Airborne forces Command of the airborne component of
Herkules was given to
Generalmajor Kurt Student and
Fliegerkorps XI. Student had commanded the German airborne assault in the
Battle of Crete in May 1941. This time, Student had months to prepare and learn from the mistakes made on Crete. Knowledge of British defensive positions on Malta was extensive, thanks to meticulous aerial mapping by the Italians. Every fortification, artillery emplacement and AA battery was carefully scrutinised. Student claimed later that "We even knew the calibre of the coastal guns, and how many degrees they could be turned inland". Ten
Gruppen of
Junkers Ju 52 transports, with 500 aircraft, were allocated for the air landings, along with 300
DFS 230 gliders (carrying ten men each) and 200 larger
Go 242 gliders (each carrying twenty-three men or a light vehicle/gun). Also to be included were two dozen
Messerschmitt Me 321 Gigant gliders capable of carrying up to 200 fully equipped paratroopers or a tank. These were to be towed by new He 111Z (
Zwilling) five-engined versions of the
He 111 medium bomber. The
Regia Aeronautica would contribute 180 to 220 transport aircraft, mostly three-engined
SM.75s (carrying 24–28 men each),
SM.81s (12–14 men each) and
SM.82s (30–34 men each). Given the distance between Axis airfields on
Sicily and the dropping zones over Malta, it was possible for the transport aircraft to make four round trips per day. The aircraft were to drop an
Italian and a German airborne
division onto the southern side of the island. The paratroopers had to secure the high ground behind the invasion beaches and seize a nearby airfield for Axis transport aircraft to land another division and supplies. Airborne units for the invasion comprised the German
Fliegerdivision 7 (11,000 men), the Italian
185th Infantry Division "Folgore" (7,500 men) and the airlanding
80th Infantry Division "La Spezia" (10,500 men), about 29,000 airborne troops. Preparations for the airborne assault included construction of three glider strips south of
Mount Etna on Sicily.
Amphibious forces The seaborne assault force comprised 70,000 Italian troops who were to make amphibious landings at two points on the south-eastern side of the island, in
Marsaxlokk bay, the main effort falling upon a site named "Famagosta beach" and a smaller secondary landing at "Larnaca beach". Also to be seized were the lesser islands of Gozo and Comino. Amphibious feints would be directed at St. Paul's Bay, Mellieħa Bay and north-west of Valletta near the old
Victoria Lines, to draw British attention away from the real landing sites. The main assault convoy was scheduled to begin landing on Malta just before midnight on the first day, after the airborne forces had landed in the afternoon and secured the heights above the beaches. The bulk of the first-wave assault troops would come from the
20th Infantry Division "Friuli" (10,000 men) and the
4th Infantry Division "Livorno" (9,850 men) of the Italian XXX Corps. Also included were 1,200 men from the 1st Assault Battalion and
Loreto Battalion (both drawn from the
Regia Aeronautica) two battalions of
San Marco Marines (2,000 men) three battalions of
Blackshirts (1,900 men General
Santi Quasimodo) and 300 (a commando unit of San Marco Marines specially trained in ocean swimming and beach assault). A follow-up convoy would be mainly made up of troops from the Italian XVI Corps: the
26th Infantry Division "Assietta" (9,000 men), the
54th Infantry Division "Napoli" (8,900 men), artillery units (3,200 men) and the remainder of the 10th Armoured Regiment (3,800 men). The
1st Infantry Division "Superga" (9,200 men) plus a battalion of Blackshirts and 1,000
San Marco Marines were to be in position to land on the smaller island of Gozo in the early hours of the second day. Armoured support for the invasion comprised sixty-four Italian
Semovente 47/32 and eight heavier
Semovente 75/18 self-propelled guns plus thirty
L3 tankettes (comparable in size and armament to the British
Bren Gun Carrier). Additional armour intended for
Herkules included
2.Kompanie/Panzerabteilung z.b.V.66 (
zur besonderen Verwendung [for special use]), a German unit commanded by Hans Bethke and partly equipped with captured Russian tanks. Ten assorted
KV-1 [] and KV-2 [] heavy tanks were available. At least ten Italian
motozattere (landing craft) were modified with reinforced flooring and internal ramps to carry these vehicles. Other tanks in the unit included captured Russian
T-34 medium tanks, up-armoured German light tanks (five
VK 1601s and five
VK 1801s) plus twelve German
Panzer IVGs armed with guns. Twenty German
Panzer III tanks were also offered for use in the invasion but it is not known what unit these were to be drawn from. Plans to use the captured Russian tanks were at some point abandoned and all armour transported to Malta was to be Italian only. Two days were allowed for the amphibious assault and landing of the follow-up convoy, though this was dependent on quickly securing Marsaxlokk Bay to land heavier artillery pieces and a much higher tonnage of supplies.
Landing craft Lacking enough landing craft for an amphibious assault, the
Regia Marina secured plans from the German
Kriegsmarine to build copies of the
Marinefährprahm Type A (MFP) in Italian shipyards. These shallow-draught vessels, were capable of transporting up to 200 equipped infantry, 2–3 medium tanks or an equivalent weight in cargo and could unload onto an open beach via a drop-down bow ramp. Sixty-five of these
motozattere (MZs) were completed by July 1942 and about fifty were available for the invasion. Twenty German MFPs were transferred to the Mediterranean via the river
Rhone to make up for an expected shortfall of Italian-built landing craft. German-operated landing craft were sent to Italy via rail for the invasion, including twelve
Siebel ferries (catamaran rafts powered by automobile engines driving water screws and armed with and flak guns), six Type 39 (carrying of cargo, two light vehicles or 45 infantry, unloaded via clamshell doors at the bow), six Type 40 (a larger version of the Type 39, carrying of cargo, three or four light vehicles or 80–90 fully equipped infantry), a company of eighty-one (Type 39 Stormboats, small plywood boats carrying up to six infantrymen and powered by outboard motors) plus an assortment of large inflatable rafts (carrying 25 troops each). Some rafts were powered by outboard motors and others had to be rowed. The Italians assembled a collection of other naval craft to transport the amphibious forces. These included two former
Strait of Messina railway ferries (converted to carry four to eight tanks each); ten passenger ships (800–1,400 men each), six former passenger ferries (400 men each), six cargo ships ( of supplies each), 30 ex-trawlers (300 men each); five converted minelayers (500 men each) and 74 assorted motorboats (30–75 men each). The Italians also requested the use of 200 additional German to quickly transfer men from ship to shore. The Italian landing flotilla and the supporting ships formed the Special Naval Force ( Admiral
Vittorio Tur). Specialised landing equipment for
Herkules included the (Sea Snake), a floating ship-to-shore bridge originally developed by the German Army for
Operation Sea Lion. It was formed from a series of joined modules that could be towed into place and act as a temporary jetty. Moored ships could then unload their cargo either directly onto the "roadway" or lower it down onto the via their cranes. The had been tested by the Army Training Unit at
Le Havre in the fall of 1941 and was easily transportable by rail.
Naval escort The
Regia Marina had to protect the invasion convoys from attacks by the British Mediterranean Fleet and provide gunfire support during the landings. The force assigned to accomplish this included four battleships (
Littorio,
Vittorio Veneto,
Duilio, and
Andrea Doria), four heavy cruisers, eight light cruisers and 21 destroyers. These ships would assemble and sortie from the ports of Messina, Reggio Calabria, Augusta and Cagliari. The two older
Andrea Doria-class battleships would carry approximately 200 rounds each for shore bombardment. Italian and German submarines were to scout for and intercept British naval forces attempting to interfere with the seaborne landings. One submarine was to be stationed midway between Sicily and Malta, to act as a guide beacon for the transport aircraft on their way to and from the drop zones. The Italians were confident they could defeat any daylight incursions by the Mediterranean Fleet, especially given the ''
Luftwaffe's
ability to dominate the daytime skies, but there were concerns the Italian fleet would face serious difficulties if the British attacked at night. Lacking ship-borne radar and having neglected night-fighting training and equipment, the Regia Marina'' had been defeated at the
Battle of Cape Matapan in March 1941. A similar encounter off Malta might wreak havoc on the slow-moving Axis invasion convoys, leaving the airborne forces cut off and imperilling Axis chances of taking the island.
(Regia Marina'', 1940) The
Regia Marina had made some efforts to rectify this situation by equipping the battleship
Littorio with an experimental
E.C.-3/bis Gufo (Owl) radar apparatus in August 1941, but the unit was considered unreliable (not until September 1942 did
Littorio receive a standardised production-version
Gufo with better performance; this set could detect surface ships at a range of and aircraft out to a range of ). In September 1941, while awaiting production of Italian-made radar units in quantity, the
Regia Marina requested from the
Kriegsmarine a
FuMO 24/40
G DeTe unit for the new destroyer,
Legionario (under construction).
DeTe units could detect surface ships up to away. By March 1942, the set had been delivered and installed and a small group of Italian ratings had been trained in Germany on its use. Operational testing began that spring and by May, the fleet commander Vice-Admiral
Angelo Iachino had submitted a report praising its performance. ==Maltese defences==