David Mitchelhill-Green - With Rommel in the Desert: Tripoli to El Alamein

Images of War

Tripoli to El Alamein

David Mitchelhill-Green

First published in Great Britain in 2017 by

P EN & S WORD M ILITARY

an imprint of

Pen & Sword Books Ltd,

47 Church Street,

Barnsley,

South Yorkshire.

S70 2AS

Copyright David Mitchelhill-Green, 2017

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 1 47387 875 4

eISBN 978 1 47387 877 8

Mobi ISBN 978 1 47387 876 1

The right of David Mitchelhill-Green to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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My sincere appreciation is extended to the following individuals and their collective expertise who helped make this book possible: Bertram Nold, Bob Johnston, Pierce Fox, Markus Wirn, Ilian Filipov, Alex Penner, Greg Singh, James Payne, Fausto Corsetti, and Dr Petra Bopp. Many thanks also to the enthusiastic staff of Pen & Sword: Roni Wilkinson, Matt Jones and Jodie Butterwood.

The majority of photographs used in this book are unpublished snapshots taken by ordinary German and Allied combatants serving in North Africa. At times compromised by poor quality photographic equipment, dust and sand inside cameras, inferior processing and the ravages of time, these images nevertheless depict the life of Rommels Afrikaner with a gritty realism. Supplementing these candid photographs are shots from the US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).

The term British will be used in its contemporary context, to denote both Empire and Commonwealth troops who actually outnumbered British personnel for much of the North African Campaign drawn from the Antipodes, India and South Africa.

Background

The Middle East, a land bridge connecting Europe, Asia and Africa, was the crossroads of the British Empire.The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 considerably shortened the length of the passage from London to the furthest points of its Empire, which at the time covered a quarter of the earths landmass, including India, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, Singapore and Hong Kong. During the First World War, Cairo became the headquarters for British campaigns against Turkey in the Middle East, including the invasion at Gallipoli, and the Western Desert where motorised warfare first showed its true potential. By 1940, the region was economically, politically and strategically crucial to Britain. The 5 per cent of the worlds oil produced there was more than enough to cover Britains needs, or indeed those of the Axis. It not only shielded India from the Axis, but also provided a buffer against the unknown threat posed by Russia, which had become aligned with Germany under the Russo-German Non-Aggression Pact of August 1939. It also strengthened British prestige. To lose the Middle East, with its oil and strategic significance, would be calamitous for Britain and its allies at a time when it was far from certain whether America would enter the war. Control of the Middle East was, therefore, deemed crucial by Britains chiefs of staff.

A strategic morass

The signing of the French surrender on 22 June 1940 presented Adolf Hitler with the vexed question: how to overcome Britain? Inside the Fhrers headquarters, General Walter Warlimont, deputy chief in the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW), labelled the lack of any clear strategic direction as a morass. A month after the French armistice, in one of the most significant decisions of the war, Hitler directed his army commander in chief, Field Marshal Walther von Brauchitsch, to begin planning for an invasion of the Soviet Union. Germanys strategic die had been cast and all future operations against Britain would be secondary to Hitlers ideological dream of conquering Bolshevik Russia.Yet the problem of crushing Britain remained. Because the Luftwaffe could not achieve the preliminary requirement for an amphibious operation across the English Channel aerial superiority Hitlers senior army and naval commanders instead proposed alternative courses of action, including intervention in the Mediterranean and Middle East.

Grand Admiral Erich Raeder, commander in chief of the Kriegsmarine (German Navy), urged Hitler to drive the British from the Mediterranean, the pivot of their world empire. He called for the seizure of Gibraltar and the Suez Canal, plus an offensive in Syria and Palestine. In addition to the obvious benefits of such a strategy, Raeder argued that it would forestall the possibility of the British, in concert with the Free French and perhaps the US, from using north-west Africa as a future base from which to attack Italy. Benito Mussolinis impending invasion of Egypt also attracted Berlins attention. Hitler and Brauchitsch debated sending an armoured detachment to Libya. It was believed that the North African coastal strip would suit mobile warfare, though Italian tanks were deemed inferior to British models.The pair also concluded that an Italian offensive stood little chance of success without German intervention.