On 8 November, the day of the Allied landings, an ad hoc collection of remnants from Ramcke's Para Brigade was formed into Battle Group Sauer and flown to Tunisia to secure the airfields at La Marsa and at El Aouina. Fighter aircraft of 53rd Geschwader touched down on 9 November and these first 27 machines were followed by 24 JU 87 Stuka dive-bombers. On successive days JU 52 and ME 323 machines came in bringing supplies, light anti-aircraft guns, and the two battalions of Koch's 5th Para Regiment. These landings met with no resistance from the French for diplomatic negotiations had ensured that the Germans would not be met as enemies.
Colonel Harlinghausen of the Luftwaffe was given overall command of the Tunis lodgement area and Colonel Lederer assumed the same powers in the perimeter around Bizerta. Once these bridgeheads had been consolidated then began the build-up of the forces and, to effect this, all available means of sea and air transport were switched from supplying Rommel's army to the reinforcement of the Tunisian front. So efficient was this organisation that by 12 November, two Italian ships had docked at Bizerta and within three weeks nearly 2000 men, 160 armoured vehicles, 127 pieces of artillery, and over 1000 soft-skinned vehicles, in addition to other military supplies, had been brought in by sea alone. Germany was fortunate in having a pool of transport aircraft and these were used to air-land reinforcements at a rate of nearly 1000 each day. By the end of November more than 15,000 troops had been air-lifted into the two perimeters.
As these new troops arrived they were fitted into gaps in the bridgehead, irrespective of regimental or national allegiance. Two infantry battalions from the Italian Superga Division were among the first to arrive and came under command of Battle Group Sauer. By such draconian methods, and as early as 14 November, the sector Tunis South had been secured. With a firm base line the German commanders could fling out battle groups westwards to gain ground and to seize important tactical positions. Koch's paratroops moved out in an advance to contact and hoped that this would not take place until they had established bridgeheads across the Medjerda river at Jedeida, Tebourba, and Medjez el Bab. Between the Allies and the Axis there was to be a race to see who could bring the stronger force to the decisive point in the fastest time and, although the Axis powers had reacted quickly, the western Allies had not been inactive nor unimaginative. [20]
A British paratroop attack had captured Souk el Arba and the British force went on towards the important road centre of Beja. A British sea-borne landing had captured the ports of Bougie and Bone and had brought two brigades of the British 78th Division to within 140 miles of Bizerta. The next obvious objective for both sides was the town of Medjez el Bab, the gateway to Tunis. In the several sectors at which they were disposed during the night of 16 November the Axis and the Allied soldiers prepared themselves for battle. With the next day possibly, within the next two days certainly, contact would be made with the enemy and the battle for Tunisia would begin.
General Nehring's return to Africa on 14 November was dramatic in that his aircraft crashed on landing and was totally wrecked. Determined not to let this accident upset his plans he called conferences in Tunis and Bizerta and. before returning to Rome to make his own assessment of the situation to Kesselring, he ordered that the troops in the Bizerta area be pushed westwards from Mateur to Tabarka to frustrate the British drive from Bone.
Nehring's opinion of the general situation was that the Allies had landed between 5 to 6 divisions in the initial assault and that this number had increased by a regular flow of reinforcements to a strength of between 9 and 13 divisions. On the German side there was no complete formation, excepting only the two paratroop battalions. There were so few troops that there was no real continuous line but a chain of qutposts defending the two main towns of Tunis and Bizerta. Behind this outpost chain there were two strategic areas -Mateur and Tebourba — around which there was grouped a small reserve whose task it would be, should the Allies break through, to delay their advance and to protect the disembarkation of the Axis reinforcements. The only real mobile reserve available to Nehring was a panzer company in Tunis and in Bizerta and these belonged to a panzer battalion which had been on its way to reinforce Rommel.
With such forces General Nehring realised that he could never halt but only delay any strong Allied assault and indeed, if we may anticipate the course of events, we shall see that the Allied thrusts which began on 21 November caused such alarm that the Germans were preparing to burn their secret files. It seemed to the German commanders at that time that their forces would be in occupation of Tunisia for only a few days and that the length of their stay would depend upon the speed and power of the Allied advance and the defensive ability of the Axis forces. But Nehring was too old a soldier not to realise that even with massive reinforcement a German victory was no longer possible and that the most his troops could do was to delay the inevitable Allied victory.
The problems facing Nehring were daunting in the extreme. He had no staff of officers to help him run his embryo Corps and he asked for the senior staff of 10th Panzer Division to be sent to Tunis to command the splinter groups which he nominally led and to establish a military system. There was neither radio nor signals equipment for HQ Nehring, as his command was called, and no transport. Strategically the situation was even more desperate. Nehring saw that the Allies' successful landings had given them the military initiative and that he must prepare for Eisenhower's forces to make the next move. This could be either a direct thrust for the principal objectives of Tunis and Bizerta thereby strangling the supply line to Rommel. Alternatively, part of the Allied armies could strike for the Gabes Gap, and thus contain Rommel while the main striking force of the Allied army attacked Sicily. Alternatively, the main thrust could drive from Gabes to the sea and thus separate the forces in Tunisia from those in Tripolitania while a smaller force contained the Axis armies in northern Tunisia. Thereafter, the 8th Army in the desert and the Allied armies in Tunisia could destroy the Italian-German armies piecemeal.
Nehring saw that his only counter lay in converting Tunisia into a strong area into which Rommel could withdraw his African army. This then, linked with the forces which he had been promised would arrive from Europe, would enable him to convert Tunisia into a wound in the Allied side. By switching his forces he could counter any assault in the north or south by threatening the flank of the attackers. But even more important was the supply route to Rommel's army and, with the expected loss of the port of Tripolitania, only the Tunisian harbours remained open and they were the nearest to Sicily and to Italy. But the political situation had to be regularised. Permission to enter and to transit through Tunisia was not sufficient; militarily he must occupy the country. For his part Kesselring aided the movement and on 16 November, in the interests of military administration, formed out of HQ Nehring the XC Corps with Nehring as General Officer Commanding and having power over German and Italian military forces in the Tunisian area.
Although the naval and air forces of Germany and Italy were not under Nehring's control the paratroop battalions - technically on Luftwaffe establishment - and two battalions of Italian San Marco Marines were assigned to him. The composition of the small force which had been dignified with the title of XC Corps was part of 5th Para Regiment, the Barenthin Para Regiment, of which at that time only Witzig's Para-Engineer Battalion was available, a battery of four 8.8cm flak guns, a reconnaissance squadron of six-wheeled armoured vehicles each armed with a 7.5cm cannon, and an infantry replacement battalion. The Italian component, in addition to the two battalions of marines already mentioned, was two battalions of infantry from Superga Division which had been rushed across from the mainland of Europe. Everything else was formed on an ad hoc basis. In the absence of signals equipment the Axis forces were forced to rely upon the French Post Office to maintain communication with their forward units. Until military vehicles arrived from Europe civilian lorries had to be hired to maintain the supply system and there was no military medical organisation; for the first months the sick and lightly wounded were treated in civilian hospitals. Even Nehring's driver was not German but a captain of Italian extraction serving on the French Army reserve. With this insufficient and un-coordinated force Nehring's orders were to strike for the Algerian-Tunisian border and to establish good defensive positions on the western side of the hills there. At all costs the Allies must be prevented from gaining observation points from which they could dominate eastern Tunisia. High ground was to be the key to success in the forthcoming battles.