“Trento Division fought well.”
“That was the best of them, but now O’Connor is breaking through at Enfidaville. Losing the men of 7th Panzer was a big loss. What has Hitler sent us in return?”
“Practically nothing gets through these days,” said Kesselring. “They are bombing us night and day now in the straits off Sicily. All we can do is make small deliveries of ammunition and supplies by submarine, or destroyer runs. Putting a transport convoy there is virtually suicide for those ships now.”
“And you know what that means,” said von Arnim. “Everything we have here is going to be lost. We can’t get back to Sicily under these conditions. It’s well beyond the time when we should have done that. Manteuffel was fortunate he got 7th Panzer out, even though he left all his tanks here to die with us.”
“We still have some fight in us,” said Kesselring.
“Yes,” said von Arnim sullenly. “We are Festung Tunis now, eh? Well that will end like all the rest—Festung Gibraltar, Festung Canaria, Algiers, Oran. Tunis will be no different. I give us two weeks at best.”
“Where is your line now?”
“It’s anchored just east of Tebarka on the north coast, and then runs through the hills to Bedja, which is screened now by nothing more than the Marsch Battalions. Goring’s division is wrecked, but I have a Kampfgruppe from 10th Panzer behind that line at Bedja. If Montgomery takes that, then he can either go right up the rail line to Mateur, or swing southwest to Medjez al Bab.”
“I think that is where he will go.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because Highway 5 leads right to that town, and that is Patton’s road. Montgomery would like nothing more than to beat Patton to Medjez al Bab.”
“Well, that seems likely,” said von Arnim. “I put most of my available Tigers into the Highway 5 defense. They’ve been giving Patton fits, I’m sure.”
“Well, you must still do what you can to slow Montgomery down. General Nehring, any good news from you?”
“Only that there’s another breakthrough east of Highway 4 now, and I have nothing to send.”
“Isn’t the Italian Superga Mountain Division there?”
“For what it’s worth.”
“Then support them with the 164th.”
“Herr Feldmarschall, the 164th is gone. They were understrength when this all began, and still they fought like the Tigers, but the division is gone. I could not even scrape together a regimental Kampfgruppe from what’s left of them.”
“Then I think you must maneuver now,” Kesselring said definitively. “You’ll have to pull 15th and 21st Panzers together. They are our last effective mobile force.”
“Yes? And what do you want me to do with them?” Nehring was not optimistic.
“Use the Italians for fodder and see if they can delay on the coastal plain. Move your own HQ to Pont du Fahs. Highways 3 and 4 meet there. Then pull out your mobile divisions and screen that junction along this line of hills. But keep a tight fist.”
“O’Connor will just push right up Highway 1 on the coast,” said Nehring.
“Yes, but the Italians have been nursing their Centauro and Littorio Armored Divisions there.”
“You can’t rightfully call those divisions,” said Nehring. “They are little more than brigade strength units.”
“They will have to do,” said Kesselring. “At the very least, they may buy us a few days’ time. Have the Trento Division fall back to their position at Bou Fiche on the coast. I want your panzers off the line and ready to counterpunch in either direction. If O’Connor gets up the coast too fast, strike to cut him off. Do the same if the Americans get too far up Highway 4.”
“They are already in the hills east of that route with infantry. I’ve had to use a rail construction company to try and block a secondary road!”
“Yes, but they’ll have to take Pont du Fahs. One way or another, you’ll meet them there. Alright, I’m going to OKW to let them know what we’re facing.”
“What good will that do?” said von Arnim. “We can’t get out by sea.”
“No, but Goring still has a lot of transport planes. We might be able to try some night airlift operations with Auntie JU, and save some of our better troops to fight in Sicily.”
“Good luck convincing Hitler to permit that,” said Von Arnim.
“Well, it is only a matter of time before it becomes our only option. I plan on speaking directly with the Reichsmarschall. He’s about to see his pet division chewed up by Montgomery. Nothing can be done about the equipment, but perhaps saving a few good officers and the better troops would make it easier to rebuild that division in Italy. Let’s see if he has the backbone to do something, even if Hitler orders otherwise.”
“I wish there was something we could send,” said von Arnim. “Conrath has virtually nothing left in that division—the pioneers, artillery, and a few companies of infantry and panzers.”
“Better than nothing,” said Kesselring, always the optimist.
O’Connor was listening in the late evening, and the sound of the bagpipes echoing in the distant vale made him glad. It was, of course, his 51st Highland Division, advancing again up the coast from Sousse towards Enfidaville. The Italians had been making a steady retreat behind a rearguard put up by the 80th La Spezia Division.
My, he thought, how things change. Rommel vanished, and he took all the panzer divisions with him. They went off to fight against the Americans. Then those last two Germans infantry divisions pulled out, and the whole Italian line went pear shaped. I’m advancing faster now than I did when I had Briggs and Horrocks with me. Both those divisions have Rommel by the horns in Syria now, and damn if the old Fox hasn’t run all the way to Baghdad. So that leaves me the job of tidying up southern Tunisia, and pushing the Italians on up the road until I can link up with the French, Americans, and British. I’ll be a bit late to the party, but I expect they’ll be glad to see me.
If Kinlan were here, I would have gone right through that line at Mareth, Rommel or no Rommel. Those were the glory days, when I could send in the thunder of that heavy brigade and smash right on through any defense the Germans could devise. Amazing what war becomes as the years roll on. I only wish I could live to see it. That was a sad fate Kinlan suffered at Tobruk…. But God almighty, that was no ammo ship explosion. It was one of those secret weapons the Russians spoke of once. Is that how they fight their battles now in Kinlan’s day? There’s no honor in that; no gallantry, and no amount of stiff upper lip on the field of battle makes a hair’s breadth difference.
Perhaps its best I fight my war here, now, and with the weapons and soldiers of our own time. I wonder how we might have fared if Kinlan had not come blundering into Rommel’s flank at Bir El Khamsa? The Desert Fox had us on the run, didn’t he? He might have run all the way to Cairo, just as he boasted. And yet, the terrain favored us with each additional mile we lost. The Qatarra Depression acted like a great stone funnel, narrowing the front as you move towards Alexandria. We would have picked a good spot in there somewhere to make a stand… Perhaps at El Alamein. Could we hold?
Thinking these things was useless, he knew. That was all history, but he wondered if future generations would ever know the whole story; the real truth, of how the British stopped Rommel at Bir el Khamsa, and how they really held Tobruk when the Desert Fox came knocking. Would they ever truly know exactly why the British Army finally pushed Rommel off his defensive front at Gazala?
After that, he thought, it’s all mine. Kinlan was gone, on his way to that horrible doom at Tobruk, and I was the man who hammered on Rommel at El Agheila. I was the man who held the line at Mersa Brega, and the man who pushed him back through Sirte to Tripoli. Oh, we got a black eye and broken nose for our trouble. But look here, it’s my 51st Highlanders pushing on up the road this evening, and the sound of those pipes tells that tale well enough.