Albert Kesselring military branch Luftwaffe
Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring (30 November 1885 – 16 July 1960) was a German military officer and convicted war criminal who served in the Luftwaffe during World War II. In a career which spanned both world wars, Kesselring became one of Nazi Germany's most highly decorated commanders, being one of only 27 military personnel awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds.
Kesselring joined the Bavarian Army as an officer cadet in 1904, serving in the artillery branch. He completed training as a balloon observer in 1912. During World War I, he served on both the Western and Eastern fronts and was posted to the Army Staff, despite not having attended the War Academy. Kesselring served in the Reichswehr after the war, but was discharged in 1933 to become head of the Department of Administration at the Ministry of Aviation, where he became involved in the re-establishment of the German aviation industry and the laying of the foundations for the Luftwaffe, serving as its chief of staff from 1936 to 1938.
During World War II, he commanded Luftwaffe forces in during German invasions of Poland and France, the Battle of Britain and Operation Barbarossa. As Wehrmacht Commander-in-Chief South, he was the overall German commander in the Mediterranean theatre, which included the North African campaign. Kesselring conducted a defensive campaign against Allied forces in Italy, being involved in ordering several massacres, until he was injured in an accident in October 1944. In his final campaign of the war, he commanded German forces on the Western Front. During the war, he won the respect of his Allied opponents for his military accomplishments.
After the war, Kesselring was convicted of war crimes and sentenced to death for ordering the murder of 335 Italian civilians in the Ardeatine massacre, and for inciting and ordering his troops to kill civilians as part of reprisals against the Italian resistance movement. The sentence was subsequently commuted to life imprisonment. A political and media campaign resulted in his release in 1952, ostensibly on health grounds. He published his memoirs, Soldat bis zum letzten Tag ("A Soldier to the Last Day"), in 1953. Kesselring accepted the honorary presidency of three veterans' organisations: the Luftwaffenring, consisting of Luftwaffe veterans; the Verband Deutsches Afrikakorps, the veterans' association of the Afrika Korps; and, most controversially, the right-wing Der Stahlhelm before dying in 1960.
armed forces military division armed service military unit military organization