3. ROMMEL
JUNE 20, 1942
I n the mid-1930s, the Italians had come to Tobruk, to carve out one more piece of Mussolini’s playground. The Italian military had recognized the city’s value and its vulnerability, and so, the engineers had ringed the entire area with trench works, tank traps, and minefields. When the Italians were swept away, the British improved those fortifications, making good use of the precious harbor to help supply their army in the field. The Germans’ main supply lines came through the port of Tripoli, nine hundred miles to the west. For that reason alone Tobruk, which was much closer to the front lines, could become an invaluable supply hub for German men and matériel. Rommel knew as well that if Tobruk remained a British stronghold, no matter his success on the battlefield, the British would continue to have a major presence in the area, a permanent thorn in his side. With his success at the Cauldron, the British were ripe for pursuit, but any major push eastward would leave the British garrison at Tobruk in his rear, allowing the troops there to threaten both his supplies and his flank. To Rommel that was simply unacceptable.
He had been in the same position the year before, one more chapter of the seesaw battles that had rolled in both directions across Libya. In the spring of 1941, he had focused on Tobruk with dangerous arrogance, believing that his forces were unstoppable, and that the enemy would simply give way. He had been wrong then, and the result was his greatest failure of the war.
His plan the year before had looked good on paper, but fell apart almost immediately. First, the Italians had failed to supply him with accurate maps of the fortifications they themselves had constructed, and Rommel could only guess what kinds of obstructions lay in the path of his tanks. But then, his attacks were uncoordinated, and supply problems immediately plagued both the German and Italian forces. Bad intelligence and poor coordination would usually doom any attack, but Rommel was confronted by yet another surprise, the tenacity of the enemy troops, who stoutly manned their fortifications, not as eager to quit as Rommel had believed.
Every veteran of the Great War knew of the Anzacs, the men of the Australia and New Zealand Army Corps, men who had stood tall throughout that horrible war, who had fought with a fierceness that had made them legends. Twenty-five years later, at Tobruk, Rommel was facing some of those same men, and their sons as well. The fortifications that surrounded the city had been occupied by the Australian Ninth Division, under the command of Major General Sir Leslie Morshead, and the Australians would not yield. The result was a long, fruitless siege that produced losses Rommel could not afford. The British had taken advantage and, late in 1941, had pushed Rommel back across Libya.
But that was then. This time, there would be no failure. This time there were accurate maps, and officers in the field who knew what they were expected to do. And the British high command had made a significant mistake. The Australians were no longer in Tobruk. Their replacements were South Africans, under the command of General Hendrik Klopper. The South Africans were certainly respected, and Klopper was a reasonably capable commander. But no one believed they had the backbone of Morshead’s Australians.
At dawn on June 20, Kesselring’s bombers opened the attack, and within two hours, Rommel began the kind of assault he had wanted to launch the year before. Rather than a diluted general advance all along the thirty-mile front, Rommel bluffed an attack in one sector of the line, then pounded his armor against unprepared defenses in an area where the South Africans had almost no armor. German engineers quickly opened pathways across the once treacherous antitank ditches, and using the same blitzkrieg tactics that had overwhelmed Poland and Western Europe, Rommel’s tanks went forward in tight punching blows, ripping breakthroughs in the South African defenses. Once through the gaps, the German tanks fanned out behind the enemy, surrounding and engulfing them. In twenty-four hours, it was over.
JUNE 22, 1942
He had briefly stayed in Tobruk, allowing himself the luxury of a bed. The staff had been scattered and busy, coordinating with the rear services for the handling of prisoners, and the cataloging and distribution of the amazing haul of goods they had captured in the city. Klopper had surrendered nearly thirty-five thousand men, and the German success had come so quickly that the South Africans had had no time to destroy their precious supplies. Besides the critical fuel, food, and ammunition, the Germans had captured nearly two thousand vehicles of all kinds, including thirty undamaged British tanks.
Rommel had met with Klopper, a brief, formal ceremony, the South African concerned about the treatment of his men. It was never an issue with Rommel, there would be no mistreatment of prisoners, ever, but he did not spend any more time than required in the presence of the enemy commander. There was nothing to be gained by humiliation, and Klopper would certainly not reveal any British plans. Besides, Rommel knew that his own intelligence people probably knew more about British intentions than the one senior officer they had left behind in Tobruk.
H e had decided to make a quick tour of the city, was being driven in a new command vehicle, an actual staff car, typical for senior officers, but unusual for Rommel himself. The Mammoth had been left behind for now, but the staff knew to have it prepared and ready, that this brief rest was no vacation.
They were near the small harbor, and he ordered the car to halt, climbed out, would see what ships the British had left behind, what Kesselring’s bombs had destroyed. It was always a price for the capture of a port, enemy vessels either sunk or scuttled by their crews, always blocking the channels, making the job more difficult for the engineers to clear passage for the supply ships of the port’s new owners. He walked close to the concrete of a shattered pier, stepped over debris, could see more of the same all around him. If there had been beauty here, there was none now. The streets were hardly streets at all, narrow passages that wound past gaping bomb craters, the wreckage and destruction not just from Kesselring’s bombers, but from Rommel’s own siege the year before, long, drawn-out artillery duels that had converted most of this seaport city into complete ruin.
He knew his army was worn-out, so many weeks of constant motion, the hard fight that had finally given them victory. The cost was high, men and tanks, the figures alarming. He was down to fewer than two hundred serviceable tanks, and even with the precious gasoline captured at Tobruk, they were dangerously low on fuel.
He stared into the harbor, watched work crews on small barges, cranes straining to move sunken debris. We can make good use of this place, he thought. It is not so big as Tripoli, but it is one more port that is ours and not theirs. Perhaps now Rome can be persuaded to send us some supply ships.
“Sir!”
A second staff car pulled up alongside his own, and he recognized the big man, oversize in any vehicle he rode in. It was Berndt, the man pouring himself out of his cramped seat.
Berndt moved toward him, all smiles, and Rommel said, “You have returned, Alfred. How was Berlin?”
Berndt stopped, made his formal salute, always the good show for the men.
“Berlin is celebrating, Herr General. You have brightened the light in every staff room. The Führer has never been in a better mood. Your name is spoken with great respect! And, I come with a very special message.” Berndt seemed to prepare himself, puffing out his chest a bit more than usual. “General Rommel, it is my honor to communicate to you the Führer’s personal congratulations for your magnificent victory. I have been instructed to notify you that the Führer has promoted you to the rank of field marshal. The appropriate certification will arrive shortly. Allow me to be the first, sir.”
Berndt took a step back, saluted, said, “Field Marshal Rommel.”
Rommel didn’t know what to say, Berndt seeming to expect a speech.
“That is quite…wonderful. Yes, I am deeply appreciative.”
There was an explosion out past the pier, the engineers blasting through some obstruction in the waterway. Rommel turned that way instinctively, watched as smoke drifted past the men working hard at their task. Yes, he thought, promotion is good. Lucy will be proud. I should write to her tonight, though surely she has heard of this already. In Berlin, success is not kept secret.
Berndt was fidgeting, moved up beside him now, seemed mystified by Rommel’s lack of response.
“Does this not call for a celebration, sir?”
Rommel nodded slowly. “Yes, I suppose so. It will be good for the men. They should know that someone beyond this dreadful place is paying attention to us.”
A lfred Berndt was a Gestapo officer, sent to Africa by Hitler’s propaganda master, Dr. Joseph Goebbels. Berndt was not a spy, precisely, though Rommel understood that the man’s job was to serve as a direct conduit between his command and Hitler’s inner circle. There had been nervousness by some of Rommel’s staff that Berndt must be handled discreetly. He had arrived in Libya with a bit too much noise, seemed to have an inflated notion of his own value. It was an annoyance Rommel had been quick to correct, and the man had actually fit in quite well, had become accepted by the staff as just one more man with a job to do. If there was one lingering absurdity, it was that Berndt was, technically, only a lieutenant. It was a poor attempt to hide the man’s influence, a decision made by someone in Berlin who no doubt believed Berndt would draw less scrutiny as a junior officer. Rommel was certainly not fooled, had quickly learned that the big, overbearing man did not come to Africa to be ignored. But he had come to trust Berndt’s intentions, believed that anything the man reported to Berlin would be accurate and fair. It was perfectly reasonable that Hitler and his staff would want to know precisely what was happening in Africa, and at the same time, by reporting to Goebbels, Berndt would pass along the kind of information that the propaganda ministry would find useful. Whether those news reports were accurate was not Rommel’s problem. He knew that he had no control over anything Goebbels put into the newspapers, or any control over how Rommel himself would be presented to the German people. Regardless of the discomfort Rommel had given many of Hitler’s “chairborne” officers, right now he was certainly being trumpeted throughout Germany as a great hero, the man of the hour. For the moment at least, his harshest critics would have to keep silent.
ROMMEL’S HEADQUARTERS, NEAR TOBRUK—JUNE 22, 1942
The celebration was hardly a party at all, a few of his staff toasting him from a single bottle of whiskey they had secured from some unspecified stash in Tobruk. Rommel had actually allowed himself to take a drink, a rare occurrence in the desert. He accompanied his glass of whiskey with a tin of South African pineapple. It was all the luxury the evening required.
The celebration concluded, the men drifting back to their work. He moved out into the open, the air cooling, no breeze, the daylight nearly gone. There was activity in the distance, trucks and armored cars, the first of the night patrols moving out, heading east, toward the enemy. It was a constant routine, scouting, probing, the enemy doing the same. The patrols would often confront each other, short fights that shattered the darkness with lightning streaks of tracer fire. But more often, the patrols would pass right by each other, avoiding the fight. Combat was an inconvenient distraction to the scouts, something to keep them from doing their jobs. Each was patrolling the desert with one goal, seeking information of some movement of the enemy, whether anyone was shifting position, gathering strength. Before dawn, they would scamper back through the cleared pathways in their own minefields, reporting back to their commanders whether the enemy was threatening to launch some dawn attack.
Rommel watched them pull away, thought, there will be no attack now, not by us, and certainly not by them. We are both used up, bloodied, worn into uselessness. The men…no, the men are fine. They can rest now, gain strength. It is the machines that suffer, the power drained from this army by the loss of so much steel. He looked to the west, toward the far distant ports of Tripoli and Benghazi, old habit now. He had grown weary of sending the urgent messages for supplies, but he sent them still. The requests followed the chain of command, went usually through Kesselring, then up the mythical ladder of authority to Comando Supremo in Rome. And there, he thought, my urgent requests go into some box, shoved underneath someone’s feet, to use as a footstool.
He heard the sound of an airplane motor, slow, nothing like the hard screams of the Messerschmitts. He saw a Storch, floating downward like a small black bird, bouncing once, slowing, rolling to a stop. Ground crews moved quickly, ropes tied to the landing gear, anchoring the plane against some sudden windstorm that would easily flip it over. The door of the plane opened, and an officer stepped down, followed by the pilot, and the ground crews saluted stiffly. It was Kesselring.
Rommel stayed put, waited for Kesselring to approach. It was a small show, purposeful, discreet disrespect. No matter your rank, this is my ground, and my army. If you wish to see me, you will come to me. If Kesselring even noticed, he showed no hint of annoyance. There was annoyance enough in Kesselring’s visits as it was, for both of them. If he was there at all, it was usually because something bad had happened.
“Good evening, Erwin.”
“Field Marshal.”
Kesselring laughed, surprising Rommel. “Oh, I stand corrected. Good evening, Field Marshal.”
Rommel was suddenly embarrassed, had crossed a line, even for him. “No, sir, I did not…I was not correcting you. I was referring to you. I meant it as a greeting.”
Kesselring still laughed, put his hand on Rommel’s shoulder, a rare gesture of familiarity.
“Humility. A rare trait in the Afrika Korps. Don’t bother yourself about it, Erwin. I made a poor joke. But, it seems you have already been informed about your promotion. I had hoped to be the first to bring the news, but then, that was not to be expected.”
“Lieutenant Berndt has returned from Berlin. He brought word.”
“Berndt. Yes, your public relations wizard. The man thrives on good news, does he not? And if there is no good news, he will provide his own.”
“He does his job.”
“Quite well too. He has the Führer’s ear, you know. That gives you an enormous advantage, should you wish to avoid my nagging and make your grievances known only to Berlin.”
Rommel felt cautious, was disarmed by Kesselring’s high spirits.
“I assure you, I have not done so.”
“I know, Erwin. I have the Führer’s ear too. May we take a walk?”
Rommel said nothing, followed, and Kesselring said, “General Bastico is concerned about your intentions. He is concerned about a great deal more, actually. He is not the least bit amused that you now outrank him. I have been told that Mussolini will promote him quickly, to maintain his paper authority over you. They are so very sensitive about such meaningless matters.”
“General Bastico is not a combat officer. Bombastico. That’s what the staff calls him.”
“Your staff would not use such a term if you did not allow it.”
“I allow it. I agree with it. Loud voices do not make soldiers. I have invited him to visit here, to inspect…whatever he feels he must inspect. Most of the time, he simply refuses to come, some excuse about his schedule. I know better. He does not enjoy treading anywhere near the front.”
“You cannot simply dismiss him. He is the commander in chief of the Italian forces here. Rome speaks through him.”
Rommel ignored the scolding, said, “I would prefer to talk about the future. You know what our next move should be. The enemy is badly damaged. He will seek safe haven, build a powerful defensive line. We must strike him before that happens. I intend to drive him hard. Cairo is within ten days’ grasp.”
Kesselring looked toward him. “I have received a cable from Rome. Comando Supremo desires that you not advance east of the Capuzzo-Sollum line. They feel there is enormous risk.”
“Of course there is enormous risk. This is war. Do you agree with them? I should simply sit here?”
“Comando Supremo understands the difficulties involved in supplying this army. There is no prediction when Tobruk can be made useful. The Italians are very concerned your supplies will not be adequate if you continue to extend your supply line.”
Kesselring stopped, and even in the dim light Rommel could see pain on the man’s face, the frustration of having to convey such an absurd message. Rommel felt his anger rising, would not just let it go.
“If they are so concerned about the adequacy of my supplies, then why don’t they send more supplies? They would instead prefer that we sit in one place, so that we don’t use up any more gasoline and food than we have to. We could all have stayed in Germany, and supply would not be a problem at all!”
His voice had risen, and Kesselring was looking at him, silent, tired eyes. Yes, Rommel thought, he knows. This is not his fight, not an argument I can make with him. Kesselring moved out to the edge of the palms, glanced up at the stars.
“Erwin, if we are to deal with the Italians, we must understand what they want. This war belongs to Mussolini. The rest of them, no matter how much obedience they lather on him, no matter their professed loyalty…the senior officers have no passion for this fight. Every one of them is looking past this war, every one far more concerned whether or not he will have a seat of power in whatever follows. The more gasoline they ship down here, the less they will have for their own automobiles in Rome.”
Kesselring was silent now, turned again toward the night sky.
Rommel said slowly, “The British are defeated. All they require is a push, and they will hand us Cairo, and with it, the Suez. Should we inform the Führer that it is best if we ignore this opportunity because our ally is afraid I will use up too much gasoline? What would you have me do?”
Kesselring thought a moment, looked at him now, said, “You know how I feel. I have always believed our priority must be capturing Malta. How do you expect to march into Egypt when the British have a great fat tiger sitting in your rear, swatting away your supply ships?”
Malta. It was the unchanging refrain from Kesselring. The island sat exactly astride the shipping lanes that came from Italy, housed British planes and a naval presence that hammered any supply convoys that ventured toward Rommel’s desperately needy army. The Luftwaffe had bombed the island into ruin, months of siege that had accomplished no more than most such sieges accomplished, no more than what Hitler had accomplished by bombing London.
Rommel stared up through the tops of the palms, the stars blanketing the sky, the chill harder now. He looked toward the tents, scanned the empty, open ground, satisfied that no one was close enough to hear. He leaned closer to Kesselring, said, “There will be no invasion. The Führer’s staff will not annoy him with such a minor nuisance as Malta, not while he has both his eyes and both his hands on Russia. He will not be distracted.”
“What do you know of Russia?”
Rommel was surprised by the question. “I know what Berndt tells me, what he chooses to bring from Berlin. All is well, we are winning a great victory over Stalin’s worthless army. When I was last there, I heard the same thing about Libya. Months ago they announced that I would soon push the British into the Suez Canal. So, they also speak of Russia. Perhaps we should leave the soldiers home and fight this war with publicists. We would certainly win.”
There was no humor in his words, and Kesselring glanced past him, searching for eavesdroppers, then said in a low voice, “Enough. I will not hear any more.” Kesselring paused. “We are stepchildren, you and me. We have had the opportunity here to strike an enormous blow, to cripple the British, to drive past Egypt, to sweep into the oil fields. We could have linked an army with our forces in the Caucasus, driven into Stalingrad from two sides.”
Rommel heard emotion in Kesselring’s voice, said, “We can not dream, Albert. We can perform. There is a job in front of us, right here, right now. Egypt is ours, if we make it ours.”
“But we cannot ignore Malta. I must insist to the Führer.”
“And when he ignores you?”
“It is plainly simple strategy. You cannot attack an enemy who holds a strong position in your rear. Why do they not see that?” Kesselring’s voice had grown louder, and he caught himself, whispered, “Jodl and Keitel both should tell him. Halder should tell him. Surely they understand how a war must be fought. They have all read the lessons of Frederick the Great. Even the Führer knows those lessons. But there are no Fredericks in Germany now. No von Moltkes, no von Hindenburgs. The Führer is concerned with nothing but Russia. The Italians are trained for display, for parades. That leaves…you.”
Rommel did not miss Kesselring’s point, thought, of course, he did not say us. No, if there is failure here, it is my failure. No matter what happens in Africa, he will live to fight another day.
Rommel said, “I have already discussed a plan of attack with my staff. You can study it tonight if you wish.”
Kesselring shook his head. “I object to it already. It is not sound unless we subdue the enemy at Malta. For their own reasons, the Italians will object to it as well.”
“Allow me to suggest how you might deal with the Italians. May I request that you inform Comando Supremo that we would be honored if Il Duce himself will ride with us as we liberate Cairo. Suggest that he might be viewed as the new pharaoh.”
Kesselring made a small laugh. “Yes, that might prove effective.”
T he next day, cables passed over the Mediterranean in both directions. The final cable came from Mussolini, encouraging Rommel to press forward his attack. And Mussolini had accepted the invitation as well. Il Duce agreed to fly to Libya to await Rommel’s glorious conquest of Egypt. When he arrived, Rommel’s aides saw that there were two aircraft in Il Duce’s caravan. One was for Mussolini himself, with his attendant staff. The second plane brought his mount, an enormous white stallion that Mussolini would ride triumphantly into the Egyptian capital, the man who had conquered Africa.
T o the east, the British scrambled to organize their ragged battalions, preparing for Rommel’s inevitable assault. It began on June 26, with the same tactic Rommel had used before, sweeping around the flanks of the British, who continued to look for the enemy in their front. When the British attempted counterattacks, they threw their tank units in piecemeal, only to be ground up by the German panzers, and Rommel’s treasured eighty-eights. In three days, the port of Mersa Matruh was in German hands, the British pulling farther east in tumbling confusion. But the British had two advantages. As they pulled back deeper into Egypt, they moved ever closer to their supply depots, while Rommel once more only lengthened his fragile lifelines. The second advantage was the land itself. Between Rommel and Cairo, the hard, flat desert grew far more narrow, a passageway barely forty miles wide, cut through with ridges and rocky hills. The sea bounded the north, and to the south, the hard, rocky ground fell away to a desolate sea of soft sand, the Qattara Depression, a place no tank could hope to cross. The British squeezed themselves between these two impenetrable barriers, while Rommel pursued as best he could. He understood that even in victory, the sacrifice had been far too great. As his army gathered up to face the ever-strengthening British defenses, Rommel’s mighty Afrika Korps had exactly twelve undamaged tanks.
Though Rommel had driven within sixty-five miles of Alexandria, the first great Egyptian prize, he was forced to order his exhausted army to pause. The British responded by launching a counterattack that accomplished little more than adding to the casualty and prisoner lists on both sides. Neither side was, for now, in any position to do much damage to the other.
In any army, failure leads to change, and the British commander in chief, Sir Claude Auchinleck, now removed the British Eighth Army’s field commander, General Neil Ritchie. But, as the man in overall command of the theater, Auchinleck himself was just as responsible for the fate of his army. On August 4, with activity along the front lines relatively quiet, Prime Minister Winston Churchill flew to Cairo and removed Auchinleck, replacing him with General Sir Harold Alexander. But the British still required a man to take charge in the field, to reinvigorate the Eighth Army. Under pressure from Churchill, the British high command gave the job to General William “Strafer” Gott. Two days later, Gott was killed when his plane was shot to pieces by a German Messerschmitt. It was one more blow the British could not afford. From London, one other name had emerged, that of a somewhat disagreeable officer who had proven himself a thorn in the side of the high command and who took a no-nonsense approach to tactics and combat. Soon after Gott’s death, even the reluctant Churchill agreed that he might be the man to handle this crucial assignment.
