Grand Alliance

Chapter 13

Johannes Streich, commander of 5th Light Division, was at his wits end. He had been ordered to move his battlegroup south yet again, in another of Rommel’s wide enveloping movements. Bypassing Tobruk was one thing, and something Streich had real doubts about. It was difficult enough to get fuel and supplies up to the fighting units as it stood, and with the Australians holed up in Tobruk, there was always a threat they would break out and raise havoc if the Germans moved too far east.

For some days now the British seemed to have no stomach for battle, withdrawing first to Bardia and Sollum, and then yielding those positions to move further east. Now the Germans had come up against a new division, the 2nd New Zealanders, and they looked to be well dug in and prepared to make a stand. They spent a day moving units up and reconnoitering the situation, seeing that this was the place the British had determined to make their last stand. About 30 kilometers due south of Bug Bug on the coast, the long escarpment that had formed Wavell’s castle wall in the desert made a dog led at its farthest point from the sea, and then extended northeast in the general direction of Sidi Barani.

Just south of this dog leg the ground was very bad for armor and vehicles, with numerous silted depressions in some places, and hard rocky ground in others. There were also several hills and ridge lines that formed natural defensive barriers, and it was here that the 2nd New Zealand Division had been placed on defense. The remnant of 2nd Armored was held behind the lines of entrenched infantry to act as a fire brigade, and the position looked very strong to Streich. His troops were tired, his tanks needed maintenance, and there was always too little fuel to go around.

“Move south? Again?”

“I will not be handed a battle of attrition at Tobruk,” said Rommel stolidly. “If the enemy is there it is because that is where he wants me to attack him. Well I will not oblige him. Instead I plan to swing around the flank of that division like this.” He pointed to the map, his finger tracing out the route he had in mind.

“Bir el Khamsa,” said Rommel. “The roads meet there, and beyond it is a British railhead in the making near Mishiefa, which we can use. They are extending the rail line from Mersa Matruh to that place, so it looks to be a big supply center. There is your gasoline, Streich. Sidi el Razig and Bir Thalata will be your primary objectives. It is presently undefended, and this whole area is only being screened by light reconnaissance units. Once we take that we will be in a good position to cut the rail line operation and outflank any planned defense of Sidi Barani.”

“Then you are not going to attack up the main road here?”

“Not directly. I’ll give that job to the Italian Ariete Division.”

“The Italians?”

“Yes, they won’t break through, but it will serve as a nice demonstration while we maneuver, as before. 15th Panzer will lead this envelopment, we will follow with 5th Light. Once we appear well behind the enemy on his flank, those infantry will think twice about holding on to their entrenchments. We will do with gasoline what might otherwise cost us men and material.”

“Assuming we have the gasoline!” Streich objected.

“Take what you need from non-essential vehicles, the flak batteries, except the 88s. They will be useful in case the British have more of those Matildas at hand.”

“But sir… Yes, we can probably move another 25 kilometers to Bir el Khamsa, but when we get there we will be wanting fuel, water, food, all left behind in this maneuver. Why not wait for the supply columns to come up and replenish before we make this turning action? That way, when we do reach Sidi Razig, there will still be gasoline in the tanks to do something more.”

“The longer we wait, the more time we give the British to regain their balance,” said Rommel. “This is their last division of any consequence.”

“Yes, but it won’t do us any good to get strung out in the desert again here. Keitel messaged us yesterday to say he is landing the 90th light at Tripoli. Each move we make like this also extends our seaward flank to the enemy. It is being covered by the Ariete Division, but they can only do so much. If you move another twenty or thirty kilometers east, we’ll have to post flak batteries to hold that flank.”

“Don’t worry about that. Do you honestly think the British are going to come out from behind that escarpment and try to attack us there?”

“There is always the possibility.”

“Nonsense!” Rommel was tired of bickering with Streich. The man had been dragging his feet for some days now, since Michili, when he had flatly refused an order to attack that vital British supply depot and airfield for these same reasons. That led Rommel to call him a coward to his face, and Streich had been so infuriated that he tore off the Knight’s Cross he had recently been awarded and demanded an apology or he would throw it at Rommel’s feet. Since then there was little love between the two men, and less cooperation. Rommel had decided to replace the man, but he was here now, and he would have to push him if he wanted to get anything done.

“Listen, Streich, I am not asking for an opinion here. This is what we are going to do. You have your orders. Are you going to disobey your commanding officer yet again and bellyache about gasoline? That Knight’s Cross around your neck only goes so far. I have one as well, along with the Blue Max. Haven’t you noticed?”

Streich tightened his jaw, clearly unhappy. “Only too well,” he said sullenly. “Very well, Herr General, I will do as you ask. And when my tanks and vehicles run out of gasoline, we’ll ask the British if they can spare us any!”

Rommel gave him a wan smile. “Don’t ask politely, Streich, just go and take it from them. Now get moving! And remember, you were given that medal for following my orders and carrying them out successfully, not for disobeying them. I don’t command by committee here. I am Befehlshaber of the Afrika Korps. Understand?”

The action started the following morning, even as Fedorov began the reconnaissance mission with Kinlan and O’Connor. 8th Panzer Regiment of the 15th Panzer Division led the way, running into a few Morris armored cars and light infantry carriers of the 9th Australian Cav, posted to this flank well away from their division, which was north behind the escarpment. The Aussies fell back, joining the cavalry elements of the 2nd New Zealand that were also there to watch that flank. I/8th Panzers had 27 Panzer IIIH, and 18 lighter Panzer IIF tanks, which was more than enough to outgun the armored cars, and Bir el Khamsa fell that afternoon. The Germans were now about 12 kilometers from Mishiefa air field, screened by the imposing height of hill 748 and some old ruins that were so common in the desert, the crumbled forts and towers of empires long gone.

Rommel was up to his old habits again, leaving the bulk of his headquarters staff behind and moving forward in a few light Kubelwagons with two or three handpicked officers. He had acquired a big armored British truck which the Germans had taken to calling the Malmut, or ‘Mammoth,’ but he found it too cumbersome during a battle. When an engagement began he was tireless, forsaking food, sleep, and even water to make certain the action was proceeding according to his plan. Learning that Bir el Khamsa had fallen, he was headed in that direction, intending to make it his HQ location for that night.

Along the way three British Hurricanes swooped down to strafe his column, but his men sustained no casualties and all the vehicles remained in working condition. He reached the small well, which was little more than a cistern tucked away in the desert camelthorn scrub, and a few untended cultivation plots where itinerate tribesmen had once thought to grow something.

That evening there was still fighting up ahead, and I/8th Panzer managed to get tanks around Hill 230, only to find that a British Machinegun Battalion was there at another small well site called Bir Arnab. It was also learned that the old ruins five kilometers to the southeast at Makhzan el Talat were also occupied by the 28th Maori Infantry Battalion, a tough, determined band that was to become the most decorated battalion in the New Zealand Army before the war was over.

Hauptmann Hans Kummel had the 1st Company in the 8th Panzer Regiment, and reported back that the ground ahead was strongly held, and there was no light for an attack, and even less fuel. His lead Panzer IIs were down to 30 % and the Medium Panzer IIIs were equally dry. He had enough to attack, but thought they should wait until morning, given he had what looked to be two full battalions in front of him now.

Rommel knew that Kummel was no slouch, nor was the Regimental commander, Oberstleutnant Cramer. When the British decided to stand and fight, the Germans had learned to be a little cautious. The first commander of the 15th Panzer Division, von Prittwitz, also a holder of the Blue Max, had charged off to scout an artillery firing position for the Italians near Tobruk and was killed instantly when a hidden British 2 Pounder anti tank gun put a round right through his chest. If Kummel wanted to wait, then Rommel decided he had better have a look for himself.

Just after sunset he moved forward to scout the enemy position, satisfying himself that it had indeed been heavily reinforced. His instinct was to continue to jog right, outflanking the defense, but each move like that forced him to leave elements of his division along the extended front, diluting his combat power at the point of that maneuver. To make matters worse, the motorcycle reconnaissance troops of 200th Kradschutzen from 15th Panzer Division had reported back that the hill he had hoped to reach the following day was now being strongly occupied by what looked to be a full brigade of infantry.

“A brigade?” he asked the Leutnant reporting. “Are you certain your eyes are not playing tricks? Where would the British get yet another brigade to throw on the line?”

“These did not appear to be British troops, Herr General. They looked to be Poles from the unit markings and flags we observed.”

“Poles?” Rommel shook his head. “Didn’t they get enough back in ’39? Very well, you may return to your battalion. But I want that position scouted again at dawn. Move out before sunrise.”

The unit was, in fact, the Carpathian Infantry Brigade, which was Wavell’s last reserve. It had been moving up from the vicinity of Mersa Matruh, and had reached the scene at a most opportune time, for the report gave Rommel pause and he decided to wait until morning before pressing the attack further.

Streich will be happy, he thought. He can siphon some petrol from his flack units and dust off his tank tracks. Then he set about to see how much of his division was within arm’s reach. He would collect what he could and plan his attack for the following morning. It would be a long and sleepless night, and Rommel was upset that things were not going as he had planned. Somehow the British had managed to read his intentions and stolidly move blocking forces into position to frustrate him.

I should go right around them, he thought, but the more he circulated among his troops, the more he came to hear the same complaint. They were running low on fuel. The movement east from the Egyptian border had already taken them nearly a hundred kilometers on fuel tanks that weren’t topped off when they started. The Panzer III Medium tanks that constituted his primary striking force for maneuver had a range of about 165 kilometers, and now they needed fuel. Streich had been correct, as much as Rommel hated to admit that. So he issued orders that all non-essential vehicles should be cannibalized for fuel to support the combat elements, and he would take the night to catch his breath and prepare a renewed offensive for the following morning.

“Where is that Hungarian?” Rommel looked over his shoulder, rattling the old map he had been brooding over.

“You mean the Sonderkommando?”

“I want him to have a look south and east tonight to see where the enemy flank is. The British cannot have very much more to throw at us. Something tells me this is the end for them. This Hungarian has good desert eyes, does he not? Send for him at once.”

The man with good desert eyes was the enigmatic figure of Hauptmann László Almásy, commander of an elite unit of long range scouts operating with Rommel’s force, the Sonderkommando. Almásy knew these deserts well, and had explored them before the war when he launched several expeditions with other British explorers to search for a legendary lost Oasis in the Libyan desert called Zerzura. The place was rumored to be a fertile, hidden valley, accessible only through a hidden wadi that ran between two mountains. There it had been reported that strange men held forth, tall, blue eyed and with very unusual speech and weapons. One legend held that they were Crusading knights who had become lost in the desert on the way to Jerusalem, and founded a city of bleached white stone that ran with fresh water from hidden springs and wells, the fabled land of Zerzura.

Almásy had searched for it in 1932 and the spring of 1933, and had also crossed the Great Sand Sea, and explored the other well known oasis sites like Kufra, Bayhira, Giarabub and Siwa. He was the Deutsche Afrika Korps’ answer and foil to men like Popski and the British Long Range Desert Group, and had actually worked with many of the men now serving in those units before the war. He met and traveled with Godfrey Jones Penderel, a WWI ace who was presently flying reconnaissance with No. 201 Group R.A.F., and Sir Patrick Clayton, who became the official surveyor of the Libyan Desert and later joined the L.R.D.G.

Almásy did not know it at the time, but at that very moment, Major Clayton was out with T Patrol with 30 men and 11 trucks of the L.R.D.G., in a planned operation against the Italian Held Kufra Oasis. His small band would be spotted by an Italian airplane, and soon engaged by a much larger force of the Italian Auto Saharan Company, and Clayton would be wounded and captured that very morning.

The intrepid Hungarian arrived at Rommel’s command tent just after midnight, eager to get new orders directly from the General.

“Here,” said Rommel, fingering his map. “The Carpathian Brigade was seen in this area. I want you to get over there tonight and have a good look around. But take your time. Move south with the other Oasis Patrols, and see what you find. Note the condition of the ground. Find the enemy flank, and then find me a way to move east around their left shoulder. I’m told you’re a man of some experience in these deserts. You should know what to do.”

Hauptmann Almásy saluted, assuring Rommel he would return before dawn, and that he had every confidence that he could find an easy way around the enemy flank.

It was the last thing he ever said that he thought he could be sure of, for this would not be another simple night reconnaissance for his Sonderkommando. The border zone he was about to scout now was the edge of oblivion, and the enemy looming like a vast shadow on that frontier were apparitions from another world.

Chapter 14

The desert seemed endless to Lieutenant Reeves of the 12th Royal Lancers. He had been here twelve months, and still could not grasp the enormity of all the desolation around him. There was nothing in the desert, except the occasional camelthorn, weathered limestone, sandy salt marshes, camel dung and the inevitable hordes of black flies. It was no place for any sane man to be, and even less so now, with this impossible news that had just been laid on all the battalion commanders.

Insane… This was the way he felt inside now, empty, desolate, thunderstruck to the point of madness. The meeting he had just had with Brigadier Kinlan had left him slack jawed with disbelief. All the other battalion commanders had reacted the very same way, amazed and perplexed with what the General was telling them.

Something had happened when the Russians attacked them, some unaccountable exotic effects of the nuclear detonation. That was the way he had tried to explain it. There was blast, radiation, electromagnetic pulse — all three well known and guarded against. But this was something altogether different. This was an effect on time itself, the fourth dimension. The detonation caused displacement in time for a limited quantity of mass within the effect radius.

Displacement in time!

He shook his head, still dazed with the news, hearing Kinlan’s words like an echo in his mind. “… It’s happened to the Russians themselves, who knows how, but that’s how they lost that battlecruiser in the Norwegian Sea. We all heard about the suspected accident there — a nuclear accident. We all knew they lost that Oscar class sub, and the word was that Kirov went down with it, but that was not so. The damn ship turned up in the Pacific a month later. Well, here’s some more news for you. This Russian Marine detachment Reeves collared with that KA-40 was commanded by the Captain of that very same ship! He was the one who put this explanation forward. I thought it was a load of rubbish just like you must now, but the evidence has been mounting with each passing hour, and it leads to only one conclusion. Sultan Apache, the odd differences in moon phase and star data, the loss of all satellite and comm-links — it’s all adding up to only one thing — time displacement. It’s happened to us, gentlemen, and from everything we’ve been able to piece together at Brigade HQ, we’ve been blown clean out of the 21st Century! We figure the date and time now is the 2nd of February… in the year 1941!”

That had been greeted by blank stares, an uncomfortable shift in posture from the men assembled, a smile from others who thought Kinlan was just trying to lighten the mood before the brigade set out on what was likely to be its last road march. But it was no joke.

General Kinlan knew he had to tell the men something before they moved north with the prospect of battle before them. Yet he could not tell them everything, just as the Russian Captain had urged. Some would have to know, but not to the whole rank and file. They would learn just as the crew of that ship learned the hard truth. In the end he decided to limit the news to his senior officers. He had to place faith in their training and discipline, and hope for the best. He made an all points announcement stating they had been informed of enemy activity ahead, a large unidentified force attempting to block their move north. He said they were using antiquated equipment, but that there was a lot of it, tanks, artillery and anti-tank guns. “Who knows,” he concluded, “maybe it’s Rommel and his Afrika Korps.”

He had tried to be a bit light hearted about it, saying they had also encountered Russians, but determined them to be no threat. They were apparently traveling with British officers, and should be treated as friendly. Then his voice became more serious and he related the disturbing news concerning Sultan Apache, saying it was a matter they were still looking into. That got quite a few men scratching their heads, but they gave it little mind and buckled down for action as any good soldiers would. Reeves heard the announcement over his comm-link command set radio, as did every man in his unit. He knew much more — the full briefing from Kinlan still clawing at him within, but he could not be forthcoming with the men just yet. He had been handed the job of going out to obtain the final evidence on all this.

“If any of this is true,” Kinlan had told him, “then you should run into the German Army out there somewhere. Take your battalion north and scout well ahead of the main column. I want to know what we’re looking at here, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. I don’t want photographs or thermal imaging data, I want flesh and blood men, and the cold hard steel of a vehicle. You’re the best in the business, Reeves. Get this done…”

“How you figure that?” said Sergeant Williams, a voice suddenly filling the void within him and bringing Reeves back to this impossible here and now. “The whole place gone?”

“What? You mean Sultan Apache? The Russkies must have hit it again,” Reeves answered sullenly. It was the only thing he could think of to explain the situation.

“The General said there was no sign of another attack. You heard it — they went over the site and detected no radiation. No blast damage either.”

“Sounds loony to me,” said Reeves. “Maybe he got his grid coordinates wrong. General Kinlan is no fool, mind you, but something just doesn’t add up here. So that’s where we come in. When brigade wants information, who do they call? 12th Royal Lancers, that’s who. So tighten your chin straps, boyo, and be sharp.”

“Yeah? Well that bit about keeping our eyes peeled for enemy ground troops was rich. Keep a look out for Rommel and the Germans, eh? And we advance in battle order instead of column of march? It certainly sounds like the General knows something he hasn’t told us yet.”

“Oh, he told us alright,” said Reeves. “Battalion officers were briefed, but none of that falls on you, Sergeant. You just settle affairs here on squad level. We’re 12th Royals and were out on point. I’ll want the Scimitars up front this time, three squadrons in battle order, and we’ll follow with the Dragons in the center. Pass the word. I want thermals and night opticals at all times. Report any contact to me directly.”

Four hours later Reeves got his first report, and from a bemused Sergeant in 2nd Squadron who sighted light vehicles ahead. They had encountered a desert patrol of some kind, and Reeves ordered his men to move up in their Scimitars and see about it. What they saw soon boggled their eyes, and quashed the rounds of humorous comments about General Kinlan’s briefing. The men had a good long laugh as they set out before dawn, but just before sunrise the laughter stopped, drowned out by incoming tracer rounds from heavy machineguns.

As was so often the case in desert war, the recon elements of the two opposing sides were the first to tangle with one another. Reeves listened to the chatter between his units on his headset, and soon learned that 3rd Squadron on point had also run into something. When his men came under fire he gave the order to return in kind, thinking they had run across groups of irregular militias riding about in SUVs and pickup trucks, out to raise havoc and then disappear into the desert again. But here? What would they be doing so far south of the coast? Then he got news that really raised an eyebrow, and reminded him that there were no SUVs if this was 1941. Lieutenant Wright radioed in from the left flank in 2nd Squadron and said he had prisoners.

“More bloody Russians?” Reeves inquired.

“No sir… well Lieutenant… It’s bloody Germans, just like Kinlan said! I have five men here, all decked out in old style German army uniforms. I interrogated the lot, but haven’t the foggiest. Sprechen sie Deutsch?”

“Germans? Somebody playing army out here again?”

“They had a Kubelwagon, right out of the museum, and a nasty 5 °Caliber MG on it. I had to use the main autocannon, and that was that. The rest gave us the hands up soon after, but one vehicle took off north and slipped away.”

“Very well,” said Reeves, wondering how he was going to keep this cat in the bag. “Stick them in one of the support vehicles, and keep moving. Secure that long ridge line up ahead and wait there. I’ll be up to have a look. Reeves out.”

A Kubelwagon with a 50-cal? That was a new spin. He’d bet get one of those back to Kinlan. They were accustomed to Ford pickup trucks with old ZSU 23’s mounted in the back, but this was a first. He reported, surprised by Kinlan’s subsequent order to stop at Ridge 699 and wait for the Mercian Battalion to come up. Then he was to jog left, set up all his Squadrons in attack echelon, and wait for the Highlanders to come up on his right. The General was playing it by the book. He was deploying the whole damn brigade in battle formation! It was as if he thought we were about to tangle with a full enemy division out there somewhere.

They were about to do exactly that…

Hauptmann László Almásy crested the barren desert hill that morning, and he was late. Almásy had been scouting on the extreme southern right flank of Rommel’s advance, with his Sonderkommando unit comprised if 12 scout cars and a few squads of light infantry. Another patrol, the 3rd Oasis Group, had been reconnoitering near an ancient tomb site near Gabr el Shubaki when they thought they saw the telltale signs of vehicles approaching from the south. Almásy heard about it, and one look at his map told him he could scout the area well from the top of this hill, number 728, about ten kilometers due east of the tomb. He would be late reporting back to Rommel, but at least he would have the very latest information in hand when he did. He reached the hill he had in mind just before dawn, in spite of the fact that his scout cars were also very low on fuel, and he wondered if he would have enough to get back north.

So it was that the famous Hungarian explorer would come to make a new discovery that morning, and see a strange group of men, tall, strangely attired, and with weapons the like of which no man alive in his world had ever known. The sun rose, painting the stark desert terrain in a rosy hue, and the light soon illuminated the whole valley floor to the south. To his amazement, there, stretching for many kilometers in a long dark column, was a large mechanized force. He could clearly make out eight wheeled armored cars in the vanguard, and behind them he could see tanks. There were other odd looking vehicles, topped with strange metal discs spinning fitfully, and whiskery antennae waving in the morning breeze as the column slowly came to a halt.

What he had seen was actually Reeves 12th Royal Lancers, the eight wheeled Dragons and a line of Scimitars in 2nd Squadron that was now following. The Scimitar was a vehicle that bore some resemblance to what Almásy would conceive of as a tank of this era. Even the 30mm RARDEN cannon looked to be about the size and scale of a typical 2 Pounder. Had he seen a Challenger II, his mind might be on other things now, but as it stood, the presence of this force was enough to get him moving again.

Good god, he thought. What unit was this? It looked to be at least another full battalion in strength, and he could already begin to hear the rattle of the tanks rolling over the cold desert ground. I have to get word of this to Rommel!

“Hans!” he rasped. “Get to the nearest radio. No time to get back there. Tell Rommel we have visitors! That looks to be a battalion of British armor out there, and it’s heading north, right on our exposed right flank!”

László Almásy had never really found the lost realm of Zerzura, but he had just discovered something that was about to change the entire history of the Second World War. And his fate, in the maelstrom that was now emerging from the vermillion shadows of a distant ridge, would be the least of things to be taken by the storm.

Rommel reacted to the news with great surprise. A British armor battalion? Behind him? Yet the evidence was plain for him to see. The lone scout car from a small oasis patrol had come barreling in on its last legs just moments ago. The back end of the vehicle was shot to pieces by what looked to be a round in the caliber of a twenty to thirty millimeter flak gun. It might have been exactly that, he thought. The British had been throwing together small ad hoc columns, like a German kampfgruppe might be formed. They would scrape together whatever they could find, trucks, stray tanks, a few flak guns, or a single towed artillery piece.

They must have run into one of the British Jock Columns, he thought, smiling. His signalmen had picked up the phrase on radio intercepts, though he did not yet know where the handle came from. The men of the Oasis patrol were wide eyed with reports of new, fast moving British tanks that could engage from very long ranges and seemed to have eyes in every direction.

“Their optics must be superb,” one man had reported. “They hit us from well over two kilometers — and well before dawn! The moon was down and it was still very dark. We lost three vehicles in the first minute, and I was only lucky to have escaped because I was at the back of the column and had the good sense to get here with this report!”

Almásy’s report had come in soon after, a battalion sized force of tanks and armored cars was on his deep right flank. How could this have happened without him knowing about it earlier? That damn sand storm, he muttered inwardly. It had prevented him from getting airborne in the Storch to make certain he would not suffer a surprise like this. Thank god I had the foresight to send that Hungarian out last night. It seemed his enemy had more forces at his disposal than Berlin claimed. The German spy network in Cairo had informed him of the arrival of the 2nd New Zealand Division, but not this other formation. Angry at himself as much as anything else, he stormed out, leaving his adjutant standing there with two staff officers. They had seen him do this many times, and knew the General was going off to war, and might not be found again for hours.

Yet Rommel was still not entirely convinced this could be much of a threat. He knew Almásy was a reliable man, a skilled observer, and one who knew these deserts like the back of his hand, but he wanted to see for himself. “Tanks” was a fairly broad category these days. He had Panzers labeled one thru four in his own division, and the British had things from the light Mark VI machine gun tankettes, to the heavy Matilda infantry support tanks. So he leapt into a nearby Kubelwagon, collaring a driver, and sped off towards the highest ground he could find, the hills above the ruined tomb southeast of Bir el Khamsa. From that height he should be able to see anything moving on the desert to the south, particularly any sizable force, which should be kicking up a lot of dust by now.

When he got there, his surprise was complete. Almásy was correct! This was a fast, mechanized force, and he could clearly see armor just behind the leading fan of armored cars, which looked to be something new as far as he could tell through his field glasses. The mutter of small arms fire and the distant rattle of a machine gun told him this force was still sweeping through the thin cordon of desert patrols, small platoons of his oasis groups that had been screening this sector.

“Damn!” he swore aloud. “This Wavell has more guts than I realized. Turnabout is fair play, or so it seems. This must be all the armor he could scrape together, and he’s sent it in a wide enveloping maneuver, just as I would have done. He’s beaten me to the punch!”

His spies had also told him that the British 7th Armored Division, the force that had been the undoing of the Italians a month earlier, was also refitting near Alexandria. Could they be ready for battle so soon? Was this the 7th Armored, appearing like a mad Jinn on his flank just as his battalions were moving into the dawn attack he had ordered? Now he would have to call off that attack and quickly disengage. Cursing, he rushed back down the hill to the vehicles waiting below, and was quickly on the radio.

“Streich! Never mind the attack! Get your tanks south of Bir el Khamsa, and form as many Kampfgruppen as you can. We have uninvited guests for breakfast!”

Streich was incensed. His men had just fought a hot action to storm the 230 meter hill overshadowing Bir Arnab, Now he was being ordered to give it back to the enemy, disengage, and regroup 15 to 20 kilometers to the south, a maneuver he had not factored into his careful fuel rations. He bawled this over the radio until Rommel cursed at him and told him to be silent and do what he had ordered. Then he acted, with skill and determination in spite of his rising anger.

This headstrong General already had the entire Afrika Korps strung out for nearly a hundred kilometers from Sollum to Bir el Khamsa. In places that long front was being screened by small detachments of flak batteries, their gasoline plundered to feed the hungry maneuver elements. Meanwhile, without their defensive AA umbrella, the troops were being increasingly harassed by enemy aircraft. The British seemed to sense that if they were to lose this battle, Egypt might ride in the balance. They were throwing everything they had at Rommel now, beating troops to quarter from every corner of their empire. They had even managed to field this Carpathian infantry that appeared so suddenly at dusk the previous evening.

Orders were one thing, but disengaging from a forward action and re-directing that effort 180 degrees to a new axis was no small matter. The Germans were disciplined, skilled troops, and managed to extricate their valuable tank battalions and get them headed south. Rommel had the 8th Machinegun battalion in reserve, which would form the nucleus of one Kampfgruppe. Streich put together another with I/5 Panzer Battalion supported by the division reconnaissance unit. A third kampfgruppe was formed with the Division Pioneer battalion and II/5 Panzer. There was plenty of artillery around to support all three while still keeping suppressive fire on the British position.

“Let them think we’re reorganizing for another attack,” Streich told his subordinates. We’ll finish off this British unit to our south first, and be back by noon to do just that — assuming I have any gasoline to get here! Then we’ll finish the job with this New Zealand Division.”

Confidence was a good thing in a commanding officer, but Streich was wrong, and by noon that day the situation would look a good deal different than anything he could imagine.

Chapter 15

Rommel was not the only man up on a hill top that morning with a good pair of field glasses. Lieutenant Reeves had come forward to look over the scene of the night engagement, surprised to see what looked to be authentic German Kubelwagons from WWII. They even had a mud slurry finish and light markings in typical German insignia. The German cross was very evident. Someone could have dug one of these old warriors up in this desert, he thought. Lord knows there’s a good many old wrecks from the war still out here. But this was not an old, rusting hulk. It looked to be in perfect working order, except for the holes his Scimitars had blown through it with their 30mm cannons. Otherwise it might be described as being in mint condition, something that would be very rare in 2021.

But it wasn’t 2021, or so he had been told. It was supposed to be 1941, and in that year the presence and condition of this vehicle would make perfect sense — not to mention the five German soldiers he had stowed away in an enclosed FV432! German soldiers, not Libyans, not Egyptians, not Berbers… Kinlan had sent him out here to look for the hard evidence of what this Russian Captain had been telling them, and damn if he didn’t have the first bit in hand at this very moment.

So he went up to the ridge he had ordered his Scimitars to wait behind, and took a good long look to scout the position with human eyes. He did not like what he was seeing. There was a strong defensive position forming, with one flank anchored by what looked to be a line of hastily emplaced guns. Their profile was quite prominent, but he could see camo netting going up and troops digging in to create some semblance of cover for the heavy guns. What was even more disturbing was the nagging thought that refused to silence itself now. The barrels on those guns were leveled for close in action, not elevated as artillery might be. Those were anti-tank guns, and for all the world they looked like…. German 88s! They were being screened with infantry digging in to good positions on stony ground. It was not a position he would approach without heavy tank support or artillery preparation. The skin on his Dragons and Scimitars was not thick enough, even with armor module additions, to reliably stop a round from an 88.

Lord almighty, he thought. Am I actually seeing this? Everything I’ve seen since I picked up that Popski fellow is evidence that all points in the same direction. I haven’t seen a single thing out here that I could reliably date to the 21st Century. Looks like we’ve really done what this Russian Captain said, and slipped right down the rabbit hole! And if those are 88s we’re going to need tanks up here, and soon.

The sun washed over the Panzer III tanks of the 1st Battalion, 5th Panzer Regiment where they waited in concealed positions beyond a low rise. When they arrived in Libya the vehicles had been painted the deep charcoal grey of Panzer Grau in color, but they had been quickly repainted in the light yellow orange and tan hues of Gelbbraun, which would make them very difficult to see in the ruddy early morning sun. They still bore the runic symbol that had identified them when serving with the 3rd Panzer Division — new clothes, but an old heritage in this strange new battlescape unlike any other in the war. The armored cars of the 3rd Recon Battalion had launched into action too soon off the docks at Tripoli, and had to settle for mud slurry to cover their darker paint scheme so they could blend in on the sere grey and sallow tan terrain.

These were the first available troops to arrive at the line Rommel had selected to greet the incoming British attack. As 15th Panzer had borne the brunt of the fighting in his attempted envelopment of Bir Arnab the previous day, it would fall to Streich and the 5th Light to answer the call this day. The division was designated “light” for a good reason. While it had two Panzer battalions as any other Panzer Division might, it was light on infantry. Instead of two Panzergrenadier regiments of three battalions each, it had only one, designated the 200th Schutzen Regiment, with the 2nd and 8th Machinegun Battalions. It also had a pioneer battalion in reserve, and Rommel had bolstered it by assigning a number of his 88mm dual purpose flak batteries, adopting a defensive posture that he would make famous in one telling of this war.

German doctrine differed markedly from British tactics when it came to armored warfare. The Germans seemed to master the art of combined arms and maneuver almost instinctively, and their command system made them a highly flexible, adaptable force. Within hours of Rommel’s pointed orders to Streich, three Kampfgruppen had been assembled to face the oncoming attack. Rommel knew that the British would be tank hunting with their armor, and if they were bold enough to launch such an attack, they most likely had Matildas with them, the one tank the German guns had trouble penetrating with their lighter caliber guns.

But the Germans did not see their own tanks as the primary foil against the British Armor. Tanks were for maneuver, exploitation, and shock against enemy infantry and artillery positions, not for dueling it out with other enemy armor. The primary weapon they would deploy against enemy tanks were the Panzerjagers with their AT guns and, in this case, the division battalion was augmented by three batteries of the formidable 88s, the very same guns Lieutenant Reeves had scouted.

The line faced south, and the 605th PzJager Battalion had twelve PzJ-I self-propelled 47mm AT guns on the extreme left of the position. They were good enough to deal with the light British Mark VI MG tanks, and could bother any of their existing cruiser tanks as well. At ranges of 500 to 600 meters, the gun could penetrate 45 to 50mm of armor, good enough to beat the 30mm armor of the British Mark II A-1 °Cruisers. If the Matilda’s led the attack, with heavier 70mm armor, then the 88s would answer the call.

Designed as an anti-aircraft weapon against high altitude targets, the 88 had become a superb anti-tank weapon. In fact, the expression bomber crews used to describe the sharp burst of fire and explosive wrath of the gun, “Ack-Ack,” was a mangling of the German “Acht-Acht” for the number eighty-eight. it was Rommel who would seal the 88’s legacy as a ‘dual purpose’ gun. The wide open spaces of the desert, devoid of trees or other covering terrain, made the 88 an ideal weapon for long range AT fire. It was a big static gun, on a heavy, unwieldy carriage weighing over 7000 pounds, and so it had to be transported to the battle site and set up, but by now the Germans had mastered the deployment of the weapons and honed it to a fine art. They could unlimber and deploy in under three minutes.

The gun’s one liability on that big flak carriage was that it presented a very high profile, but it made up for that by being able to outrange any tank gun it might face. Against aircraft it could hit targets flying as high as 39,000 feet, and when the long steel barrel was leveled for ground target action, its range was an astonishing 7600 meters, though gunners seldom could see or hit a target that far away. Tanks of that day might only reach good firing ranges at 1000 meters or less. The 88 could penetrate 84mm of armor at twice that range, and up close, the powerful gun could smash through up to 200mm of armor, an armor thickness that no British tank of this era would ever attain. Rommel had proved the weapon’s virtue in France at Arras, where he used his 88 batteries to stop the British armor. Today it would be no different, or so he believed when he ordered the guns south to meet the oncoming attack.

Out in front of the 88 batteries were the hardened troops of the machinegun battalions, ready to cut down any infantry that might be moving in support, though the British seldom used combined arms at this stage of the war. They massed their tank formations and used them like armored cavalry, bold dragoons in the desert, charging against the enemy line.

Streich was out on Hill 222 with a light 37mm flak battery posted to defend a small section of three 150mm howitzers. He slid his sand goggles up onto his forehead and raised his field glasses, frowning when he saw the dust being kicked up by the enemy armored vehicles, perhaps ten to twelve kilometers distant. He shook his head. The fools, he thought. They’re late! They should have hit us just before sunrise when all that rosy red dust would not be visible. It’s a miracle I was able to get my Kampfgruppen re-established on this line but, now that we’re here, the British will pay the piper!

He called back to the main artillery group. Well behind him and set up to provide suppressive fires that he would be calling in. If the British were planning one of their little tank charges, they’ll get a dose of that artillery first, he thought. Then the 88s will settle the matter, and I’ll order my tanks to swing left and hit their flank. This should be over in an hour.

There was a long, thin desert track that ran to the left of a sinuous wadi that rooted its way down from the hill he was on. That would serve as a nice anti-tank ditch for anything they send up that road, and it was well covered by another hill designated 198, where four 88s had been positioned. So they’ll have to move to their right, away from that wadi, under fire from my 88s the whole time. He smiled. All these years in Egypt and the British still couldn’t read a map! There was no way they could push armor up that road and live to tell about it. The wadi funneled the track toward an old dry well site called Qabr el Shubaki on his map, and a crumbled stone tomb marked the place. His men had scouted it the previous evening when he first got the order to re-deploy here from that irascible braggart, Rommel.

To the left of the tomb from his perspective, there was a sharp rise that pointed directly at his position. That would hinder tank movement in that direction as well. They’ll have to flow around either side if it, and won’t be able to support one another as they do so. Once they do flow around it, they’ll be right in front of my infantry position, nice stony ground that will slow them down about 1500 meters out.

The sound of vehicles came to him on the cool morning air now, a faint, distant rumble that was growing in strength and power with each passing moment. They’re coming, he thought, looking at his watch. Another ten minutes and we should be able to make out the lead vehicles.

“Pass the word to the artillery,” he said to the Leutnant commanding the small battery he had posted here. “Your guns start the show. In ten minutes I want you to start spotting rounds on either side of that ridge. See? The main battalions will fire for effect on my command.”

They were coming.

Tanks.

Other vehicles were behind them, but nothing that he had seen the British use before. What are they? Matildas? He could not quite see in the dust and ruddy red light of the dawn. They were moving fast… too fast for Matildas, but too big to be anything else.

He looked at his watch again.

The leading tanks of 3rd Sabre, Scotts Dragoon Guards, 15 Challenger IIs, had been ordered to move ahead when Reeves reported his long range imaging had identified a considerable force ahead, many gun positions, in a line stretching several kilometers!

It had to be the bloody Egyptian Army this time, thought 1st Lieutenant William Bowers in the lead Challenger II, and he made his report… But with German mercenaries fighting with them? How did they know we would be making this march to Mersa Matruh? How could they have found us here, and deployed like this so efficiently? It wasn’t like the Egyptian Army at all. They had not shown this kind of aggressive pluck for many months.

Then the uncomfortable alternative he had been avoiding asserted itself. He had been in on the briefing with General Kinlan, yet found it all too much to swallow. Now Reeves was reporting gun emplacements, infantry, even artillery setting up for a fight. What if these weren’t mercenaries, he thought? What if they’re the real thing?

He decided to try and get more confirmation, got on the radio, and keyed Reeves call sign. “Sabre One to Royal Lance. Do you copy? Over.”

“Royal Lance here. Copy your signal Sabre One.”

“What’s the story on that position out there Johnny? Have we got rag heads, rabble, or the Kaiser’s brood?”

“Wrong war, Bill,” Reeves familiar voice returned. “You’re looking at 88 millimeter AT guns on your left, good infantry screen. Better let the RHA in on this one before you lead in the Mercian Battalion. That 88 is not anything to trifle with.”

“Didn’t know the bloody Egyptian Army was using those,” said Bowers, fishing. There was a long pause, then Reeves came back again.

“Didn’t expect that either,” he said. “But seeing is believing. You heard what the General said same as I did. Let’s leave it at that.”

“Good enough Johnny. Bowers out.”

Well, let’s see what they want to do when I move my Sabre up. If they have these guns they will be dug in to either side of that hill. I’d better call for the RHA to shake things up first like Reeves says. But after that I think my Challengers can fill out the dance card easily enough. That wadi is a nice little obstacle on my left. It funnels the attack right at the base of that hill. Once I get round that, those AT guns will have a good field of fire at us. Then again, I’ll have the same, and I can move and fire on the go. So let’s drop a few rounds to see what happens. The last thing those fellows out there expect is for me to come gunning up the side of that wadi — so that is exactly what I’m going to do!

He tapped his driver’s shoulder to stop his Sabre, and put in a call for three rounds of artillery, warning fire. Usually that had been enough to send any irregular force scrambling for their SUVs and hi-tailing it into the desert, and he watched as the first 155s came in, deliberately short, right in front of the hill… one… two… three…

The Desert Rats had just thrown their hat into the ring, and Bowers waited, watching his optics screen closely for signs of retrograde movement that he expected. What he got instead was somewhat of a surprise. The enemy, whoever they were out there, answered those opening three rounds with three of their own, right across that sharp ridge that pointed at the enemy position. Streich and his three 150s had answered the challenge.

He got on the radio and reported to Kinlan at Brigade HQ as ordered. “Sir,” he said, the surprise evident in his voice. “They’re answering with artillery.”

“Very well, Lieutenant. Hold your position. The RHA will be clearing its throat in another minute. Standby.”

Well to the rear, the self-propelled guns of the Royal Horse Artillery were about to increase the tempo and send in a full salvo. Bowers was attached to lead in the Mercian Battalion on this flank, and they had sixteen AS-90s in support. The fireworks were about to begin.