Lions at Dawn

Chapter 19

Private Kaling Kapoor was very busy. He had gotten his hands on a British Bren gun, and he had spent the last hour figuring out how it worked. Now he was elated, rushing towards the forward lines where the platoon had been digging in and building fortified strong points. The Sergeant caught a blur of movement out of his right eye, and turned his head, seeing the Moonbird trying to squeeze past an ammo cart.

“Private Kapoor!” he shouted. “Stand where you are!” He strode quickly over, giving the young man a stern look. “Now where in the world did you get that?”

“From the British,” said the Private, beaming. “I’m going to use it to attack the Germans.”

“The British? They just gave that to you?”

“No Sergeant. I traded them for it—but I drove a very hard bargain, just one silly 2-inch mortar tube, and I didn’t even have to give them any ammunition!” His eyes were wide as he spoke, but he could see that Sergeant was in no way pleased.

“Just one 2-inch mortar….”

“They wanted a 3-inch tube, but I bargained very hard. Look Sergeant, it’s a Bren machine gun!”

“I can see that, you miserable goat! Where is the ammunition?”

“Right here. I insisted on three magazines.” The Private opened his pack to show off three of the classic curved top loading magazines that were characteristic of the Bren. It was a light weight, fast firing gun, using .303 ammo and very effective out to a range of 600 yards.

“Do you realize that gun is operated by a two man team? You are a trained sapper, not a machine gunner. What’s gotten into you?”

“But Sergeant, we already mined the bridges and set up wire. There was nothing else to do, but with this, I can attack them!”

“You will do no such thing. Take that gun to the Corporal over there immediately, and ask him which bunker he wants it in. Then come back here.”

“But Sergeant!”

“But nothing. Do as I have ordered. Right now!”

Frustrated, the Private saluted, and went trudging off to find his Corporal. The Sergeant shook his head. I will have to keep a much closer eye on that one, he thought. Wait until he gets back here and I ask him where he got that 2-inch mortar he traded. This is going to cost him a month’s salary. Maybe that will knock some sense into his silly head.

That afternoon the Germans did attack, dark uniformed men of the Prinz Eugen Mountain Division. They had come up the main road to Hamah and were trying to take the bridge over a small river, held by the men of the British 17th Brigade. The 32nd Indian Engineer battalion was right on the line, sandwiched in between the Northamptons on their left and the 2nd Seaforth Highlanders on their right. The Germans began with a good artillery prep against the Northampton Battalion, and then rolled it right over the Engineers.

With a full day’s hard labor, the Engineers had built some very sturdy strongpoints, and they weathered the shelling easily enough. But that was the first time Private Kapoor had been under direct fire, and he found it much more difficult than he imagined it would be. The Sergeant found him in a covered trench, standing boldly over the lad as he spoke to him.

“It’s lifting,” he said stoically. “Now the infantry comes. You just stay right there Packshee.”

The Moonbird stuck his head out of the trench, his face already stained with the dry earth. “If I had kept that 2-inch mortar, I could have fired it back at them, but that machine gun won’t do at all. You were right, Sergeant. I missed my chance.”

The Sergeant knew his Private was aching to strike a blow at the enemy, so he could say he fought hard here and earn his keep. As it was, all Packshee could do now was lay low, and he didn’t want the lad to feel like a coward, not during his first engagement.

The attack came in, and he unshouldered his rifle to fix his bayonet, waiting and watching behind a low sandbagged wall. The Northamptons took the worst of it, hit by two battalions of the 13th Mountain Regiment. Along the lines of the 32nd, they could hear the fighting loudly, but it wasn’t directed at their front. Then Private Kapoor pointed. They could soon see the British falling back, away from the bridge towards the outskirts of the town. He waited tensely, watching and listening, a well of fear building in the place that had once been filled with all his excitement and anticipation.

The British had been driven back! In all his years in India, whenever the British troops were near at hand, the Moonbird would run to watch them, the tall, broad shouldered men that had made such a presence in his homeland for many long decades. His admiration for those soldiers had been the reason he wanted to join the army, and now, seeing them rushing to the rear was a shaking experience.

“Sergeant!” he said with an exasperated expression. “We spent half the morning laying charges on that bridge. Why didn’t they fire them off? They let the Germans take just it!”

“Things happen in battle,” said the Sergeant. “Not everything goes as we might wish.”

Now they heard the crack of 25 pounders, and the British guns began to find the range. It was a full a barrage from three battalions, falling first on the bridge sector, and then rolling west along the line of the river where the Germans had taken up positions. After a hot ten minutes, things quieted down, then the pop of mortar fire was heard, and there were shouts of alarm from their forward positions.

“Smoke!” the Corporal shouted, which set the Private to wave dismissively at the enemy beyond their lines. “It’s only smoke,” he said. “They’ve probably run out of ammunition.”

“Don’t be a fool, Packshee. They use that to cover their advance. Now we get our turn. Stay low.”

The Moonbird saw the Sergeant checking his rifle. The burly man waved his broad arm at a section on the right, and three men moved forward toward the bunkers. The sound of gunfire began, first rifles, then a terrible buzzing sound from hell that the Sergeant had heard too many times before, the dread German MG-42 machinegun. The Private stuck up his head, aghast when those rounds began biting into that forward strongpoint, right where the Corporal had told him to set up his Bren Gun.

Then he saw a big explosion there, and a sapper’s body was literally blown up and out of the entrenched position. He shirked in terror, biting his lip, and heard the deep throated sound of the enemy soldiers calling to one another. They were coming. The bunker had been hit with a panzerfaust, and the two man gun crew killed outright.

Sergeant Anandsubramanian whistled to his reserve squad, ordering them forward. “Hold that bunker!”

The Private saw him rush forward, and his heart was pounding. There he was, cowering in a covered trench, the sound of battle all around him now, and it was a terrible sound indeed. He could hear the cries of wounded men, the earth shaking sound of explosions from mortar fire and grenades. But not one of the Engineers had reached the bunker yet, and no one was firing his prized Bren Gun back at the enemy.

He stared through the dust and smoke, seeing the broad figure of his Sergeant firing his rifle at the unseen enemy. Then something just snapped in him, driven by the fearful rush of adrenaline. He could not just sit there. Up ahead, he could see dark shadows looming in the smoke. They were coming!

Private Kapoor was up on his feet before he even knew what he was doing, and he ran for all he was worth. One of the fastest men in the platoon, he was so nimble afoot that he just leapt right over the next trench line where the Sergeant was rallying a squad, and he kept right on running toward that bunker.

“Packshee!” Came the Sergeant’s voice, a shrill edge in it that cut. But the Private kept running, leaping at last right into that strongpoint and looking wildly about to find his Bren Gun. It was laying there on one side, right next to the slumped bodies of two men, their tunics red with the stain of a bloody death.

Whether it was panic, courage, or insanity, it did not matter. Any of the three would have been equally fair reactions to the situation where he now found himself. What did matter was that the terrible energy that shook his frame now set his hands in motion. He seized that gun, setting the bipod legs right up on the edge of that bunker, and then he began to fire it, just as he had seen the British soldiers do, in short, sharp bursts. He fired at the shadows looming in that smoke, his eyes wide with both fear and excitement now.

Packshee was attacking the Germans!

The Sergeant could not believe what he had seen the young man do. He stood up and waved his men forward. “Veera Madrassi, Adi Kollu, Adi Kollu!”

The reserve squad rushed forward bravely, guns firing. They reached the bunker, where Packshee was still spitting fire at the oncoming enemy. To either side of that position, the other engineers looking on began to cheer and shout: “Har Har Mahadev!”

Then the Sergeant saw the cold evil shape of a potato masher grenade clatter off a wood beam, and grasped it as quickly as he could, hurling it back at the enemy. Then two dark shapes coalesced from the smoke and dust to become enemy soldiers. The Sergeant took the first with his bayonet, the second he wrestled with, bringing him to the ground, and all the while Packshee continued firing, and with very good discipline, realizing he was now on his last ammo cartridge.

There came a shout, and the strange sound of other voices calling in that guttural sounding language of the Germans. The shadows receded. Private Kapoor fired his last fierce burst, now out of ammunition, turning wide eyed to see blood all over the tunic of his Sergeant.

Thankfully, it was only the blood from his fallen enemy, and Packshee saw the long knife in his Sergeant’s hand, the fire of rage in his eyes. They heard more harsh shouts. A machinegun buzzed at them, the rounds kicking into the sandbagged position.

“Back!” shouted the Sergeant, and he literally took the Private by his collar and hauled him out of that bunker. The smoke had rolled over them, obscuring everything, as Anandsubramanian dragged his charge along, three other men retired with him, all that was left of that squad. They reached the second trench line that the Private had leapt over earlier, and settled in, choking in the dust and gasping for breath.

They had abandoned that bunker none too soon, for another panzerfaust round came surging in, blasting the structure so badly that the wooden beams of the low roof collapsed. It had been fired for spite as much as anything else, because the German mountaineers were falling back. The crack of those British 25 pounders had dismayed them, and this attack was soon over.

There, still breathing hard in the trench, the Private looked up, wide eyed, at his Sergeant. “We attacked them! Didn’t we Sergeant? Did we drive them away?”

The sergeant gave the young man a long look. He wanted to speak hard words, about discipline and following orders and remembering his training, but he said none of that. The boy in front of him had just crossed over that thin, yet palpable line that led him into manhood, and he smiled.

“You attacked them Packshee. We only came to help. I intend to go right to the Company Subedar and get you a medal! And when things settle down, we’re going right back to that bunker so you can get your Bren Gun. Rest now. Then you can go and look for some more ammunition.”

The private bobbed his head, very happy.

Dusk could not come too early that day, the red sun falling through the haze and smoke of that battle. The Germans did not return. When the Northamptons gave way, the 32nd Sappers and Miners had held the line, and that night they would dig even deeper into the dry ground, their picks and shovels singing as they chinked against the stones.

The waxing gibbous moon sunk low on the horizon, setting very late, just before midnight. The men had eaten and rested from their long day’s ordeal, and Anandsubramanian was sitting with his eyes closed, listening to the night. Then he heard the Moonbird singing, his voice high and bright, yet tinged with a deep sense of sadness, and the resolution of newfound purpose.

All his young life, Private Kapoor had been afraid of the Germans, which is why he had resolved that he simply must go and fight them. His father had told him the story of what happened in his home town of Madras in the first war, when the German raider Emden slipped into the port one night to raise hell. The Germans hit two oil tankers, causing a tremendous explosion that lit the city up with the rising flames. Then they had wantonly shelled the buildings near the harbor, hitting the National Bank of India, the Port Trust, Boat House, and Madras High Court. It was done as much to sew the seed of terror than to do any real harm, the only attack made on Indian soil during that first awful war. Terror did strike the city after that, causing many thousands to flee, and ever after the name Emden was synonymous with the fear raising skill of a daring enemy.

But Packshee wasn’t afraid of the Germans any longer, and the Sergeant could hear that in his song. In that single unforgiving minute in the bunker, he had been changed, transformed, the boy becoming a man. There was no sound of fear in the Moonbird’s voice as he sang that night. There was only sadness, resolution, and a deep understanding that could only be grasped in the sight of the blood that had been spilled in battle that day. But there was also joy in that song, acceptance; the song of a man who had finally found, and now knew, his place in the scheme of things.

The Moonbird sang…

Chapter 20

The Germans had taken the farming town of Salamiyar, midway between Homs and Hamah, and some 30 kilometers to the east. Good roads connected to each of those two cities, and so the town formed one point of an equilateral triangle. 4th Panzer was finally getting fueled up again and ready to move. 3rd Panzer had already moved through its lines to take the lead.

With the arrival of Kubler and his 1st Mountain Division by rail, that force was moving to relieve 10th Motorized. Hans Hube was a veteran of this fast maneuver warfare that Guderian wanted. Heavy set, serious in aspect and purpose, it had been his 16th Panzer Division that held the British at bay in Spain after their landings in Portugal. After that he had moved to Marseilles for transfer to Kesselring’s command in North Africa, but when Guderian accepted command of Operation Phoenix, he made a direct request for the man.

The feint to the south was carried off just as we planned, he thought. It was only to buy us the time to get all of Kubler’s mountain troops in position, and of course, to pull all the British reserves here to the Homs sector. Now it’s time to run. I take the entire 14th Panzer Korps east now, right through Palmyra to the Euphrates. The Brandenburgers are already out there, and they will come under my overall command when we get close. With this force, I can take Iraq.

Hube’s confidence was not boastful. The force he would have would outclass anything the British had east of Homs. The first to feel the bite of those panzers would be General Miles with his 56th Infantry Division. His troops had been posted all along the route of the Tripoli pipeline, centered on Palmyra, and that was where the action was moving now.

I/6th Panzer Battalion was in the lead, moving that night to a gap in the long line of hills that stood like an outer rampart shielding the T4 pumping station and facilities at Tiyas. The panzers swept through Bir Abu Qaylah, and quickly overran a company of light trucked infantry that had been watching the gap. Behind them came I/3 Panzergrenadier Battalion, and they would push hard to reach the T4 station by dawn.

The three panzer battalions in 6th Regiment each had 18 VK-55 Lions, the earlier model with the 75mm main gun. The second company was composed of an equal number of the Pz-IV-F1s, also with a 75mm gun, though its velocity and hitting power was not as great as that on the VK-55. That did not really matter much, for the divisions had deployed with a preponderance of HE rounds when intelligence indicated they should expect very little in the way of armor from the other side.

So the lions moved east at dawn, General Westhoven closely monitoring the progress of his battalions on the radio. That initial spearhead would attack T4, supported by the motorized infantry regiment. A blocking force was posted on the road leading west to Homs to prevent any intervention from that direction, and then the second mechanized echelon, the 3rd Panzer Battalion, and one more Panzergrenadier battalion in halftracks, swung east of T4 and continued up the road to Palmyra.

A strong pinning attack was put in again by the Prinz Eugen Division, and this time the action was on the right flank of the position occupied by the 32nd Madras Engineers. Kubler had his division northeast of Homs, and he demonstrated strongly by pushing down the road from Salamiyar, and putting in a liberal dose of artillery. The intent was to fool the British into thinking the Germans were mounting a big offensive aimed at taking Homs, hoping they would see Hube’s initial move at T4 as an attempt to outflank that city. That was how it would seem to Wavell on the morning of the15th, but the frantic radio calls coming in from T4 would soon change his mind.

“Damn!” The General swore, and deservingly so. The Germans had pushed into that gap as he had feared, but they had not turned west to envelop Homs as he first believed they would. They went right for the pipeline stations at T4.

“They’ve snookered us yet again—came right through that gap. Is Tiyas holding?”

“For the moment,” said Anderson. “remember that Miles and his 56th also tangled with the Brandenburgers yesterday at As Suknah, right south of Tayyibah Pass. Could they be planning a pincer move on Palmyra?”

“It bloody well looks like it. Palmyra is the center of the board. From there they could turn about and come west again to Homs, or southwest for Damascus.”

“And east for Dier-ez-Zour,” Anderson cautioned.

“And these are bloody panzer divisions. Miles had his lot of 6-Pounders, but if the Germans concentrate, his division won’t hold.”

“Perhaps they didn’t think they could turn us here at Homs without dealing with the 56th Infantry first. After all, Miles would have been right on their backside if they had come for us.”

“Right,” said Wavell, sleepless and weary. “They want Palmyra, that’s for certain.”

A runner came in with the latest reports, saluting as he handed the message off to Anderson.

“It says here that the Germans relieved their 10th Motorized Division with another infantry force—1st Mountain Division. RAF says they spotted a lot of dust kicked up around the German positions, and heading east.”

Wavell pursed his lips. “Palmyra. The whole bloody Corps is going to head east. By God, their infantry is just here to give us a nice big bear hug. They want to run all the way to the Euphrates. Any word on that regiment that slipped through at Tayyibah Pass?”

“Miles says he’s posted a brigade east of Palmyra anchored on T3, but there’s been no further movement in that direction.”

“Because they don’t think they’ll even need the damn Regiment,” said Wavell. “They’re going to hit Miles with three divisions. That regiment of Brandenburgers east of Palmyra is just a path finder. In fact, it might even be continuing east towards Dier-ez-Zour as we speak, to join the rest of its division on the Euphrates. General, this is much bigger than we thought, and by God, I don’t really think they want Syria and Lebanon back again. They want Iraq! They’ll have the Brandenburgers out in front, and then this whole bloody panzer corps behind it. They could run all the way to Baghdad!”

“Well what in blazes are we going to do about it?”

“First off, “ Wavell looked at the map. “Let’s fight them for T4 on this end of things. Send word to 31st Armored. I want all the tanks they have to mount a counterattack up this main road. They might not get through, but Jerry will at least have to look over his shoulder. Then I think we need to give them a bone to chew on. We’ll pull out of Hamah this morning. The marshland and canals north of Homs are easy ground to hold, and we should be able to extend our line east. I’ll want the whole of the 31st Armored Division in that attack I mentioned. We’ve got to make it more than a nuisance. If we can force them to watch their back, they may have to deploy one of those motorized divisions here, and that will weaken their drive for the Euphrates.”

“Good enough,” said Anderson. “I’ll get the lads moving at once.”

“And we’ll want to notify Brigadier Kingstone directly. He’s got the 10th Indian back of him, yes?”

“Yes sir.”

“Well we’ll be asking a good deal of them, a good deal indeed.”

Glubb Pasha got hit hard that morning, and whether or not he held good ground, Duren’s 3rd Brandenburg Regiment sent him and his Arab Legion packing. He pulled into Dier-ez Zour, disheartened, and with a truck full of wounded men from his light companies. He had served to merely delay the enemy by stealing the morning from them, but knew he could not hold.

“We’ve stuck our head in it here,” he said to Brigadier Kingstone. “My scouts tell me that Jerry is coming at us from three sides now. The French couldn’t stop them on the east bank either.”

“And they’ve bloody well come up from the west as well,” said Kingstone. “I sent two battalions and a company of armored cars out to see about it.

“Have they taken Palmyra?”

“Not yet, but that’s what they’re after. I just got off the radio with General Anderson. We should expect bad company soon if the 56th can’t hold on to Palmyra, and the whole line of the Tripoli pipeline has gone to hell. Now we’ve just got the Haifa line, and its carrying all the oil O’Connor needs for 8th Army, and then some.”

“Well they ran right past the French and are probably half way to As Suwar by now.” Glubb folded his arms, quite unhappy.

“How could you possibly know that?”

“General, I’ve a little bird that flits about. Haven’t I told you about it? But seriously, I was just up that river valley before I was recalled here, and I took the liberty of leaving a radio with the locals. You’d better have RAF take a better look.”

Glubb was correct. The Lehr Regiment had motored on past the French, followed closely by Langen’s 4th Regiment. Then a man rushed in with more bad news, only serving to sour Kingstone’s already acerbic mood. The Germans had taken the airfield at Jubaylah, and now they were driving hard for the secondary field at Ayyash, That was just ten kilometers up the road from Dier-ez Zour.” Kingstone’s 4th Cav had dug in astride the road, but it was being hit with armored vehicles, the Panzerjager Battalion had twelve Panthers, six Marder IIIs, three Nashorn 88s, and three more mounted on halftracks. That was going to be more than the lightly armed cavalry could handle.

“My God,” said Kingstone. “We thought those paratroopers of theirs were tough the first time around, but this motorized unit is a real nightmare.”

“Brandenburg Division,” said Glubb.

“I thought they were just small commando units?”

“They have those too, but this is a full division—tough as nails. They were the shock troops that the Germans threw at Volgograd. This is some of the best infantry they have.”

“Well, the question now is whether or not we can hold this place. If they’ve already pushed as far east as Suwar on the Kahbur River, then what’s to stop them from swinging right down to Hadithah? If they take that, then they’ve effectively cut both pipelines.”

“Another runner came rushing in. “Sir! Jerry’s got the bridge at Al Busayrah! Armored cars and motorized infantry.”

“What?” Kingstone had a blank expression on his face. “That’s damn well 25 kilometers behind us! Where’s Blaxland and his bloody Indian Division?”

It was on that road, and heading for that very town and bridge over the Euphrates, at least a brigade was coming. The others were still strung out on the long road south, and one brigade had veered off and motored over to the T2 Pumping Station well west of the river. For all intents and purposes, King Force was virtually surrounded.

“They’ve thrown a bag over us. Glubb, can your people slow them down a bit? I think I’ll have to take King Force south and retake that bridge. We should meet 10th Indian down there, and then perhaps we can make a stand. If we stay here, we’ll be cut off and wanting ammo sooner than we think.”

“I’ll do whatever I can,” said Glubb, casting a wan glance at that truck. “In the meantime, I’ve a good many wounded out there. Can you look after them?”

He saluted, and was heading for the door, blowing out into the rising desert wind.

The T4 Station at Tiyas fell that afternoon, and the casualties were very heavy on the British side. Brigadier Lyne’s 169th Brigade lost two of its three infantry battalions, the rest of the brigade scattered south in a retreat that took it as far as Ain el Bards in the Jebel country. As Wavell had ordered, the 31st Indian Armored consolidated to begin its attack east along the pipeline, and this did force Guderian to halt 10th Motorized to stop them. While that was going on, the two panzer divisions pushed quickly onto Palmyra.

In modern times it came to be known as “The Bride of the Desert.” The old Roman ruins still remain, like the elegant Corinthian style colonnaded portico at the temple of Ba’al, dedicated to the storm god who might bring much needed rain to the parched desert around the settlement. A prominent trading site, the armies of the Romans, Sassanids, Muslims, Mamlukes, and eventually the Mongols all swept over the place as the centuries passed, each leaving some remains in the ruins that survived there.

In the early 21st Century, it was in the news yet again as the black flagged desert warriors of ISIS overran the place, with wanton brutality as they defaced more of the ancient artwork, especially the temple sites. The famous Temple of Ba’al would survive WWII, but not the ravages of ISIS in 2016. They would flatten all but one grand arch over the main entrance, destroying priceless ruins that had stood for centuries.

By the 1940s, the desire for exotic goods from the east had been distilled down to one primary thing—oil. The city sat right astride the long underground pipelines that carried the oil from Kirkuk, through Homs, to Tripoli and Banias on the Mediterranean coast. Fedorov and Troyak had once swept in on their helicopters to land upon the atop the high volcanic cone just west of the town, crowned by the old stone fortress of Fakhr-al-Din. Now it was manned by the 2nd London Irish. 10th Royal Berkshire Battalion held the old Roman tombs, and the 56th Royal engineers deployed just south of the Temple of Ba’al. They would not occupy it for fear that it might see the Germans resort to heavy weapons it.

The place was a small settlement, graced by shady groves of palm trees scattered amid the bleached skeletal bones of old fallen empires. Now the British Empire would strive with Huns of another sort, this time mounted in cold steel metal vehicles and tanks, their dark feldgrau uniforms blending into the evening shadows as they formed up west of the town. The history here was written in the sandstone, layered deep, and carved into the land over long millennia. Now another chapter would be written, the Second Battle of Palmyra.

4th South African Air Force Fighter Squadron had been operating there, but as the Germans approached, the pilots had leapt to their Kittyhawks and taken off. They howled overhead for a time, making a few strafing runs on the enemy columns and dueling with the German flak guns. Then they flew off east to the small landing strip at T2. Seeing the Brandenburgers disappear to the east, Brigadier Birch sent the bulk of his brigade west to reinforce the defense of Palmyra. It was there that General Miles and his 56th London Infantry Division would make their gallant stand.

Wavell was gambling that they could hold, or at the very least delay the German move east for a few more days. 46th Infantry Division had arrived, right on schedule at Suez, and he was already getting them onto the trains for the move into Palestine. That was a mixed division, and he would have a full Brigade of good armor when they arrived. Now what he wanted was one more mailed fist, and then he thought he might have a fighting chance at going on the offensive.

Time to pay a visit to General O’Connor, he thought. As much as he hated to do so, it was time to make good his threat to pick his pocket.

Chapter 21

New cards were dealt to both sides in the wild campaign now underway. The British received their 46th Mixed Division, with that brigade of much needed armor, and now Wavell flew all the way to Benghazi to meet with O’Connor.

“I know this is a lot to ask of you, particularly since we lost the brigade in that tragic accident. But we’ve two panzer divisions to contend with in Syria, and if we don’t do something about that, they’ll be in Iraq before we can finish our next cup of tea. Is there anything at all that you can send me?”

“Well I can’t touch 7th Armored. I’ve positioned it well to the south. 23rd Armored Brigade has just deployed on the coast with 51st Highland Division. That’s my hammer, and I really can’t proceed without it. That leaves 1st Armored Division, if we can call it that. It’s really only two brigades, the 2nd Armored and the 7th Motorized. I have it between the other two groups as a ready reserve, but I suppose I could detach 2nd Armored Brigade. That will mean I’ll have to bring up 44th Home County. I was going to rest them, but there’s nothing else for it. I don’t suppose I could interest you in a South African Division? They’re at the back end of the line, way south of Misrata.”

“It’s armor we need now,” said Wavell. “Jerry is boxing our ears with those panzer divisions, and I’ve only two tank battalions in play, at least until I get 46th Infantry up. With one more tank brigade, I can counterattack. Otherwise, we just sit and try to parry what the other fellow does.”

“Well General, you can have the 2nd Armored, but realize it’s presently sitting some 700 miles from the railhead near Tobruk. That’s a long slog, and I wouldn’t vouch for that unit in combat after a march like that. Things fall apart, if you understand my meaning. It will take them five days to get to your trains, another day to load up, and then another on the rail lines into Palestine. After that they unload, get sorted out, and the maintenance operations can begin. Figure to have them in hand where you might want them to fight in two weeks.”

“I see…” Wavell had hoped he might get something much sooner. He had been so preoccupied with the situation in Syria that he completely overlooked what O’Connor was doing, assuming 8th Army was in good hands. Now he found that he had left no armored units in his rear areas, and the distances involved were daunting.

“You might trim off a few days if you can get shipping to Benghazi,” said O’Connor. “That’s just 500 miles on the road then, and then they could go by sea to Haifa. You’ll have to see about Cunningham covering that move, but I’m sure it could be done.”

He saw the weariness in Wavell now, and knew the burden of command was laying on him heavier than ever. By this time in the war, Wavell had long since been replaced in Fedorov’s history. He was hanging on because he was “in the know,” and Churchill wanted that circle to be a most exclusive club.

“I suppose we might use the shipping delivering the 46th Division. There should be enough there to lift tanks. But that 500 mile road march to Benghazi has me worried. I know what you say about the wear and tear on the vehicles. I just didn’t realize you had everything so far forward. We might find nothing more than a maintenance nightmare by the time they get to Benghazi.”

“Have you thought to pass the cup to Monty?”

“Montgomery? It never occurred to me.”

“Well he’s been getting regular convoys every other week, and one is due in to Algiers today.”

“Even if he had a thousand knights in silver armor, we’d never get them past Tunis and Sicily. That’s the heart of German air power on that front, and those straits are infested with enemy submarines.”

Wavell was quite discouraged when he left O’Connor, but bit his lip and resolved to do what he could with the single armored brigade attached to 46th Infantry. When he arrived back at Alexandria, eager to get the latest report on the situation he was facing, a clerk handed him a shipping schedule, which he nearly put aside to get at the latest combat reports. But he gave it a passing glance, seeing a most unexpected delivery was due in another two days.

“See here,” he said to the clerk. “What’s this about another Winston Special arriving on Monday? I haven’t heard a word about it.”

“Sorry sir. It was in the daily file, but you’ve been away at the front, and then off to Benghazi.”

“Has it been scheduled for debarkation?”

“Yes sir, all right and proper. But it will only need a day, as the Convoy Master signaled that the unit was all combat loaded.”

“Combat loaded? What unit?”

“Why it’s right there, sir. 25th Tank.”

Wavell flipped a page, squinting with that one good eye. There it was, the answer to his dilemma lost in a sheaf of paper in a plain manila folder on his desk!

“25th Tank Brigade?”

“A territorial unit sir, or at least it was.”

Not everything leaving England in the last month was bound for Montgomery. A week after 46th Infantry Division departed for the Middle East, another unit that had been schedule for Montgomery was hung up on the docks because there would be no immediate need for it in North Africa. Monty had all the armor he could use on his front, and if it had been sent, he would have only put it into reserve for training while he advanced with his veteran units.

In late December of 1942, the 25th Tank had mustered at Liverpool, intended for deployment to Algeria. It was an old brigade with a new name, once a second line territorial unit in the UK, and now getting all new equipment for its first real foray into the war. The unit was composed of three tank ‘Regiments,’ which were really battalion sized formations with three squadrons of 18 tanks each. HQ troops with AA and support tanks fleshed it out a bit, and a battalion of twelve self-propelled ‘Bishop’ 25-Pounders was added, with a company of armored engineers. The main battle tanks in this unit were the Churchill IV, with an improved 75mm gun.

This TO& E would make it the most powerful armored force east of Suez, at least for the British. Wavell was flabbergasted. It was all right there, authorized by Churchill himself, and Wavell would later learn that it had been sent to try and fill the void when another brigade had been mysteriously lost in that terrible event at Tobruk. The Prime Minister knew that would likely effect things, and he wanted no further timidity on the part of his commanders. So instead of letting the 25th languish on the docks at Liverpool, he teed up a Winston Special and simply sent it to Wavell.

Wavell was beaming as he read the details. “The drunken Dutchess,” he said with a smile. “Good for her.”

One of the troopships assigned to carry the personnel in that convoy was the former Canadian steamship liner the Dutchess of York, often called the “Drunken Dutchess,” a nickname given to the liner for its remarkable stability in heavy seas. It would roll heavily, but always stay on its feet. All the tanks were spread over twelve other merchantmen, and the convoy would be in Suez in another two days. There was his second mailed fist, and now he could face the Germans with two hands in the fight.

“Splendid!” he said to the clerk. “I want expedited offloading on that convoy, understand? Pull anyone needed, but I want it on the trains to Haifa the same day it arrives.”

A little gift from Churchill, thought Wavell, but little did he know that the gift giver was very close at hand, and would soon be paying him a most unexpected visit, to collect on the bill.

At that very moment, Churchill was meeting with President Roosevelt in the newly liberated port city of Casablanca to iron out the wrinkles in plans laid for 1943. Among other things, the two leaders agreed on a policy of absolute victory that would grant no terms to the enemy and insist upon unconditional surrender. In spite of Marshall’s push for a decision on the invasion of France, the British successfully argued that it was still far too early, and that operations in North Africa must be concluded first. They then suggested Sicily as the next target, aimed at knocking Italy out of the war.

When the Germans crossed the border into northern Syria, the news was met with some chagrin and growing alarm, especially by Churchill. He had it in mind to make a secret visit to Turkey that very month to press her hand in marriage, but now that seemed to be an impossible undertaking. Churchill was greatly offended, for the plans for the meeting had been arranged with the Turkish government for some time, and now he realized that, all the while, Turkey had remained a wayward bride, her infidelity glaringly revealed as German combat units had been moving on Turkish rails for the last week.

Sir Alan Brooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, was with him, along with General Maitland Wilson, getting ready to take over in Iraq so that Alexander could be moved elsewhere. Churchill had planned to fly to Cairo from Casablanca to complete that move, which would come as yet another surprise for Wavell.

Deep down, the General could sense that something was up. The fact that he had not been asked to attend the Casablanca Conference was one clue. He thought that fortuitous at first, for that left him in Alexandria when the Germans crossed the Syrian border, but now he was to learn there was something more behind it. Churchill was planning to kill two birds with one stone in his visit to the Middle East. Now that the first had flown before he could take aim, he would settle for the bird he still had in hand, and meet with Wavell.

“General,” he said with as much warmth as he could muster, for he had found relations with Wavell somewhat strained at times. The two men retired to a secure room, but a moment later, Alan Brook came in through the back door, and greeted them both.

“Archie,” he said. “Good to see you.”

“And you, Sir Alan.”

“I’m afraid this won’t be a social call,” said Churchill. “And given the bad news we received with the opening of this new front, I thought, since I was close at hand, that I should come and see you about it.”

“Of course, sir,” said Wavell. “And oh yes, I must tell you that when I learned you had put the 25th Tank Brigade to sea for us I was most gratified. It will arrive in two days, and in the nick of time.”

“General,” said Brooke. “Just how bad is this new incursion? We’ve been locked away in smoke filled rooms at Casablanca.”

“It’s quite serious. They’ve hoodwinked us with this move through Turkey, and on that note, I suppose you received my messages concerning Turkish neutrality.”

Churchill had them in hand, but he had hoped to take no action on that until he had his visit with the Turkish government. That wasn’t going to happen now.

“That will be high on our agenda,” he said. “In fact, I hoped to be meeting with Ismet Inonii in just a few weeks, and this puts that in some jeopardy.”

“I should think so,” said Wavell. “Quite honestly, the Turkish frontier is a war zone now. It would be impossible to arrange security for such a visit, unless, of course, the Turkish officials might agree to come here.”

“They won’t,” said Churchill. “I proposed as much, and got a very cold shoulder. General, I think we’ve lost her, and that becomes a matter of the gravest concern. We sent a strongly worded reply to the Turks, but received nothing in response. I might understand their position, what with the Germans sitting a stone’s throw from Istanbul, and Ivan Volkov poised on their eastern borders. Everyone has to pick a side in this damn war, and it seems that the Turks have done so. Whether they formalize it or not, they’ve allowed German units to transit their territory, and on more than one occasion. Our patience has finally run out.”

“Yes, and German aircraft are flying from Iskenderun and Gaziantep, and we’ve not been able to lift a finger against them.”

“That will not be the case for long,” said Churchill. “So lay it out for us. How many divisions are involved in this dirty business?”

“Four light infantry divisions, mostly mountain troops, but also four more mobile divisions—two of them panzers.”

“I see… That’s a full army, and more than we expected. Is it true that they’ve already reached the Euphrates?”

“Unfortunately so,” said Wavell. “Quite frankly, I think they mean to push into Iraq.”

“As we feared,” said Brooke. “Well, can they?”

“At the moment, I’ve one mobile brigade under Brigadier Kingstone out there, and the 10th Indian Division under Baxland is only just arriving from Baghdad. There’s also fighting for Palmyra. That’s where the two panzer divisions went. Up until now, we’ve had just the infantry divisions, and the one Indian Armored Division, but it only has two battalions of tanks. So we’ve had to be stubborn with our infantry. We’ve got a fairly solid line inland from the coast at Tartus through Homs, but that’s a very wide flank to the east, and the enemy has moved with alarming speed.”

“Who’s commanding on their side?”

“General Guderian, and he’s no slouch.”

Brooke raised an eyebrow. “Will you stop him?” he asked.

“Now that 46th Infantry is here, and thanks to the Prime Minister’s foresight with that tank brigade, I believe we can hold Palestine and Lebanon secure. The problem now is going to be out east. Miles has the 56th at Palmyra, but Jerry has already roughed up one of his brigades pretty badly. I’ve organized a counterattack to try and get to him with the 31st Armored, but we’ll need much more armor. Once these new arrivals get up from Haifa, then I can attack in force—perhaps five days.”

“And if the Germans do have designs on Iraq?”

“We’ve only the four Indian divisions there, but I moved two of them into Syria. That action remains… unsettled.”

“Alright,” said Churchill. “We’ve come to the conclusion that this is far more serious than we first believed. The Germans have opened an entire new war front right under our noses, so we’ll have to really be on our game, or this could take a disastrous turn. Unfortunately, this will mean we’ll have to shake the tree out here, and I hope you’ll understand what I now propose—no, I’ll be plain with you sir, I’m going to make a change of command. I would like you to transfer to India forthwith, and take over planning for operations aimed at Burma and Ceylon. Now… You may take that on the chin as a slight, or evidence that we perceive you to have failed here, but nothing could be farther from the truth. Your service has been exemplary. You’ve saved Egypt, kicked the French out of Syria, and now you’ve set up O’Connor to do the same to the Italians in Libya. We owe you a great debt, but the situation in India is a bit loose these days. What we need is a good administrator, like yourself, to pull it together. Gandhi has been leading a movement against British rule, and there’s a good deal of sentiment that way. I want you to assume the role of something more than a simple commanding officer for that theater. I’ll be looking at you as the Viceroy of the entire colony.”

There… Churchill had spread as much frosting on the cake as he could, though Wavell was wise enough to know the real reasons for his transfer. In spite of a feeling of letdown, with this coming right in the middle of a crisis, he also felt that he needed a change. He was weary, more than he had ever been here in the desert, and perhaps the move would be good for him.

“Very well,” he said at last. “You’ve a way of holding my coat that is quite charming, Mister Prime Minister, but as I have in my mind nothing more than service to the Empire, I will gladly go wherever I am needed. May I ask who you have in mind for Middle East Command?”

“Alexander will return from Baghdad tomorrow, and Archie, it isn’t so much that we think a change is needed here. Alexander’s a good man for this sort of thing, and he can take up the reins here easily enough. But I was thinking of sending him to India, and he’s not quite right for that post, even if he has had experience there. The Japanese ran him out of Rangoon, and nearly captured him in the process. Now they’ve pushed us all the way back into India. Slim’s a good man over there, and we thought you were the best man to step in now and sort things out. Understand?”

“Of course,” said Wavell.

And that was that, another of those unforgiving minutes that would reset Wavell’s life from this day forward.