4.

Harald Quandt loved being a paratrooper. He felt at home among his comrades on the base in Dessau. Besides learning how to parachute, he was trained to shoot rifles and pistols, likely the ones made by his father’s arms company, and learned the paratroopers’ battle song: “Green is our parachute, strong the young heart, steel our weapons, made of German ore.” Everyone was young and adventurous within the German band of brothers. There were parties and pranks, which almost got Harald kicked out of the Luftwaffe before he ever saw combat. “Harald has messed up his military career for the time being because of a very stupid thing,” Goebbels wrote in his diary on February 12, 1941. “A real childish prank with a more serious background. Now he has to pay for it. Hopefully he won’t pull any more pranks, or it will be over for good.” It’s impossible to know for sure, but Harald had probably pulled some stunt following a night of heavy drinking. That Harald had gone “really out of line” kept Goebbels preoccupied for days. He was determined to get his stepson out of trouble. He even sent an aide down to Dessau to check on Harald, who was, of course, not your average soldier. As Goebbels’s stepson, he enjoyed protection unlike anyone else in the Wehrmacht. After the aide returned to Berlin, Goebbels noted curtly: “The issue is solved.”

Early in the morning of May 20, 1941, Harald finally went to war. His first mission was the spectacular invasion of Crete. Allied forces wanted to build a bomber base on their remaining bastion in Greece, and the Germans wanted to prevent this at all costs. Dubbed Operation Mercury, it was the first largely airborne operation in military history. In his war memoir, the British prime minister Winston Churchill wrote, “Never was a more reckless, ruthless attack launched by the Germans.”

Harald and his comrades took off from their base on the Greek mainland before sunrise, “with a fiery heart in proud confidence of our wartime good fortune.” Flying over the mainland coast, German fighter planes appeared on all sides to escort the paratroopers to their jump site over the island. British anti-aircraft guns started firing on the plane carrying Harald as soon as it flew over Crete’s coastline. Then Harald got the command: “Ready to jump,” followed by the green light. The nineteen-year-old leapt from the plane and free-fell into battle.

The jump was magnificent. Harald had clear weather and perfect altitude, and the German paratroopers were dropped over their designated jump sites with “pinpoint accuracy.” They came under heavy British machine-gun fire, but Harald and most of his comrades managed to land on Crete without injury. More than forty shells had punctured Harald’s parachute, causing him to drop much faster and hit the ground at great speed. After unbuckling his harness, he retrieved his weapon container, which had landed fifty-five yards away.

The fighting began immediately. Harald and his comrades particularly feared the many snipers hidden in trees and hedges. They were also wary of the heat. On their first day of combat, it was 125 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade, and that was by no means the hottest day they experienced. After a long and difficult battle, German troops finally conquered the island on June 1, 1941. But the carnage wasn’t over. Local civilians put up widespread resistance; this was the first time during the war that the Germans met with such opposition. Led by the Luftwaffe general Kurt Student, the Nazi forces executed thousands of Cretans in reprisal. German troops burned several villages to the ground to quell the resistance. Student’s deputy made good on an order he had issued during battle: ten Cretans were to be shot for every German soldier killed or wounded.

The invasion was ultimately a success for the paratroopers, though almost six thousand German men had been killed or wounded in action. Even Winston Churchill was impressed. “The German Air Corps represented the flame of the Hitler Youth Movement and was an ardent embodiment of the Teutonic spirit of revenge for the defeat of 1918,” he wrote. “The flower of German manhood was expressed in these valiant, highly trained, and completely devoted Nazi parachute troops. To lay down their lives on the altar of German glory and world-power was their passionate resolve.”

Harald Quandt, in uniform, with Magda and Joseph Goebbels and his six half siblings, 1942.

ullstein bild – Ernst Sandau

Harald thrived in his first deployment. He was awarded the Iron Cross First Class. Magda had been worried about her son. She had heard of mutilations suffered by German prisoners of war in Greece. Goebbels, who wasn’t told in advance about the mission or Harald’s deployment, was immensely proud of his stepson, as was Hitler. In mid-June 1941, Goebbels told the führer about “Harald’s bravery, which makes him exceptionally happy. He’s still very attached to the boy.”

Harald returned to Germany six weeks later, just in time for his father’s sixtieth-birthday party in Berlin. He was soon promoted to under officer and penned an article for AFA’s company magazine, detailing his experiences in Greece. “Operation Crete has shown us once again that there is no such thing as ‘impossible’ for German paratroopers,” Harald wrote defiantly. “We all have only the desire to deal the death blow to the Englishman, preferably on his own island.” His father echoed that sentiment. During the Blitz and the Battle of Britain, Günther wrote to AFA employees that the Luftwaffe had “already made a lethal and decisive strike against our first and last enemy,” the British. At home too “everyone does their duty and utmost to contribute to the victorious end of the German struggle for existence.” But the invasion of Britain was called off. Instead, the eastern front awaited Harald.