It was a long trail of defeat for Rommel
ever since the loss at Alamein four months previous.
His troops fled the pursuing Eighth Army across
Libya, giving up the major port of Tripoli with
very little fight.
Hitler and Mussolini were furious
with their rogue commander.
No one cheers a loser.
Field Marshall Kesselring, Smiling Al to the troops,
was Hitler's man running the Mediterranean, and
Erwin Rommel's boss in North Africa.
Rommel thought he was finally head honcho in Tunisia.
Then he got word of a battle underway that he knew
nothing about. Smiling Al and Rommel's rival,
General Arnim, schemed together a battleplan without
letting Rommel in on the planning.
Kesselring supported Arnim's insubordination.
Rommel's authority now resembled the thin gloss
of a dime store badge.
Surprise.
General Montgomery, Monty to most everyone,
knew he had a two to one advantage over Rommel
in most every factor that mattered on the battlefield -
firepower. Yet it was Rommel's forces that charged
the Brits at Medenine without any hope of winning.
Rommel could only stir things up to buy time.
In the picture above Monty is the cat that just ate
the canary. He knew Rommel's plan right down
to the when and where. So much for the surprise
Rommel counted on to win. It was the Tommy cyphers
that stole German secrets from the Enigma machine.
They were 'listening' in as Rommel gave a detailed
explanation of his plan to his superiors in Rome.
Monty stuffed the area around Rommel's objective
with as much artillery, tanks and anti-tank weapons
as the terrain would allow.
Rommel's three undernourished Panzer divisions
walked into a lights-out experience. A third of his
tanks were lost in this useless effort to slow Monty.
From here on Axis troops could only back up.
This tactic might be called stretching out defeat.
The plan to attack Medenine was not Rommel's.
His men no longer listened to him. He was on
borrowed time. Rommel was not a military genius.
He'd become a has-been.
The Field Marshal flew to Rome three days
following the battle. He made his case for
evacuating Africa with both Mussolini and Hitler.
Neither man could tolerate this embrace of defeat.
Hitler hospitalized Rommel for a needed rest.
* * * * *
OVER EASY
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