Glider Platoon

"The hardest part of the mission was just getting here!"

"I grabbed a helmet from the debris and ran across the field to where I saw others heading. Someone next to me shouted, 'Major, are you sure that is the rendezvous point?' I told him I wasn't sure at all, and, in addition, I wasn't a major. 'Then why are you wearing that helmet?'"

– Walter Cronkite

The US glider platoon is an American unit in Flames of War, representing Glider Infantry utilized by the Allies in WW2. Unpowered gliders were utilized as a way to deploy infantry with a lessened impact on fuel and available powered aircraft. They were used in many allied operations during the war, from Sicily to Market Garden.

IRL

Glider infantry was a concept first thought of after WW1 and during the 30s, where the insertion of a team or even platoon of infantry via a relatively stealthy (no running aircraft engine, no noise other than flaps, alerions, or a particularly hard landing) air-towed glider was highly appealing. The reality however was quite different, Gliders, well, glided to their target, at a slow enough speed that even shots from tanks could near reliably hit them. Upon landing the infantry was also quite vulnerable because of slow disembarkment. However, the allies supplemented this by sending them in swarms and glider infantry being of the same ilk as airborne troops, damn near fucking fearless made them quite fierce. Gliders faced difficulty in early operations, in both Sicily and mainland Italy, however, there was a general success in Normandy where many glider platoons were able to complete their objectives due to the surprising nature of their gliders.