On 3 September 1939—two days after the
invasion of Poland—Hans Geisler was removed the staff of
Luftflotte 2 and given command of
Fliegerkorps X, which was initially named
Fliegerdivision 10 upon formation on 5 September. Harlinghausen was appointed as chief of staff, effective from 1 November 1939. The headquarters located to
Blankenese,
Hamburg. The
OKL regarded the war at sea and the destruction of British sea communications as secondary to the defeat of the
Royal Air Force (RAF) and the British aviation industry. In September 1939, Harlinghausen's
Fliegerkorps carried out sporadic operations off
Eastern England with some success. After it was renamed and formed from a
division to a
corps on 3 October 1939 the command was given I./
Kampfgeschwader 30 and I./
Kampfgeschwader 26, equipped with the
Junkers Ju 88 and
Heinkel He 111. The air corps operated in the
North Sea during the
Phoney War period. In a memorandum, dated 15 January 1940, the navy wished to procure the
Dornier Do 217 bomber, then under development, but
Hermann Göring, commander-in-chief of the
Luftwaffe, refused citing the intent to transfer all offensive operations over to
Fliegerkorps X, along with all new types. The He 115 was allocated to the navy instead. Harlinghausen was influential in ending production of the He 115 in favour of the He 111 for naval operations. For Harlinghausen, the war began in the autumn. On 17 October 1939, elements of the air corps attacked
Scapa Flow, a major anchorage for the Royal Navy.
Nazi propaganda wrongly claimed the aircraft carrier
Ark Royal sunk. Operations in the north sea over the course of
17-19 December 1939 sank 10 vessels, all fishing trawlers, for a meagre 2,949 tons. On 17 December 1939, five trawlers were sunk, with at least two dead and five wounded. The following day there were three deaths aboard two sunken trawlers. Another was damaged and lost three crew killed. On 19 December,
Star of Scotland suffered three dead in an attempt to sink her. From
9–30 January 1940, the air corps sank 12 freighters for 23, 994
gross register tons off eastern England. Specifically, KG 26 and 30 sank four ships and damaged four more in a single operation on 29 January. The following day, 35
Heinkel He 111s sank a further two and damaged a further eight. Shipping operations were extended to
Scotland in 1940. In March 1940 German aircraft attacked 57 merchant ships and 38 Trawlers. Seven of the former and one of the latter were seriously damaged. Despite being the
chief of staff in
Fliegerkorps X, Harlinghausen flew missions and sank two merchant ships of , and severely damaged the 8,441 grt passenger ship
Domala. The attack, carried out off
St Catherine's Point, killed 98 people. On 1 March 1940, a He 111 from the
Korpsführungkette (Corps Command Section)/
Fliegerkorps X with Harlinghausen aboard, sank the 1,388 grt Norwegian freighter,
Vestfoss south-east of Copinsay Island. On 20 March he sank the transport
Barn Hill (5,439 grt) on a southward armed reconnaissance mission into the
English Channel. The ship sank off
Brighton. The vessel settled on a sand bank in shallow water and her cargo was salvaged. Operations incurred casualties.
No. 12 Group RAF and
No. 13 Group RAF moved into Scottish and Northumbrian airfields in greater strength. With this move, the number of interceptions by
RAF Fighter Command increased. 10 26 bombers were lost from 17 October 1939 to 15 August 1940 over
Northumbria and
Durham. 30 lost a further aircraft; all but one to fighter aircraft. A number of these interceptions were made during attacks on the
Orkney islands from 8–10 April, made as a precursor to the invasions of Norway and Denmark.
Operation Weserübung Anti-shipping operations were interrupted. On 5 March 1940, Harlinghausen and Geisler travelled to
Berlin. They were informed of the intention to invade
Denmark and
Norway. The planning for these invasions ended the prospect of intensive operations in the North Sea. In April 1940 the air corps'
order of battle showed considerable reinforcement. The
Luftwaffe order of battle April 1940 included transport groups
KGr zbv 101–108, equipped with the
Junkers Ju 52.
Kampfgeschwader 4,
26 and
30 provided its bombing power. Harlinghausen remained chief of staff. The long coastline allowed for the use of longer range aircraft. Only weak dive-bomber units were allocated.
Fliegerkorps X was given 500 aircraft; just 40 were dive-bombers. The air corps issued an order to all naval and land forces with the finalised plans, suggesting the air staff had a strong influence on the invasion plans.
Operation Weserübung began on 9 April 1940. Denmark was in German hands within the day. Airborne forces assiste in the
Capture of Egersund,
Kristiansand and the
Oslo Airport, Fornebu. All ports, from
Stavanger in the south to
Trondheim in the north were to be reinforced by air once captured. From the second week,
Fliegerkorps X turned to defeating the
Åndalsnes landings and supported the
Battle of Dombås and
Namsos campaign. Southern and central Norway was secured within days. In the north, the
Royal Navy prevented the capture of
Narvik and the subsequent
Battles of Narvik ended in a series of German naval defeats. Harlinghausen earned a reputation as one of the more aggressive commanders and excelled in his command of the ad hoc
Fliegerführer Trondheim. The Royal Navy acknowledged the air corps' effectiveness. Admiral
Charles Forbes kept his distance from the Norwegian coast after a series of damaging air attacks on his
Home Fleet. Forbes was especially concerned about his smaller ships; his
cruiser and
destroyers after the loss of
Gurkha. Harlinghausen's air corps flew in supplies to
Eduard Dietl in the days following the invasion, as his forces fought the
Battles of Narvik. The snow and weather conditions made landing and take off difficult. Aircraft were vulnerable in the narrow
fjords. The supply operations had limited effect; they improved morale but did not improve the battle-readiness of Dietl's forces. On 30 April 1940 Harlinghausen flew a patrol between
Trondheim and
Namsos in one of two
staffel KüFlGr (Coastal Flying Group) 506's He 115s. Over Namsfjord he discovered many targets. His reconnaissance mission guided 3./
StG 1 to the area and the
Junkers Ju 87 Stukas sank the
anti-submarine warfare trawlers
Siretoko,
Jardine and
Warwickshire. was also badly damaged necessitating her scuttling by . Harlinghausen was awarded the
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross () on 5 May 1940 for his service piloting
Heinkel He 115s and commanding an ad hoc group named
Fliegerführer Stavanger. Harlinghausen's command made a significant
operational contribution to the German victory in the
Norwegian Campaign by rendering Allied sea communications insecure. On 18 May 1940 Harlinghausen probably sank the 55-year old 988 brt
Sirius—claimed as a 1,500 grt freighter. The campaign ended on 9 June with the
Allied evacuation from Norway. The
Luftwaffe tipped the balance, compensating for the weakness of
Wehrmacht sea power. Interdicting shipping lanes, air superiority and transport operations were crucial to the eventual German victory. The invasion cost
Fliegerkorps X 1,130 air crew; 341
killed in action and 448
missing in action.
Battle of Britain to Mediterranean Fliegerkorps X remained in Norway. It formed the only combat formation of
Luftflotte 5 (Air Fleet 5). KG 26 and 30, the anti-shipping specialists were the only bomber units under its command. 4 was reassigned to
Fliegerivision 9, the minelaying unit, which was formed into a flying corps of the same number in October 1940. While
Fall Gelb was put into effect—the
Battle of the Netherlands,
Battle of Belgium and
Battle of France—
Fliegerkorps X continued in attacks on British coastal shipping. By the conclusion of the campaigns in June 1940,
JG 77 provided the only single-engineḍ fighter group.
ZG 76 was the long-range fighter group present for
fighter escort over the
North Sea. The air corps sat out the
Battle of Britain until mid-August 1940, while
Luftlfotte 2 and
3 carried out the main effort in southern Englanḍ. On 15 August 1940,
Luftflotte 5 carried out its only large scale bombing attack of the battle on land-based targets. The OKL hoped to divide Fighter Command's fighter squadrons and destroy them by attacking the
British Isles from all directions. The operation was a failure and the air corps suffered heavy losses among bombers and long range fighter escorts. The air fleet (effectively
Fliegerkorps X) lost 10 percent of its strength on one
sortie. ZG 76 suffered one-third losses; some 19 aircraft over the North Sea and English Channel. The German air fleets lost 77 aircraft that day. Operations against the mainland were out of the question thereafter. The air fleet did not venture over Britain again for the duration of the battle. The Norwegian and Danish-based German aircraft resumed the war against the Royal Navy and merchant traffic. Harlinghausen refined and developed ship-attack tactics that the Luftwaffe used over
Great Britain in 1940. The bomber approached on the
beam at low-level and released bombs to damage the ship's hull below the water line. The types of vessels targeted extended to
Lightships and fishing boats which the Germans saw as legitimate targets. The number of ships attacked and damaged in 1940 rose to 127 in 1940 and to a peak of 164 in 1941. On 3 November 1940 Harlinghausen was credited with sinking a 6,000 grt ship, probably the 3,871 grt
Kildale off
Kinnaird Head bringing his claim total to approximately 100,000 grt. The air corps was sent to
Sicily,
Italy in late 1940. It formed the first wave of attacks on the
intensively bombed British base at Malta and to support the
Axis powers in the
Battle of the Mediterranean. The air corps moved to
Axis-held Greece in June 1941, by which time Harlinghausen had left the corps. During its operations in the first half of 1941, the air corps effectively suppressed the
Royal Navy Submarine Service, and its
10th Submarine Flotilla. Even with two antishipping experts occupying the position of commander, and chief of staff, the air corps failed to neutralise or paralyse the island's defences. The staff blamed limited supplies and the distractions on other fronts for the failure to achieve more; and above all, closing the
Strait of Sicily to British naval forces. Harlinghausen tried to secure assistance from the
Regia Marina to help shut the straits. His idea was for naval forces to patrol in darkness for his air corps could not see the enemy. The Italians could shadow the enemy until daybreak when his air power could be used against them. His efforts were in vain. The major success in this region was achieved on 11 January with the sinking of the cruiser
Southampton and damaging of
Gloucester. He was awarded the
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves () 30 January 1941. Harlinghausen was part of the disastrous raid on British convoys moving through the
Suez Canal. After four hours they reached the southernmost region, but found nothing. Harlinghausen ordered the other seven to seek alternative targets. After attacking a
Ferry, Harlinghausen spotted the scattered convoy in the
Great Bitter Lake. The head winds were double than expected, and all the He 111s ran out of fuel. Harlinghausen and Kowalewski crash landed in the desert 280 km south east of
Benghazi. They were rescued after five days; three crew were captured.
Fliegerführer Atlantik On 28 February 1941 Harlinghausen was appointed
Fliegerführer Atlantik (Flying Leader Atlantic). As a ship-attack expert, he was a logical choice to lead Atlantic air operations. His headquarters were stationed in the village of
Brandérion. Harlinghausen was responsible for organising fleet and
U-boat support,
meteorological missions and even coastal protection, although
Küstenfliegergruppe (KuFlGr) (coastal aircraft group),
Minensuchgruppe (MSGr—minesearch group) existed for that purpose. He had barely 100 aircraft operational. His commitment to the
Mediterranean Theatre of Operations while managing the staff of X
Fliegerkorps, delayed his command until 31 March 1941. He agreed with the operational methods of
Karl Donitz at
BdU, who favoured using the four-engine
Focke-Wulf Fw 200 "Condors" to shadow convoys and direct U-Boats to their quarry; then to begin a coordinated air-sea attack to defeat the convoy. Harlinghausen was given meagre forces to achieve these ends owing to
Hermann Göring's intransigence. Among his duties was to coordinate attacks on convoys with the Kriegsmarine's U-Boats. Harlinghausen's command was effective, and often transmitted accurate locations of convoys but because of a paucity in submarines, they failed to respond. Harlinghausen remonstrated with Dönitz who decided a more flexible approach was needed, rather than close cooperation. Harlinghausen frequently clashed with the Admiral over operational deployments, and opposed the shifting of air operations to interdict
Gibraltar sea lanes as opposed to the
Western Approaches. Harlinghausen's appointment coincided with the "
First Happy Time", which was already rapidly approaching its end when Harlinghausen took charge. By Christmas 1940,
KG 40, for example, had sunk 19 ships of approximately 100,000 tons and damaged 37– 180,000–tons worth of shipping. In January 1941, 17 ships were sunk amounting to 65,000 tons and five damaged. February was worse for the British, losing 21 ships to Fw 200s, totalling 84,301 tons. During the first quarter of 1941, the Condors sank , the vast majority being lone ships. In one case, a sustained attack upon convoy OB 290 on 26 February 1941 accounted for seven to nine vessels (), all sunk by KG 40 Fw 200s. However, with never more than eight aircraft operational, this was an exception. Soon, British
CAM ship (catapult aircraft merchantmen) appeared, and the time of light Condor losses ended. Three months into his leadership, Harlinghausen was held responsible for the
Luftwaffe's failure to prevent the loss of the
battleship Bismarck, which sank on 27 May 1941. His command was reinforced by II./
KG 1, II./
KG 54 and I./
KG 77, to help the
Bismarck, but the air effort failed to reach the combat area before the ship sank. No German
Capital ship sailed into the Atlantic again, leaving only the U-boat war in operation. The last half of 1941 had been a severe blow to
Fliegerführer Atlantik. It had sunk just four ships (10,298 tons) and damaged two for the loss of 16 Condors, including seven to convoy defences. From 15 March to 31 October 1941
Fliegerführer Atlantik reported 57 convoys. Through cooperation with U-boats 74 ships, totalling 390,000 tons, one
aircraft carrier, and one
destroyer were sunk. The command sank 161 vessels for 903,000 grt, probably sank seven for 31,000 grt, damaged 113 for 590,000 grt. Within six months, this trend underwent a radical change. The transfer of
Condors to other theatres, according to OKL wartime report, in mid-December 1941 brought air-submarine cooperation to "a standstill". Harlinghausen's insistence on flying combat operations left his command leaderless after he was shot down and wounded without his usual pilot Robert Kowaleski on 13 October while attacking a transport ship in the
Irish Sea. The crew managed to slip back to the French coast near
Vannes, where they were rescued by fishermen. He spent the next three months in hospital. In January 1942 he was replaced by
Ulrich Kessler as
Fliegerführer Atlantik.
North Africa, return to Mediterranean In January 1942 Harlinghausen was appointed
Geschwaderkommodore of
Kampfgeschwader 26, an anti-shipping bomber wing. KG 26 operated three
Gruppen, groups, simultaneously but often they operated in different theatres. Harlinghausen and the staff command remained based in the Mediterranean. Harlinghausen had long been a supporter of torpedo bomber development. Along with the operational command, he was appointed
Bevollmächtigten for das Lufttorpedowesen—Plenipotentiary for airborne torpedoes. KG 26 relocated to Italy in early 1942, and began torpedo training at
Grosseto. Harlinghausen soon lost one Staffeln (6) to the
Black Sea campaigns. I and III./KG 26 were ready for operations and deployed to Norway while II./KG 26 transferred to the Eastern Front in April, only to return in early August. Harlinghausen remained wing commander through the intensive attacks on
Malta convoys in February 1942. Among their successes was the
Rowallan Castle, which sank after her escorts
scuttled her. III./KG 26 moved to France near
Rennes from Norway. Southwest of the
Scilly Isles on 3 and 4 August it carried out its first torpedo attack against a small convoy and claimed six ships totalling 20,000 grt. 6./KG 26, recalled from the
Soviet Union, claimed two freighters from the infamous
Pedestal convoy in mid–August. From May 1942, KG 26 engaged targets from Norway and sank a significant number of ships.
Convoy PQ 10 and
Convoy PQ 14 by KG 26 and 30 resulted in the sinking of two by air and two by submarine attack. It attacked
Convoy PQ 16 and achieved success. In September 1942, I./KG 26 were involved in the destruction of
Convoy PQ 17 and attacks on
Convoy PQ 18, during the
Arctic convoys. In the later operation, the III./KG 26 lost 52 crew missing, seven wounded and five killed. Against PQ17, aircraft sank 10 of the 24 ships; though U-boats claimed ships that had already been crippled by air attack. This amounted to 56,000 of the 142,000 grt sunk. 26 were supported by torpedo-equipped He 115s. Against PQ18 ten of the 13 ships were sunk by air attack. 26 and 30 had a hand in sinking a further three; all in 300 sorties. But the cost was high; 44 aircraft. The operations, despite the losses, were a vindication of Harlinghausen and the use of torpedo bombers. In November 1942 the Axis front in North Africa began to collapse. The
Second Battle of El Alamein destroyed their foothold in
Egypt and led to their pursuit across
Libya by the British;
Operation Torch had seized
Algeria,
Morocco and threatened to take
Tunisia. The OKW reacted swiftly and dispatched air and land forces to Tunisia to maintain a bridge head. The
Run for Tunis was narrowly won by the Axis beginning the
Tunisian Campaign. Harlinghausen was appointed
Fliegerführer Tunesien. Harlinghausen was responsible to the Commander in Chief South,
Albert Kesselring, in the initial stages, who was given complete command of the Tunisian bridgehead. The limited forces available forced the Axis to establish their lines on defencible terrain with the shortest logistics line, one as far inland from the main supply ports as Axis forces could maintain. Harlinghausen led three companies of 1st Tunis Field Battalion, one company of paratroopers, one antiaircraft artillery company, 14th Company, 104th Panzer Grenadier Regiment, advance detachment of the 5th Parachute Regiment of the
Hermann Göring Panzer Division (3 officers and 150 enlisted men). Harlinghausen's forces seized the key positions in Tunis with his troops after the bulk of the
Vichy French forces had withdrawn from the city on the night of 13–14 November. Harlinghausen had 140 aircraft, including 109 fighters. Harlinghausen was given command of
Fliegerkorps II from February to May 1943. The air corps fought a defensive battle over Tunisia into 1943. Axis air forces in Tunisia were under constant threat of fuel and ammunition starvation. Supplies that reached Tunis were immediately used up. From March to April Allied naval and air forces sank 108 ship—41 percent of all Axis supply shipping. In contrast, Harlinghausen ordered his anti shipping units to abandon forward bases in
Sardinia for the mainland, due to Allied air raids. The daily sorties against Allied warships fell from 11 to two. In April 1943
Operation Flax permanently disrupted the air bridge from Sicily to Tunisia. At the end of April there was no fuel left to run radar sets, or move tanks from workshops. The vain effort to supply Tunisia was disastrous. In April and first week of May, 1943, 177
Junkers Ju 52s were lost; six months after the beginning of the failed air lift during the
Battle of Stalingrad. Harlinghausen escaped the 13 May capitulation in which 130,000 soldiers, starved of food, fuel and ammunition, surrendered. Harlinghausen survived a month longer until dismissed from command on 10 June 1943 following a series of disputes with Kesselring. Harlinghausen's desire to rest and rebuild his
Kampfgruppen was overruled by Göring. The
Reichsmarschall demanded air attacks on Allied ports at night in strength. Harlinghausen's complaints to Kesslering were counter productive and the main reason for his dismissal.
Later commands After his dismissal, Harlinghausen briefly returned to
Fliegerführer Atlantik as a member of Kessler's staff but was placed in reserve on 26 June 1943. In October 1943 he was appointed
General der Kampfflieger. On 11 November,
Reichsmarschall (Marshal of the Realm)
Hermann Göring, in his role as commander-in-chief of the Luftwaffe, organized a meeting of high-ranking Luftwaffe officers, including Nordmann. The meeting, also referred to as the "Areopag" was held at the
Luftkriegsakademie (air war academy) at
Berlin-Gatow. This Luftwaffe version of the Greek
Areopagus—a court of justice—aimed at finding solutions to the deteriorating air was situation over Germany. In December 1944 Harlinghausen was appointed
Chef des Luftwaffenkommandos "West", a position he held until the cessation of hostilities. He was captured by American troops, and illegally held after the war ended. He was finally released in 1947. ==Postwar career==