It is wrong to make comparisons between fighting units of the same army and in the case of 8th Army it is almost impossible for it contained such first-class units as 9th Australian Infantry, 2nd New Zealand Infantry, and the first class 4th Indian Divisions.
British military power rose from two divisions in 1940 to a strength of six by May 1942, and then to nearly a dozen by April 1943. When 8th Army entered Tunisia it linked with Anderson's 1st Army which had begun operations with only one infantry brigade and a weak Allied tank force but which ended the campaign with an Allied army made up of men of three different nations. For it must be remembered that in addition to the British and Imperial troops, American divisions, French units, Polish and Greek Brigades had also fought in Africa. When one considers the Allied battle line then one becomes aware of the terrible odds which faced the army of Erwin Rommel and its Italian allies.
Rommel arrives to Africa
It is a military truism that supply services must be established, lines of communication laid out, and depots set up before combat operations can begin, for without these fundamentals a fighting force is restricted either to that which it can carry or to being forced to live off the land. The first German troops which debarked in Tripoli on 11 February 1941, were, therefore, supply specialists and water purifying teams who immediately set about establishing store depots, ration, fuel, and ammunition points, and generally preparing the area for the arrival of the fighting troops.
The German combat units which were despatched to Africa were the only Axis soldiers which could be considered as ready for battle and because the original task of the force had been foreseen as a blocking operation the group consisted principally of a number of machine gun battalions and anti-tank units. Artillery support was afforded by .a single motorised artillery battalion and the services detachments were a signals and an engineer company. At a later date 5th Panzer Regiment was to come under command and this addition of light and medium tanks increased the force's potency. A battalion of self-propelled (SP) anti-tank guns which arrived during March at the port of Tripoli was not taken on strength of 5th Light Division but had an independent role.
From 13 February onwards the combat troops began to arrive regularly; at first elements of 3rd Motorised Reconnaissance Battalion and 39th Anti-tank Battalion and then, during the first weeks of March the artillery and armoured fighting vehicles were unloaded. Although Hitler's name for the new unit was Africa Corps, it was not organised as such until a much later date and for a long time there were neither Corps troops nor supply columns and the second German division, 15th Panzer Division, which would have raised the group to Corps level was not expected to arrive in Tripoli until the beginning of May.
The military situation in those anxious February days was that the British had reached El Agheila and their armoured reconnaissance units had appeared to the west of that place. The Axis command had to anticipate the British intention. Would Wavell go on to capture Tripoli and to destroy not only the Italian Army but also a major part of the Italian Colonial Empire, or would time be given to Rommel and his battle-ready troops to establish a defensive line in the desert south of the gulf of Sirte? The Italians anticipated an early resumption of the offensive by Wavell's army, which they estimated to contain two armoured and three motorised divisions. The German commanders were less inclined to this appreciation for they reasoned that any advance by the British from El Agheila to Tripoli wouldjequire that Army to cover a distance of over 400 miles, the greatest part of which advance would be through a waterless and empty wasteland.
The British offensive, which had just smashed Graziani, had covered more than 800 miles and the losses of men and material which would have been incurred during that operation would have to be made good before the offensive could roll again. Then, too, there would be supply problems; for Wavell's lines of communication had been extended and any attempt to use the ports along the coast, in particular Benghasi, would be interrupted by the Luftwaffe whose Xth Afr Corps was now operating in Africa against British targets and which had begun to bomb Benghasi as early as 12 February.
Rommel first sent his troops to positions in the empty desert of the Sirte where they gave backbone to the Italians in that area and prepared to delay any British advance. On 16 February, 3rd Reconnaissance Battalion travelled 360 miles along the Via Balbia, took up position east of Sirte, and sent out patrols which made contact and drove off the British reconnaissance detachments near En Nofilia. This successful clash showed that the British had still not reached that area in any strength. The reconnaissance battalion then advanced to reconnoitre at Arco dei Fileni, some 100 miles to the east, where the tactical headquarters of 5th Light Division was established and to which the divisional units were directed to advance, once they had debarked in Tripoli.
The Brescia and Pavia Divisions were set to build defences in the Sirte around which Rommel formed a blocking line, set along the high ground approximately 20 miles west of El Agheila. The right wing of these positions was touching a salt marsh but, to guard the wide open, deep southern flank, patrols were sent to occupy the Marada Oasis, 80 miles south of El Agheila and Ariete Division was also positioned to give greater strength to the southern flank.
At the beginning of March, 5th Panzer Regiment arrived in Tripoli, held a ceremonial parade to show the flag, and moved up to the temporarily stagnant front. The Africa Corps was now strong enough to act offensively and could plan for the recapture of Cyrenaica. Rommel's original intention, to wait for the arrival of 15th Panzer Division before going over to the offensive, was discarded and now he urged Gariboldi, his superior officer, to bring the Italian divisions forward. Reluctantly Gariboldi agreed and released Ariete, the armoured division and the partly-motorised Brescia. Rommel then took this latter formation and put it into the line to relieve his German units.
On 23 March, after discussions with both Hitler and Mussolini, Rommel grouped his Corps and on the following day sent a battle group in to attack 8th Army reconnaissance troops in El Agheila. There was a short, fierce fire fight and the British withdrew closely pursued by the Germans. The next objective was the Marsa el Brega gap between the sea and the difficult country to the south. Even at this early stage in his new command Rommel had shown an independence in the conduct of his operations which often conflicted with the intentions and even the orders of his superiors -particularly those of General Gariboldi, a militarily timid man. He had intended the Marsa el Brega operation to be only a reconnaissance to establish British strength in that area. The attack, he had told Rommel, must not go in without his approval and even OKH had stressed caution for it did not anticipate that the Axis forces would have sufficient strength to reach Agedabia, the principal objective, before May. Africa Corps commander had other ideas and planned to capture Marsa el Brega by a pincer operation. The stronger of two columns, containing the panzer regiment, 3rd Reconnaissance Battalion, 8th Machine Gun Battalion, and elements from the anti-tank gun detachment, was to advance along the Via Balbia supported by artillery. The second column, made up of anti-tank guns mounted as SPs, together with 2nd Machine Gun Battalion was to outflank the British positions from the south and through this threat speed the assault of the main column.
In the event only the main column came into action and when the attack opened on 30 March, it ran up against strong British defences manned by 3rd Armoured Brigade lying behind extensive mine-fields and supported by an aggressive Royal Air Force, which attacked and delayed the German advance. Not until the second day of the offensive, and in daytime temperatures of over 80°F, did the infantry and the panzer regiment, supported by 8.8cm guns firing over open sight and with Stukas dive-bombing ahead of them, break through and by pursuing the British closely allow them no time to form fresh defence lines. The southern column, meanwhile, had failed to reach the battlefield at all due to a combination of navigational errors and bad going.