually referring to Antony Beevor's book just to understand Clark's.

Another surprising omission is the lack of any appendices; an order of battle and an estimation of losses would be useful contributions to better understanding.

If you only ever read one book on the battle for Crete, I'd recommend Crete - The Battle and the Resistance by Antony Beevor ahead of Alan Clark's book. Both spend a similar length on the fighting itself but Beevor makes use of sources unavailable to Clark, provides good dispositional maps, is easier to follow and discusses in detail the resistance and life on Crete under occupation.

The book is dated, and written very much from the british point of view. As the other reviewer notes the book makes moral judgements as to the participants with no basis to support, other than preconceptions.