Rommel was pacing outside his field tent, a mix of frustration and anxiety. His grand vision of sweeping around the flank of the Amis with three Panzer divisions abreast was not going to happen. The sudden appearance of 34th Infantry Division in that meeting engagement on the road to Ghafsa had forced him to commit the whole of his 15th Panzer Division to drive it back. After inflicting that severe check, which nearly did become a rout, General Ryder managed to get his division deployed in a semi-circle and was trying to hold his own. Rommel could have completely smashed that position if he had committed von Funck’s 7th Panzer Division, but instead he sent it right up the road towards Feriana and Thelepte. That afternoon, he came up from Ghafsa to speak with General Randow.
“We’ve hurt them pretty bad, and stopped them cold,” said Randow.”
“Good,” said Rommel, “but now we have another matter to resolve—the French. They appear to have found some backbone and joined the Allies. The Constantine Division is advancing on Ghafsa from the south. I need to get up north and flank Tebessa, and I’ll be taking the Tiger Battalion with me, but I will leave the Korps artillery here with you. Make good use of it against that American infantry. As for the French, I’d like you to assemble a strong Kampfgruppe from your division as well. Retain enough here to keep that American infantry division edgy, but you need not over exert yourself. Send that KG south to cover Ghafsa.”
“Very well. I can send the recon battalion, a good tank battalion and some Panzergrenadiers.”
“That will do. Keep me informed if anything changes here.” Then Rommel was off in his command vehicle, racing up the road to Feriana, his mood already souring as he went. There had been a log jam at Dernalia and Bou Chebka where Blade Force had fought a very stubborn defense. They were eventually forced out of that position by 7th Panzer, and fell back to the high ground that shielded Tebessa from the south, where Patton had tapped General Allen’s shoulder and told him to send a full RCT to lend a hand.
This terrain is maddening, thought Rommel. No sooner do we fight our way through one tortuous mountain pass, when we are faced with another. This high country south of Tebessa sits there like a great stone wall, and if they are smart, they will get infantry dug in on those heights. Von Bismarck has made progress through Kasserine, and he is now 10 kilometers beyond the pass. But this terrain… The Americans just keep falling back from one ridge line to another. It’s no place for armor, and I had to leave both my infantry divisions at Mareth to backstop the Italians.
There’s another problem. O’Connor is stirring to life again. He’s already moving up two infantry divisions against the Italian lines at Medinine. Those defenses should hold for a while. I placed the three Italian motorized infantry divisions on the line at Medinine. If O’Connor breaks through, then I have my two infantry divisions on the Mareth Line. They’ll hold. My men are dug in deep. but for how long? Two weeks? Three? That doesn’t matter. This will be decided here in a matter of days.
Patton stood beneath the high stone arch abutting from an old stone wall in Tebessa. It was an ancient Roman artifice, one of many in the ‘city of a thousand gates,’ as Tebessa was called.
“Gaius Egrilianus built that,” he said, hands on his hips, his famous Ivory handled pistols close at hand. He had always worn one on each hip—ever since that foray into Mexico with General Pershing to get after that bandit Pancho Villa in May of 1914. Patton got into a close firefight during that action, armed with only one pistol, which he had to reload three times in that action. He ended up hitting Pancho’s number two commander, collecting his spurs as a souvenir, and after that encounter he always wore that second pistol for backup.
“He was Prefect of the 14th Roman Legion,” said Patton, “and he was born in this very same town. Went off to find his fate and joined the Roman Army to make something of himself. When he returned home, he built this triumphal arch and then marched his whole goddamned legion through it in celebration. And here I am, standing on that same hallowed ground.” He smiled.
“Old Magister Solomon incorporated this arch into the city wall there a couple hundred years later. His field works are all over this region, a real master of the art of fortification. He fought with the great General Belisarius here in Africa,” Patton nodded at Bradley still seated in the nearby jeep. “And I fought here with them….”
“George, that’s a wonderful history lesson, but the Germans are about to take that ridge and ruin all of Solomon’s work if we don’t do something about it. We’ve got this war to fight.”
“Well I’m your man for that, Brad. But it never hurts to remember you’re standing on the shoulders of other brave men who fought here before you. Alright. Let’s get moving. Take us on up to the artillery.”
Patton had ordered General Allen to send every battery of artillery he could spare, and now he had a full three battalions from 1st Infantry Division, and three more battalions from the armored forces. He planned to meet the German attack with a hailstorm of lead.
“Brad, after we look over the guns I want you to get up to Ain Beida. I ordered Fredendall’s Corps staff there this morning, and I want you to pull things together.”
“What about Fredendall?”
“I sent him to Oran.”
“You relieved him right in the middle of a fight like this?”
“Well, he wasn’t even in the goddamned fight! The man was holed up in a rabbit hole over 75 kilometers behind the front! Look, this is just temporary. I’ll send someone up to take over there for you tomorrow. In the meantime, do what you can to keep II Corps from folding until I can coordinate this thing with Montgomery.”
“It was a miracle you got him to chip in on our side of the fence.”
“A little diplomacy at the right time never hurts,” said Patton. “Now let’s see if he can fight.”
“They say he did a damn good job stopping the Japanese at Singapore.”
“Yes, the ’Rock of the East.” The only problem was that he gave the place to the enemy two weeks later and skedaddled over to Java. Now he’s claiming the mantle of ‘Rock of the West’ as well for taking back Gibraltar.”
“Well the British need their heroes too, don’t they?”
An hour later the guns began firing, answering preliminary fires from the Germans. Massed artillery is one of the most fearsome displays on any battlefield. Ever since the first war, it had been the bane of infantry holding any defensive position, and was even worse for those having to attack under enemy defensive bombardment. The dark earth sprayed up with every impact, wet with the rain and laced with steel shrapnel. The earth itself shuddered with the impact of the rounds, and Patton stood with the gun crews, his riding crop in one hand, urging them on.
“Come on!” he shouted over the din of the guns. “Pour it on. Give it to the bastards!”
The Germans would see the first waves of their Panzergrenadiers grounded by that artillery, but the tanks lumbered on, a few stricken and overturned on the main road, and one lighter Leopard recon tank literally blown into the air by a heavy round.