In January 1941, Student was named commanding general of the XI. Fliegerkorps, the newly formed command for the expanding German airborne forces. In May 1941, Student directed Operation Mercury (Unternehmen Merkur), the airborne invasion of Crete, defended by British, Greek and Commonwealth forces. Crete was taken, in what became the Fallschirmjäger'''s greatest victory, but the high casualties caused Hitler to forbid future major airborne operations. During the invasion of Crete, the German forces encountered unexpected mass resistance from the Cretan civilian population, and several German parachutists were killed by civilians armed only with knives and clubs. The German troops were initially surprised and later outraged. German military intelligence, the Abwehr, had predicted that the Cretan population would welcome the Germans as liberators, due to their strong republican and anti-monarchist feelings and would want to receive the "... favourable terms which had been arranged on the mainland ...". Student was made the temporary commander of Crete, immediately after the island's surrender on 31 May 1941. On Hermann Göring's orders, Student launched a wave of brutal reprisals against the local population with the Massacre of Kondomari, Alikianos, and the Razing of Kandanos being well-known examples. In 1943, Student ordered Major Harald Mors to plan Operation Oak (Unternehmen Eiche), the successful raid conducted by a special Fallschirmjäger unit to free Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. They landed with gliders and STOL aircraft on a hilltop. Student received the Oak Leaves to the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross for his role in the operation. Student was transferred to Italy and later to France, where he was involved in the battles of Normandy in 1944. He was put in charge of the First Paratroop Army and took part in countering the Allied Operation Market Garden, near Arnhem. After a brief time at the Eastern Front in Mecklenburg in 1945, he was captured by British forces in Schleswig-Holstein in April of that same year, before he could take command of Army Group Vistula. War crimes conviction In May 1947, Student was put on trial on eight charges of mistreatment and murder of prisoners of war by his men in Crete, and crimes against the civilian population of Crete, like those at Kondomari, Alikianos and Kandanos). He was found guilty of three charges relating to prisoners of war, but acquitted of crimes against civilians owing to the testimony of Brigadier Lindsay Inglis, commander of the 4th New