Desert Fox: The Storied Military Career of Erwin Rommel by Samuel W. Mitcham

Author:Samuel W. Mitcham [Mitcham, Samuel W.]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Regnery History
Published: 2019-03-11T16:00:00+00:00

As November 2 dawned, the battle entered its eleventh day like an enraged bull. Rommel grabbed a quick breakfast of chicken fricassee with rice (most likely the remains of supper), wrote a brief letter to Lucie, and rushed off to join the fighting. He transferred his remaining panzers to the central sector to block Montgomery’s Supercharge breakthrough—setting up the climactic Battle of Tel el Aqqaqir.

It was one of the most bitter, hard-fought battles of World War II. “The enemy fought with all the certain knowledge that all was at stake, and with all the skill of his long experience in armored warfare,” Montgomery would later comment, with admiration.10

Thoma counterattacked with the 15th Panzer Division but was not successful, and the British surged forward again into the gap with more than four hundred tanks; they had four hundred more in reserve. Colonel Teege met them with thirty-five battered panzers. The battle was the death ride of the 8th Panzer Regiment. The Panzertruppen fought with reckless abandon and with absolutely no regard for their own lives. Their courage was worthy of a better cause. The battlefield was soon littered with burning British tanks, but they kept coming . . . and coming . . . and coming. Except for a few rear-area support units, the 8th Panzer Regiment was completely wiped out. Colonel Teege died with his men. The 33rd Panzer Artillery Regiment fought in direct support of the 8th Panzer, and with equal courage and skill. It barely avoided the same fate. Only enough men escaped to bring off seven guns. The elite 15th Panzer Division—a full half of the Afrika Korps—was reduced to a strength of seven guns and zero tanks.

Disaster overwhelmed Panzer Army Afrika all along the line. By the end of the morning, the Littorio and Trieste Divisions broke and streamed to the rear. Rommel responded by bringing up the Ariete Armored Division from the south, thus completely denuding that flank of armor. He knew that the Italians in their “self-propelled coffins” had little chance against Montgomery’s Grants, Stuarts, and Shermans, but it was all he had left. By the close of November 2, General Randow’s 21st Panzer Division was down to thirty-five tanks, when it should have had more than two hundred.

Meanwhile, dense formations of British and American bombers concentrated against the German 88mm anti-aircraft batteries, which were very effective in an anti-tank role and were a mainstay of the Panzer Army’s defense. By the end of the day, only twenty-four of them were still operational, and, as Rommel wrote, “final destruction was upon us.”

The Desert Fox ordered his aide Captain Berndt to go to Fuehrer Headquarters to obtain “freedom of maneuver”—permission to retreat—for the Panzer Army. Colonel Westphal volunteered for this mission, but Rommel curtly dismissed the idea. Hitler would not listen to the arguments of Westphal, a professional soldier. But Berndt was a Nazi, a political officer, and a former high-ranking official in the Propaganda Ministry. Rommel thought Hitler might listen to him.

In the meantime, the remnants of the Afrika Korps continued to put up a spirited resistance.

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