| | Field Marshal Albrecht Kesselring (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-19) |
 | | A Bavarian gunner officer who transferred to the expanding secret air force in 1933, Kesselring rose to command Luftwaffe units in the Polish invasion of 1939, and in the Belgium invasion of 1940, authorizing the bombardment of Warsaw, of Rotterdam, and of the retreating troops during the Dunkirk evacuation. |
 | | However, his task was fundamentally hopeless; the High Command's seeming indifference to Allied air superiority meant that Kesselring fialed to receive the equipment and supplies he considered necessary to the situation he was facing. |
 | | The situation had by then, however, deteriorated too far and Kesselring was forced to surrender on 7 May. His death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. |
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