Battle of Leros

Battle of Leros
Part of the Dodecanese Campaign of World War II
German paratroopers prepare to be flown to Leros.
Date 26 September – 16 November 1943 Location Leros Island, Aegean Sea Result German victory
Belligerents
Italy  United Kingdom South Africa Greece	Nazi Germany
Commanders and leaders
Luigi Mascherpa  (POW) Robert Tilney (POW)	Friedrich-Wilhelm Müller
Strength
Italian: 8,320 soldiers and sailors British: 3,500+ soldiers 74 Squadron, RAF 7 Squadron, RSAAF	2,800 German soldiers
Casualties and losses
Italian: 254 killed or missing 18 wounded 5,350 POWs 1 destroyer sunk 5 auxiliary and merchant ships sunk 5 MAS and MTBs sunk British: ~600 killed 100 wounded 3,200 POWs 115 RAF aircraft lost 3 destroyers sunk Greek: 1 destroyer sunk 68 killed	512 killed, 900 wounded at least five MFPs
20 civilians killed (Leros Islanders)

The Battle of Leros (Greek: Μάχη της Λέρου) was the central event of the Dodecanese Campaign of the Second World War, and is widely used as an alternate name for the whole campaign. The Italian garrison in Leros was strengthened by British forces on 15 September 1943. The battle began with German air attacks on 26 September, continued with the landings on 12 November, and ended with the capitulation of the Allied forces four days later.

The island of Leros is part of the Dodecanese island group in the south-eastern Aegean Sea, which had been under Italian occupation since the Italo-Turkish War. During Italian rule, Leros, with its excellent deep-water port of Lakki (Portolago), was transformed into a heavily fortified aeronautical and naval base, "the Corregidor of the Mediterranean", as Mussolini boasted.

The island was base for some Italian naval units; specifically, in September 1943:

After the fall of Greece in April 1941 and the Allied loss of the island of Crete in May, Greece and its many islands were occupied by German and Italian forces. With the surrender of Italy on 8 September 1943 however, the Greek islands, which were seen as strategically vital by Churchill, became reachable for the first time since the loss of Crete.

The United States was skeptical about the operation, which it saw as an unnecessary diversion from the main front in Italy. This was confirmed at the Quebec Conference, where it was decided to divert all available shipping from the Eastern Mediterranean. Nonetheless, the British went ahead, albeit with a severely scaled-down force. In addition to that, air cover was minimal, with the U.S. and British aircraft based in Cyprus and the Middle East, a situation which was to be exacerbated by the withdrawal of the American units in late October in order to support operations in Italy.

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Wikipedia