Wednesday 1 March 2017

Fallschirmjäger - Part 1

The next unit I have been working on is my Fallschirmjager. I've had these models hanging around for a while and have been looking for a good excuse to use them in a force. They are largely the older, metal Paul Hick's sculpts with a few of the new plastics added to make up the numbers. In game terms they will form the strong point of my force, providing the only veteran unit and a lot of firepower. Historically they will represent Fallschirmjager battalion 67 which was formed from various units and flown into Breslau on the eve of the battle. Many of the Fallschirmjager units created towards the end of the war were poorly trained and inexperienced; certainly a long way from the elite paratroops of the early war period. However battalion 67 included men from the Fallschirmjager's Brandenburger regiment and so must have had experienced soldiers among its ranks. Consequently I feel justified as portraying them as veterans in the force.












I have painted them in a mixture of uniform styles, with some in the well known 'knochensack' in splinter camouflage. I always find this quite a time consuming style to paint but I'm quite happy with the results. Some of the others wear wool Luftwaffe grey jackets and I have tried to go for a slight winter theme by giving many of the models snow camo trousers as well as helmets that have been painted white. By having a mixture of uniform styles I hope to create a unit that has a slightly 'rag-tag' experience; as you might expect from one at this stage in the war. I almost have enough models now for the unit in my list, however I still have more Fallschirmjager to paint. I'm doing this mainly because the models are so nice and it will enable me to expand my force in the future, should I want to.

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