Rapidity is the essence of war. Make your way through unexpected routes and attack unguarded spots.
- -- Sun Tzu ( Art of War )
After Rommel's daring drive through France with his 7th Panzer Division ( Dubbed the Ghost Division for its ability to turn up where unexpected -- see WWII Newsletter No. 4: May 2002 ), the word "Rommel" was becoming widely known. German propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels deeply admired him and publicized his daring exploits to the fullest. Goebbel's diaries abound with references about Rommel's exemplary character and his outstanding leadership. Goebbel's admiration for Rommel remained intact until almost the end.
The Western campaign was coming to an end and for Rommel as well as for many Germans peace was now on the point of breaking out, a just peace, a peace to be enjoyed. They did not know at the time that Hitler had already decided to attack Soviet Union as soon as possible. Since Britain was not willing to make peace, Hitler was now also planning on to destroy and capture British colonies.
After the Luftwaffe's first setback in the Battle of Britain, Hitler gave up plans to invade England in 1940. Rommel always thought that Operation Seelowe (Sealion), the invasion of England, should had been attempted. If Hitler would had invaded England in 1940, Rommel would had yet undertaken another armoured thrust: this time initially from Rye to Hawkhurst, fifteen miles inland to the north-west.
Grandeur
In the autumn and winter of 1940, Hitler was having some grandiose ideas. He would attack and defeat the Soviet Union in 1941, and then would prepare a German army for offensive operations into British held colonies of Iraq and Iran.
At the same time, a German army would advance from Libya into Egypt and would destroy the Allied forces there. Also, another German army would move from Bulgaria and Turkey and attack the Allied forces in Syria. Then a powerful German panzer army would move from Persia into the sub-continent of India and destroy the Allied forces there. After all that, the German army would be reduced to sixty army divisions to secure its eastern, middle eastern, african, asian, persian and indian empires. Then the power of the Luftwaffe (The German Air Force), and the Kriegsmarine (The German Navy) would be increased to once and for all invade and capture Britain. After that Hitler would fight the U.S.A economically and militarily and in time capture it. Thus would Hitler and the Germans conquer the whole world.
Rommel at this time knew nothing of his Fuhrer's plans of world conquest. What he did know was that the Italians had declared war on the Allies and had joined Hitler in time to appear at the victors table just before the French signed the armistice. Mussolini's ambition was to expand his Roman Empire in Africa. He had already conquered Abyssinia in a campaign of 1936 and now had more troops moved to Eritrea and in Italian Somaliland to threaten and attack the tiny British garrisons of Sudan, British Somaliland and Kenya. In Libya the Italian Army had deployed fourteen divisions under the command of Marshal Graziani. Mussolini planned to attack and capture the British colony of Egypt and seize the Suez Canal which gave the British Navy access to the Mediterranean from its naval bases in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Italian Advance in Africa
On the 13th of September, 1940, the Italian Army began moving toward the Libyan-Egyptian border. They advanced to Sidi Barani, fifty miles inside Egypt and there they stopped and started building fortifications on a twenty-mile frontage. Here on the 9th of December, 1940, the British Imperial Western Desert Force, under the command of General Richard O'Connor, attacked Italian positions (see WWII Newsletter Issue 1).
The Italians outnumbered the British force by a ratio of 5 to 1 and yet within three days the British troops had managed to capture nearly forty thousand Italian prisoners, 237 guns, seventy-three tanks and a thousand vehicles.
The Italian Army was now pursued relentlessly throughout January 1941 by the British along the North African coast. The Italians were defeated in fortified places of Bardia, Tobruk and Derna. The capture of Tobruk by the British Army was a big prize for it had a harbour which could provide it with supplies from the British Navy. General O'Connor then drove his mobile forces across the Cyrenaica 'bulge' south of Benghazi. Moving quickly on the Beda Fomm on the Gulf of Sirte, the British troops blocked the Italian southward escape route and on 7th February, the Italian Tenth Army surrendered.
Some ten Italian divisions had been destroyed, with the loss of 130,000 men, 500 tanks and over 800 guns. While the losses to the British Imperial forces had been less than two thousand men. On February 8th, the British occupied El Agheila, near the border between Cyrenaica and Tripolitania. There they were stopped by Churchill, who had decided to send British help to Greece, and it could only come from North Africa. Greece had been attacked by Italy in October 1940. The Italians had attacked Greece from Albania which the Italians had invaded on Easter Day in 1939.
Hoping to achieve a quick victory in Greece, Mussolini had commited a blunder. For the Greeks fought back gallantly throwing the Italians back. In Eritrea the Italian army was attacked in January by British and Indian forces under General Platt, invading from the Sudan. Almost at the same time, General Cunningham advanced northward, having already destroyed the garrisons of Italian Somaliland. The Abyssinian capital of Addis Ababa was captured by the British on 6th April and by the end of June 1941 Mussolini's empire in East Africa would be no more.
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© Copyright 2004 by Shahram Khan.
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