WHAT WAS THE FATE OF Rommel’s Afrika Korps? Following the fall of Tobruk, Rommel felt Egypt was within his grasp. Both armies were like exhausted heavyweight boxers, but he felt if he could land one more decisive blow Egypt must be his. As Desmond Young wrote:
The Afrika Korps was, indeed, exhausted. But to Rommel, with his tremendous vitality, no soldier was ever too exhausted to fight the last round of a winning battle, or, for that matter, of a losing one.1
On 21 June 1942, the day Tobruk fell, Field Marshal Kesselring flew to Africa to discuss matters with Rommel; it had been agreed at the highest level that after the fall of Tobruk the army would halt. Then all available air and sea forces would be turned on Malta, which would later be taken by airborne forces. Rommel argued his advance should continue, and they should not wait for the fall of Malta.
There was rather more to it than a strict choice. Rommel doubted the Italians would ever be ready to invade Malta, but Hitler was expecting the Italians to take a lead role, the Germans having suffered heavy losses during the Battle of Crete.
Count Ciano’s diary entry for 20 June demonstrates the indecision in the Italian high command.
General Carboni has come to Rome to discuss the Malta operation, which has been set for the next new moon. He is convinced, technically convinced, that we are heading for an unheard of disaster. Preparations have been childish; equipment is lacking and inadequate.
The landing troops will never succeed in landing, or, if they land, they are doomed to total destruction.
All the commanders are convinced of this, but no one dares to speak for fear of reprisals by Cavallero [Marshal Ugo Cavallero, Chief of Staff Italian Army]. But I am more than ever of the opinion that the undertaking will not take place.2
The momentum was with Rommel and he wanted to go on. On 23 June Ciano wrote in his diary:
According to some intercepted cables from the American observer at Cairo, Fellers, we learn the English have been beaten and that if Rommel continues his action he has a good chance of reaching as far as the Canal Zone. Naturally, Mussolini is pressing for the attack to continue.3
On 21 June Panzerarmee Afrika began pushing east after the retreating British. On that day Rommel was promoted to Field Marshal by Hitler. He confided to his wife Lucie: ‘I would much rather he had given me one more division.’4
By 24 June they had reached Sidi Barrani and the next day they closed in on Mersa Matruh. That evening General Auchinleck took over direct command of the Eighth Army. He resolved not to defend Mersa Matruh; he could not afford to leave more troops to be bottled up. Rommel struck before the withdrawal was over on 26 June with just 62 tanks and 3000 infantry troops. Auchinleck had decided to try and stop Rommel between Matruh and El Alamein, with 30th Corps occupying the main defences at El Alamein as a precaution.
Rommel’s attacking forces took heavy losses in fighting with the New Zealand Division, but his men managed to cut the coast road 20 miles east of Matruh. The British 50th Division and 10th Indian Division fought their way out at night.
The next day Rommel’s men reached the El Alamein line at the sea. Alexandria was only 60 miles away. Lieutenant General Fritz Bayerlein confided to Desmond Young, Rommel’s biographer, that at that point they had only twelve tanks left.
Then the ‘Good Source’ dried up, and a few days later Rommel’s listening companies were decimated. As Paul Carell observed in his history of the Afrika Korps:
Now by rights Kondor should have been functioning in Cairo. Now the situation had arisen which Almásy had foreseen and feared, and which had made him so eager to deliver Eppler and Sandstette to Cairo. But the Condor’s wings had been clipped.5
Would it have made any difference if Kondor had been set up as planned? It is unlikely in the extreme; Eppler and Sandstette were not dedicated or skilful enough for such a complex mission.
Rommel tried to punch his way through the El Alamein positions, but on 3 July he ordered his soldiers to dig in. ‘Every man, from the divisional commanders to the private soldiers, realised that the attack which had begun so victoriously on 26 May and was to end in Alexandria had come to a standstill.’6
Limited attacks – some quite heavy – by both sides continued in the first part of of July. Rommel finally went on the defensive on 10 July. On 30 July Auchinleck rightly judged Rommel might attack before the end of August, but where?
At this point Rommel’s best option was a withdrawal to a more favourable position, which had the added advantage of shortening his supply lines. However, the German High Command ordered Rommel not to retreat, a political decision. ‘They instructed him to stand firm, leaving only one course open to him; to attack; to assemble once more all his forces and gamble everything on a single card.’7
It is possible that Rommel’s next move – the attack at Alam el Halfa – may have been dictated by a false Kondor communication sent by the British. According to Mosley, British intelligence sent a message to German listening stations in Europe and Africa using the code books found with Eppler and Sandstette. After all, all they had to do was ‘turn to page 128 of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca and make up their code from the letters in the third paragraph down.’8
No doubt the British would have tried this stratagem; it was certainly worth a try. Rommel’s radio operators had been told to discount any communication from Kondor after the capture of Aberle and Weber. However the Abwehr – after hearing the news of the compromise of Kondor – continued to listen on their nets hoping to establish contact via W/T stations in Athens (Adolf) and Libya (Otter). The following order was picked up by Bletchley Park on 7 July.9
By order of Schloss [Berlin] Kondor is to be called until the end of September and be supervised. Suspension of supervision will be ordered. Transmitting frequencies and call signs of Schildkroete [Weber].
Did the Abwehr listeners ‘pick up’ a fake British message apparently from Kondor, and forward it to Rommel? Mosley certainly thought so.
Kondor calling. Have confirmed message from reliablest source Eighth Army plan to make final stand in battle for Egypt at Alam Halfa. They are still awaiting reinforcements and are not yet ready for more than makeshift defence.10
If this message did reach Rommel it could only have come via an Abwehr source.
All this is rather tentative, however one fact stands out: Rommel did attack at Alam el Halfa. However, General Bayerlein, a Colonel at the time and Chief of Staff of the Afrika Korps, tells a rather different story. In his view Rommel had already decided to attack the south of the line, because the British would expect him to strike in the north where the terrain was easier.
Alam el Halfa Ridge lay some fifteen miles behind the centre of the Alamein line and ran south-west to north-east for about twelve miles. It was an ideal backup defensive position against a thrust from the south toward the coast road, and Rommel’s men would have to take it.
During the build-up to the attack, a British reconnaissance patrol got lost and strayed into a minefield in the southern sector, where it hit a mine. German troops examining the wreckage found a map case which was rushed up the chain of command.
The staff were naturally cautious and suspicious. They checked it and made comparisons. ‘It’s genuine,’ was the verdict. Now they had what they needed. The firm serir routes were shown and the soft impassable sectors of dunes and drifting sands. Also the treacherous wadis and the broad open patches of desert.11
This was a British deception plan, the maps showing a very distorted version of the terrain. Mosley dates this event to 29 August, saying that the dead officer found in the car was a certain
… Major ‘Smith,’ who had dallied with Hekmat Fahmy when he should have been on his way to the desert … when the Germans went through the papers of the dead man in the scout car, they found his identity card. His name was Major ‘Smith’. They buried him with full military honours.12
So where did the dead officer come from, and was he part of the plan?
Sansom also mentions ‘a map planted on the Germans, showing the going hard where in fact it was soft sand.’ He does not identify any dead British officer.13
On 30 August the panzer divisions set off for the southern front with 190 tanks. By this point there had been another change in British command. General Sir Harold Alexander became Commander in Chief Middle East, while General Bernard Montgomery became tactical commander of the Eighth Army.
The Battle for Alam el Halfa is often called the Stalingrad of the Desert. It could also be compared to Gettysburg, where the Confederate commander Robert E. Lee felt he had to batter through for a remote chance of victory as he had no other choice. His Union opponents stood on the defensive, having changed their army commander only a few days before the battle.
For six days the Germans tried to batter through the prepared defences and minefields. Montgomery showed his hand as the Afrika Korps retreated from Alam el Halfa Ridge; there would be no ‘loosing of the British armour’, no cavalry charge which had lost the British so many tank battles in the past. He would give his wily opponent no opportunity. The Eighth Army would stay ‘balanced’ and prepare for ‘Lightfoot’, the second battle of El Alamein.
Maybe the Rebecca Code and Operation Kondor did play a part at Alam el Halfa; perhaps it was turned successfully against Rommel. Whatever the truth, it is unlikely we will ever know for sure.
See here for a list of abbreviations used in the below notes
1 Young, D., Rommel the Desert Fox p.140
2 Ciano, p.530
3 ibid, p.531
4 Young, p.142
5 Carell, p.227
6 ibid, p.241
7 ibid, p.251
8 Mosley, p.147
9 GCCS 19/38 No 38789 Athens to Libya 6/7/1942
10 Mosley, p.148
11 Carell, p.254–255
12 Mosley, p.151
13 Sansom, p.132