The assault by 11th Brigade opened disastrously. Defending Medjez el Bab were three companies of Koch's 3rd Battalion, an Italian anti-tank gun detachment, a pair of 8.8cm guns, and some armoured fighting vehicles belonging to 190th Panzer Battalion. Signs of the impending British offensive had not been lacking and the Axis defenders stood ready for battle. The British pincer which struck from the north was made up of the 2nd Battalion The Lancashire Fusiliers and this unit made a night assault upon the town. In the bright moonlight Koch's men saw the extended line of British Fusiliers moving across the open plain and opened fire with terrible effect. The German paratroops had a higher than usual establishment of mortars and light machine guns which, when mounted on tripods, were converted into medium machine guns with a greater range. These weapons were also being handled by men who had years of training and combat experience and in the shon days of preparation had calculated the distances of objectives to a foot. The first mortar bombs of the barrage struck the Fusilier's battalion headquarters as it moved, with the rifle companies, across the plain to the west of Medjez and in the minutes which followed and under a storm of bullets and shrapnel, the Fusiliers were driven to ground.
The British advance was halted. There could be neither a going forward nor a going back and Koch's paratroopers made the British battalion suffer all through the night. A German barrage at dawn brought more casualities, but then the Fusiliers moved forward to the Medjerda river, determined to force a victory. The machine guns sited to fire along and across the shallow river caught the British infantry as they struggled to climb the crumbling banks and blasted them back across the Medjerda. The German paratroop commander seeing that the initiative now lay with him put in a sudden, determined counter-attack, which caught the Lancashire Fusiliers as they were preparing to withdraw to the start line from which they had begun the advance, and caused a certain amount of confusion. Later in the afternoon the German paras showed their potency when they attacked a British force at Djebel Bou Mouss, known to the British as Grenadier Hill, and located to the south-west of Medjez.
The threat of being outflanked by United States armoured forces nearing Goubellat forced Koch to evacuate Medjez el Bab and, covered by a rearguard furnished from men of No 10 Company, the Germans left the town after blowing the bridge. The British moved forward and occupied the deserted town. The paras then took up positions on both sides of the main highway to the west of Massicault. Near Bou Arada the 1st Battalion of Koch's regiment had been fighting against an Allied tank thrust and in short but bitter engagements had destroyed three armoured vehicles. The Allied attack was deflected and the armoured column turned back.
An American tank battalion, part of Blade Force, and numbering more than a hundred tanks in addition to other vehicles, moved out to reconnoitre the ground across which llth Brigade would progress after its capture of Medjez el Bab. The armoured battalion's line of advance lay through the Chouigui pass and to the west of that feature, just after noon, the United States armoured unit struck No 3 Company of Witzig's battalion. This group, which had formed the reserve for Brioch's division, had been reinforced with a troop of Italian SP anti-tank guns and sent up the line to hold the Allied assault.
In the face of superior numbers Witzig's men withdrew into the shelter of a walled farm which they defended tenaciously and held at bay the repeated assaults of the American tank men. With bursts of machine gun fire and sorties armed with explosive charges the German para-engineers obstructed the American advance and, having then fulfilled their purpose, slipped away in the hours of darkness.
During the morning of 26th a virile thrust by the American tank battalion brought a new crisis for Nehring for during their advance 'C' Company of the United States tank battalion caught the aerodrome at Djedeida unguarded and in a short fierce fire-fight destroyed 17 of the aircraft drawn up there. The news that the Allied armoured spearheads were only 10 miles from the capital alarmed Nehring. He had viewed with concern over the period of the past few weeks the struggle of his men to hold back the furious assaults of the Allies and this new alarm confirmed in his mind the intention he already had; he would withdraw the perimeter line back towards Tunis and Bizerta. By shortening the line thus, he could perhaps have a chance to regroup his forces, to form a more solid line and maybe even build a proper reserve. All along the line of the German bridgeheads the orders to disengage went out and small, silent groups of men left the positions which they had fought for and defended with such tenacity and moved eastwards back towards the principal cities.
The German defensive line, if it can be called that, extended at that time from a point north of Djebel Abiod to the area of Mateur, along the Mateur-Djedeida road to St Cyprien and from thence to a point south of Hamman Lif. To the south of the perimeter there were detachments either guarding or extensively patrolling along the open southern flank.
It was imperative that the United States tank thrust around Djedeida be halted and the Luftwaffe was called upon to support the ground forces by air attacks upon the Allied spearhead. Nine separate attacks went in, and destroyed some vehicles but the others continued their advance. It seemed as if Allied boldness might yet win the race for Tunis, but as the American armoured fighting vehicles thundered along the western road they came into the defence sector which had been specially created to guard the approaches to the city. The backbone of this was the two 8.8cm guns which Nehring had himself sited.
The Luftwaffe gun crews held their fire as the American column came closer and still closer. At almost point blank range the gunners opened fire and the crack of the first shot was barely heard in a greater detonation as the lead tank blew up, then a second burst into flames, a third slewed round with its track destroyed, another and then another; the gunners firing as fast as they could load until six machines had been put out of action. In the face of such a weapon as the 8.8 with its high rate of fire and its great powers of penetration, the American tank unit could make no further advance. The American column turned and withdrew upon Djedeida.
During the early morning of 26th, Witzig's Group, which had received reinforcements of No 3 Company of the Tunis Field Battalion and a squadron of tanks from 190th Panzer Battalion, resumed its march upon Tebourba. To carry out this advance it had to cross ground in which American tank columns were ranging. Then followed the first battle between German and American armoured forces.
The German Panzer IVs were fitted with the long 7.5cm high velocity gun and the Panzer IIIs with the 5cm weapon. The United States tanks had smaller cannon but their force was not only numerically stronger but was in better tactical position. The Panzer IVs advanced in a shallow wedge formation with the lighter armed Panzer Ills in the intervals. Firing rapidly the panzer squadron advanced towards a company of American self-propelled guns but it had fallen into a trap and was taken in flank and from the rear by US tank groups hidden in hull-down positions. The United States tank crews fired at close range and to such good effect that all the Panzer IVs and several of the Panzer IIIs were knocked out within minutes. The remnants of the armoured elements of Witzig's command pulled back to the farmhouse which his para-engineers had defended so tenaciously.