Now Wavell finally knew what it was like to fight against a real elite force. His army worked hard and crazy for six days in Operation Tomahawk, launching nearly a hundred attacks on various fronts.
After leaving behind more than 10,000 corpses and more than 200 tanks, they retreated dejectedly to the position they set out from six days ago without even taking advantage of it.
Only then did he realize what kind of amazing combat effectiveness the German army had in the offensive and defensive battles in France and Britain.
It took him nearly a week without breaking the first line of defense of the German army, and it only took the German army only 4 days to cross the Maginot Line, known as the world's first line of defense in France.
When Wavell defeated the Italians with a 1 to 5 strength disadvantage, he had the illusion that he was a contemporary god of war. It was only now, when he met Rommel, a famous German general, that he discovered that his abilities were...
It’s not enough to look good in front of others!
Echoing his emotion, he now also understood why Montgomery went against everyone as soon as he arrived in North Africa, insisting that the combat effectiveness of the German army should not be underestimated, and assuming a cautious posture.
As a general who experienced and participated in battles with the German army twice in Dunkirk and on the British mainland, Montgomery was the British officer who knew the German army best in Africa. He was so worried before because he knew very well the relationship between the British army and the German army.
The gap between the German armies.
Soon, Wavell's rearguard was also pursued by Rommel's cunning armored troops, who took advantage of the darkness to eat up two regiments of British rearguards. As a result, they finally returned to the Egyptian border at dawn the next day.
When Wavell counted the number of people, he found that the remaining soldiers he brought back did not exceed 10,000 people.
Naturally, the Allies' German-Italian Africa Army and the Vichy French Army would not sit still and wait for death. After Rommel completely resolved the crisis caused by Wavell's "Operation Tomahawk", he immediately arranged a follow-up combat plan.
.
"Lieutenant General Hans, have your troops regrouped now after the British army completely retreated?"
In the frontline headquarters of the German-Italian Africa Army, Rommel looked at the map of North Africa and thoughtfully asked Lieutenant General Hans standing next to him.
Hans's 30th Infantry Division undertook most of the defense tasks in this battle. It can be said that the main reason why Wavell could not gain any benefits in Operation Tomahawk was that its
The opponent is the battle-hardened Lieutenant General Hans and his meritorious divisions with rich combat experience.
"The 30th Motorized Infantry Division was already in place three hours ago, but the two Italian divisions are not all in place yet. About half of the Italian infantry are still on the way." Hans told Rommel directly.
said.
"It's the same here." Rommel complained with a smile after hearing this: "My side has just received the batch of supplementary tanks sent by the Italian light armored division from Rome, and now it reports to me that it is still heading to Kabul.
On the way to Pucuo."
The reason why the German-Italian African Army is called the German-Italian African Army, rather than the German African Army, is because the army consists of two German and Italian armies.
The two German divisions brought by Rommel and Hans from Germany were quite powerful. They attacked wherever they wanted. Their defense was watertight and their offense was chaotic and decisive.
But one Italian light armored division and two Italian infantry divisions, which both belonged to the Africa Army sequence and could be directly commanded by Rommel and Hans, were very useless.
Although after Rossi came to power, the new Italian Prime Minister immediately emphasized that all Italian troops in Africa fully cooperated with the command of the Allied Allied Forces Command, especially the three Italian divisions of the German-Italian African Group, and were required to fully accept the group army.
Command's combat orders.
The Africa Army Headquarters, to put it bluntly, was the headquarters where Rommel himself was the commander. Rossi's request for the Italian troops was to have them completely obey Rommel's command and dispatch.
It's a pity that although these troops are asked to do so and actually do so, their efficiency cannot be complimented.
Even for most defense tasks, the German 30th Infantry Division, which had previously been deployed in various positions, had been assembled. As a result, the armored divisions in the Italian army were not yet in place.
From this point of view, it is not without reason and reason that Wavell was able to defeat the Italians with very few troops before.
"Let our liaison officer urge those Italian division commanders." After Rommel thought for a while, he didn't know what to say. In the end, he didn't even bother to blame the Italian troops. He just urged them according to the script.
.
Anyway, Rommel does not need the help of these Italian friendly forces now. Even if they cannot arrive, Rommel is confident that he can rely on the German troops in his hands to complete the subsequent harvest operations and his plan to conquer Egypt alone.
He had suffered a small defeat before, but that time he used less than 3 battalions in total to deal with the 4 divisions of defense troops held by Wavell.
Such a failure is not shameful.
Rommel was indeed good at defeating more with less, but he could not accomplish tasks that were impossible for manpower.
Although he did have a good record in the last World War when he was unable to capture a single Italian division with his battalion.
However, no matter how bad the British army was, they could still fight better than the Italians. Moreover, when Rommel's attack failed that time, he faced not one division of enemy troops, but four entire divisions.
If Rommel can win in this way, then there will be no need to fight this war. Just give Rommel an independent regiment and let him cheat all the way.
Of course, now Rommel has begun to slowly cheat.
"Tell Berante that Tobruk Fortress will be handed over to the French army. Let him not continue the feint attack and directly launch a general attack to win this strategic node in one fell swoop!"
It's not that Rommel didn't know how to make strategic arrangements, it was just that his tactical attainments were too high, and he was sometimes overly confident that his own tactics would win, so he often only gave people the impression of a master tactician.
In addition, Rommel had previously disobeyed Reinhardt's order and launched a limited attack with two battalions, which conflicted with the African part of Reinhardt's grand strategy, so there was even a sense that Rommel was not
Understand the overall strategic situation.
However, after serving in the army for so many years and serving as an officer in two world wars, how could he not understand strategy?
"Inform Garibaldi and ask him to bring the Italian troops in his hands to join our German-Italian African Army." When the battle situation reached this point, Rommel could recalculate his title of "Conqueror of Africa": "Tell him
, if you want to go to Cairo for the military parade with me, hurry up and come over!"