Allen’s infantry had spent all morning climbing the heights of Hill 1545. By evening they were dug in there, with a fine view of the valley to the south, the road emerging from light woods and climbing the ridge shielding Tebessa. On and behind that ridge, Patton had lined up six more battalions of infantry, and at least three full battalions of tanks, backed by all that artillery. Now they were listening to it fire, and waiting for the inevitable response from the German guns. They knew they were on a hill the enemy would simply have to take if they wanted to use that road.
When Rommel came calling he would be taking the cream of his veteran Panzer Divisions and trying to use them as a battering ram against that wall. It was not the battle he expected, not the swirling duel of maneuver where he certainly hoped to best his enemy, but the ground had dictated the time and place of the fight, and his enemy had chosen the ground.
Something began prickling within his military mind by way of objection to what he was now obstinately doing here. His plan was to throw 21st Panzer against the lower ridge to the north of the main road, and use his old warhorse, the 7th Panzer, to push up the main road to Tebessa, right beneath the brow of Hill 1545. He could abandon the battle of attrition and still swing west around this high country, ignoring his objective and nominating another in its place. He could drive instead for far off Khelencheld, which was 80 kilometers east of Batna, the major American supply portal feeding Patton. At Khlencheld, he would be 45 kilometers south of Ain Beida, which was von Arnim’s main objective.
You do not have to fight here, he said to himself—not for Tebessa. The indirect approach is always best; the unexpected. Strike at their lines of communications, sever those road and rail connections! Yet if I do this, I could only take the 7th Panzer Division with me. Von Bismarck’s entire division would have to adopt a defensive posture here, and Randow’s troops are all tied up down south watching two divisions for me. Could I do this with only one division? That is not a question I would have ever asked myself in Libya—at least not in the beginning. I raced across all of Cyrenaica in a matter of days, and nearly all the way to the wire on the Egyptian border.
The sound of that artillery duel throbbed in his head like the onset of a migraine. His mood darkened with each pulsing report, and his military mind stubbornly answered the question he had been speculating over the last few minutes.
It’s no good trying to swing around to the left. If I had all of Randow’s 15th Panzer Division, I might contemplate such a move, but it is just not possible with Funck’s Division alone. It would be a mad dash into nowhere. I would have nothing to support it, and if this General Patton stands his ground, which I think he will, then I would have no recourse other than withdrawal. Unless…. Could von Arnim get to Ain Beida as planned? If so, the 7th could swing around Tebessa, and then turn north to link up. What was happening with von Arnim?
That was going to decide everything.
Yet now that stiff necked von Arnim tells me that Montgomery is sticking his nose in things. He says the Americans and British are planning a pincer attack aimed at cutting off his entire Korps. Ridiculous! I’m told he has paused his offensive pending further developments. Does he plan to renew it? I knew that weak-kneed aristocrat had no real stomach for a fight. He should have been at Ain Beida yesterday!
He shrugged, raising an eyebrow. And I should have been in Tebessa by now, he thought. That night, a hard rain began to fall, and Rommel huddled inside his command vehicle, feeling very despondent. He was tired of the cold now, which was hard on his body. His health had been in decline for some time, a factor which OKW attributed to his setbacks in Libya… until they finally saw the tank he had been facing in those battles.
Chapter 8
They stared at it with a mix of awe, respect, and sheer fright. The Challenger II recovered from the battlefield near Mersa Brega had been examined by technicians for many weeks now, but it was finally time for Hitler and the senior officers of OKW to visit the Henschel plant in Kessel where Hitler was to view a new prototype of the Tiger, but first he was taken to a secure area to view the captured tank. Its long 120mm gun was bowed from the spiking demolition, the interior completely destroyed, but even in death, it was a dour spectacle.
“This is the tank that stopped Rommel’s Panzers in Libya,” said the technician. We estimate its weight at approximately 62 tons, and heavier when fully combat loaded. Its main body is 3.5 meters in width, and 8.3 meters in length. This makes it a little bigger in all categories than our current Tiger and Lion series panzers. Yet size is not everything. We deduce its virtue can be attributed to two things, the exceptional design of the armor, and that monster of a gun, fully 120 mm. It is also reputed to be very fast for its size, which has everything to do with the engine and suspension.”
Hitler walked slowly up to the beast, hands clasped behind his back, then he reached out and touched the armored turret. Keitel actually shirked when he did so, as if the tank might suddenly reanimate and become the snarling nemesis that the men in the field had described in so many reports.
“What is exceptional about the armor? How thick?”
“My Führer, it is not merely the thickness, but the actual material from which this armor is made that is so baffling. This side of the tank is intact, but to convince ourselves of the veracity of the battle reports, we conducted fire tests against the armor on the other side. It stopped every weapon, every round that we fired at it. There was absolutely no penetration.”
“So Rommel was not belly aching about his fate in Libya after all,” said Keitel. Hitler looked at him over his shoulder, not appreciating the remark, and Keitel shrunk into silence.
“What is it made of?” asked Hitler.
“We are not entirely certain, but from our initial testing, it appears to be a mix of layered ceramic tiles.”
“What? You are telling me this is armored by material used in my teacups?”
“Not exactly. These are highly refined ceramics. Their compressive strength, shear strength, and tensile strength have been greatly enhanced. Each one may be a composite including other materials. We have already detected diamond in this armor, the hardest substance on earth. Then each tile is encased in a metal frame which we are presently analyzing. It is then bonded to another backing plate that includes some very elastic layers which allow this material to absorb shock from a high velocity weapon. The tiles can be damaged, but even so, this framework and bonding keeps them in place, and they still retain a great deal of stopping power against shaped charges. As for kinetic energy penetrators, the rounds simply shattered on impact.”
Hitler nodded in a sullen silence. “And the gun?”
“It is a 120mm rifled barrel, and its rounds completely penetrated any tank that faced it. We also estimate its range to be well beyond 3000 meters, and it was reportedly very accurate at that range.”
Now the Führer turned to regard the man for the first time, for his eyes had never left the tank from the moment he saw it. “I assume you have something to show me in the next room that will answer this?”
“We do, my Führer.” The technician extended his arm, leading the way. Hitler was about to view the first fully functioning production model for the newest Tiger tank, soon to be dubbed the Konigstiger, or Royal Tiger. The party moved slowly past the broken Challenger II, and through a large metal door.
“This is the series one model of this new design, now in competition with the Lion-90. As you can see, it is every bit as impressive in size as this new British tank, in fact, it is heavier at over 68 tons, and wider. The British design is just a little longer, and with a better gun.”