The torrent pressed relentlessly on when Sibiba fell and the scant German defense there retreated south. CCA of 1st Armored pursued them aggressively, while CCB kept hammering its way through the Douleb Gap. Tanks would push through there, hastening along the narrow road that led down onto the valley floor. They would arrive just in time to support the hard pressed men of the 82nd Airborne, now under attack by a KG from 7th Panzer from the west, and Randow’s 15th Panzer from the south.
The plan was working.
By the 17th of March, the Americans had all the passes through the Western Dorsal except Kasserine, moving south and east, engaging any Germans they encountered, and flowing around these boulders in the flood, hell bent for Patton’s stated objecting—Highway 3. When the General received news that 2/82nd Recon had reached the gap at Ket el Amar, he could smell the victory he was after here, and ordered the special reserve Combat Command under Abrams to follow 2nd Armored.
Von Bismarck was at the town of Kasserine when he learned the Americans were now well behind his position at the pass as they pushed down from the Douleb Gap and Sibiba. The KG that von Funck had sent was already dueling with tanks that were now moving to support the American paratroopers. Reports were scattered and sometimes fragmented, but a shot up Luftwaffe fighter soon landed at the airfield at Thelepte, reporting to von Funck there, and he was quickly on the phone to von Bismarck.
“My front is stable,” he said “but the Luftwaffe says there is a massive enemy column up at Ket el Amar! It stretches all the way back to Bou Aziz! Can you stop it?”
“Stop it?” said von Bismarck. “Most of my division is at Kasserine Pass. I’ve only got the recon battalion left up that far north, and it’s trying to fight its way out of that gap even now.”
“Look… This is serious,” said von Funck. “Randow is moving his division up south of Sbeitla. He’s trying to set up a defense east of that town, and I think that is where we need to be now. Unfortunately, that damn American Airborne Division is blocking your retreat through Sbeitla. If you try to take the direct route, you’ll be fighting on three sides the whole way. I think you should fall back through Kasserine, and then come south to Thelepte. We can then follow the route Randow used and take the secondary road east through Bir el Hafey on Highway 3. And we have to move fast! If Randow can’t deal with the situation, the American’s will push all the way to Faid Pass.”
“Does Nehring know about this?”
“He must know something, but I only just learned of that big enemy column a moment ago, and right from the Luftwaffe pilot who flew that recon mission. I’ll see if I can get to Nehring and inform him, but we had better move now. I’ll need to recall my Kampfgruppe, so move quickly.”
“This is a big move… It will mean we give everything up west of Sbeitla. What about the Italians?”
“I’m ordering them to Ghafsa.”
“You are ordering them? What about Nehring?”
“I’ll confirm all this with him soon enough. Just get moving!”
Von Funck hung up the line, realizing that he was taking a risk by precipitating this general retreat, but he instinctively knew that he could no longer hold where he was, airfields or no airfields. This was time to maneuver, not sit on objectives. He pulled on his gloves, grabbed his map satchel, and walked briskly out the door to give the orders that would set the rest of his division in motion. There were three Luftwaffe squadrons providing most of the close support at the two airfields flanking Thelepte, and he told a staff officer to get word to them immediately.
It was a big move, the artillery going first before the front line troops. He was gratified later when the first dusty columns of von Bismarck’s troops began to arrive from Kasserine pass. He would order the KG he sent north to act as a rear guard delaying force astride the main road. Otherwise it was up to the fine art of German mobile finesse to carry off this move, a lightning quick redeployment to the east, and on a moment’s notice.
Von Funck found a Kubelwagon and collared a driver. We could have held Kasserine and Thelepte indefinitely, he thought. But this attack over a hundred kilometers to the north has just taken them both. These Americans are smarter than we realized, bolder, more aggressive than anyone at OKW ever thought they could be. General Patton must be behind all this. There will have to be a day of reckoning with that man. He beat Rommel at his own game, putting on quite a show, and now this attack has our entire Korps running for the exits!
Nehring was at the other airfield, but as von Funck started east, he saw him come riding up in another staff car. “What is happening?” he said, clearly upset.
Von Funck related everything he had learned, and told him how he advised von Bismarck.
“You ordered all this on your own initiative?”
“Someone had to act. Time is of the essence in a matter like this.”
“My God! Are those von Bismarck’s troops? Very well, Herr General. You can write the report to Kesselring tonight. Understand? And when Hitler finds out that we just handed the Americans Kasserine and Thelepte, it will be your name on the order!”
He drove off, also heading east on that same road, and von Funck gave the man a half sneer as he went. Where were you when I was running with Rommel to the French coast, he thought? Yet Nehring’s threat frightened him more than the Americans ever could. He was not in Hitler’s good graces—in fact the Führer had a particular dislike for von Funck. He had served as adjutant under another man who had fallen out of favor, Werner von Fritsch, and he later went to Spain as a liaison to Franco. Hitler seems to have painted von Funck with the same distaste he had for the Spanish leader, and barely tolerated him, only because he was said to be a highly skilled officer.
So it was that the shift first initiated by General Randow to get east of Sbeitla, now became a general retreat of the entire southern front. Von Funck’s timely order may have been in the interest of trying to save the front line in central and southern Tunisia, but he would end up trading his career in the army for his impetuous initiative when Hitler found out what had happened. While German forces advanced everywhere else, in Iraq and the Caucasus, the report that von Funck had retreated from Kasserine, leaving the place unfought, sent the Führer into a rage. The General was recalled to Germany the following week, and OKW sent another man to Tunisia to lead the 7th Panzer Division. His name was Generalmajor Hasso von Manteuffel.
Chapter 12
The crisis precipitated by Operation Hammer was now going to force a most uncomfortable decision upon the German defenders in Tunisia. Kesselring called a meeting with von Arnim and Nehring to discuss the situation, knowing the inevitable before he even opened his mouth. The other two men knew it as well.
“We simply cannot defend this way,” said Nehring, the man on the spot now that it was his forces giving up ground in the south. “I’ve been able to establish a new line, but the panzer divisions are holding fronts over 30 kilometers each. I would want them holding half that—in fact, I would prefer they weren’t on the line at all, held in reserve to counterpunch.”
“We both know that isn’t possible here,” said Kesselring. “We have only four infantry divisions worth the name north of the Mareth Position. Two hold the north coast, and two hold the position between Souk Ahras and Bou Aziz. Luckily, that has been the quiet sector.”