Meindl Air Force Division
The Luftwaffe Division Meindl was a major unit of the air force of the German Wehrmacht during the Second World War .
Division history and organization
Division history
This large division was set up on February 26, 1942 from excess Luftwaffe personnel in Army Group North on the Eastern Front . The formation took place after the heavy losses in the course of the Soviet winter offensive 1941/1942, which the army could not compensate for a short time. In order to be able to close gaps in the front quickly, one resorted to the available personnel of the air force ground organization. The Air Force Division Meindl was the first erected from the ground staff of the Air Force Infantry - Division . It became the model for the Luftwaffe field divisions established from 1942 .
The division was mainly assigned to the 18th Army on the German-Soviet front from March 1942 to December 1942 and held an area near Leningrad . At the end of 1942, parts of the division were also assigned to the 16th Army . The association was dissolved again in December 1942 and its personnel were used to set up Luftwaffe field divisions 21 and 22 .
The unit was named after its commander Major General / Lieutenant General Eugen Meindl .
structure
- Air Force Field Regiment 1st
- Air Force Field Regiment 2nd
- 3rd Air Force Field Regiment
- Air Force Field Regiment 4th
- Air Force Field Regiment 5th
- Air Force Field Regiment 14
- News Battalion
- Ski Battalion
literature
- Kevin Conley Ruffner: Air Force Field Divisions 1941-1945 , Osprey Publ., Oxford 1990. ISBN 1-85532-100-9 .
- Samuel W. Mitcham (2007). German Order of Battle. Volume Two: 291st - 999th Infantry Divisions, Named Infantry Divisions, and Special Divisions in WWII. PA; United States of America: Stackpole Books. P. 321, ISBN 978-0-8117-3437-0 .
- Peter Schmitz / Klaus-Jürgen Thies / Günter Wegmann / Christian Zweng: The German Divisions 1941–1945 , Vol. 3, Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1996. ISBN 3-7648-2458-1 .
