The decisive battle against the Third Reich

The goal of the German army is of course not Cairo, but to eliminate the effective force of the British army... As long as the effective force of the British army can be eliminated, then all strategic locations and the Suez Canal will belong to the Germans? !

But Auchinleck woke up too late. The 7th Armored Division had lost its combat effectiveness, and the Australian Infantry Division also suffered heavy losses. After suffering more than 2,000 casualties, they were even in danger of being surrounded and annihilated...

The 6th Australian Infantry Division, formerly the 3rd Division of the Australian Imperial Regiment, was a unit that participated in World War I.

Of course, most of the soldiers from World War I have retired and been replaced by fresh blood, but most of the officers are veterans with rich combat experience. They know how to train their soldiers or how to effectively command the troops in combat.

In addition, one of the special aspects of the Australian colonial army is...

Other colonial armies such as the South African Colonial Army and the Indian Colonial Army. Not only the middle and senior officers of these armies are appointed by the British, but also the low-level officers are no exception... The British army is to better control the colonial armies. On the other hand, It was because the quality of soldiers from South Africa and India was so poor that they simply didn’t know what to do without British junior officers commanding them to fight.

The Australian army is different. It is basically Australian from top to bottom. Only the top commander or staff officer is British... This is not because of distrust of the Australian army, but to better coordinate with other British forces. .

There are many reasons for this situation. On the one hand, Australians and the British have common ancestors... The British have exiled criminals to Australia since the seventeenth century, so many Australians are descendants of these criminals. They have great differences in language, They are all culturally connected, and Australia also recognizes that Britain is its mother country, so it has a strong willingness and consciousness to fight for the British army.

Another point is that Australian soldiers have more combat experience and better quality than the colonial armies of South Africa and India, so they are qualified to fight independently.

These make the combat effectiveness of the Australian Infantry Division second to none in North Africa.

For example, in this battle, although they fell into an ambush by a German armored division and suffered heavy losses, they still actively organized defenses in the face of danger.

In the end, they retreated to a hill and formed a circular position to hold on... This approach was obviously correct, because as an infantry division, they could not outrun the tanks and armor-piercing vehicles no matter how hard they ran.

Stopping and holding on, for example, laying mines in front of the position and deploying anti-tank guns from a high position, you can use the terrain to weaken the combat effectiveness of enemy tanks as much as possible... The tank guns have a limited elevation angle and it is difficult to hit the Australian troops on the hills. At the same time, When the tank drives up uneven hills, it will be difficult to aim because the vehicle body is not level.

These are all manifestations of the Australian infantry division's rich experience.

Then, the Australian army called in British fighter planes to cooperate with them and repelled the German attacks several times... This surprised the German army and even General Strike. He originally thought that the 21st Armored Division could easily defeat the Australian infantry. Teacher's.

Another person who was surprised was Major General Bolton... Also attacked by the Germans, the Australian Infantry Division fought in a decent manner, but the 7th Armored Division retreated without even having time to call in fighter planes for coordinated operations. Major General Bolton felt completely humiliated.

General Strike did not waste too much time on the Australian Infantry Division... If the German army attacked with all its strength, it would have been able to break through the Australian Infantry Division's defense lines and completely defeat it, but there was no need to do so. British fighter planes have discovered the location of the German armored divisions. If they continue to fight like this, the 21st Armored Division will also suffer heavy casualties. They will use precious tanks to replace enemy infantry... General Strike will not do such a stupid thing.

The gain of the German army in this battle was that there were more than a thousand Australian prisoners in the back compartment of the convoy... The British army and the Australian army successfully met here as prisoners.

On the other side, General Auchinleck kept sending messages almost hysterically asking: "Where are the Germans going? Where are they?"

"General!" Major General Achill, commander of the Australian 6th Infantry Division, replied after the reconnaissance: "They may be returning to Sidioma!"

"Sidi Omar?" General Auchinleck asked, "What are they doing there?"

"I don't know!" Aqil replied: "Maybe they want to fight back to Tobruk!"

General Auchinleck took the telegram and said to himself: "Fight back to Tobruk? This is impossible! They are running back and forth in the desert, and they no longer have enough supplies to fight back to Tobruk, unless..."

Then General Auchinleck opened his mouth for a long time and couldn't close it.

"What happened? General?" Major General Rich asked when he saw General Auchinleck's expression was wrong.

"Have they confirmed that Sidi Omar's supplies were bombed?" General Auchinleck asked.

"Of course, General!" Major General Rich replied: "How could the Germans leave supplies to us..."

Before he finished speaking, Major General Rich realized what the problem was.

"Oh my God!" Major General Rich said: "They couldn't have just pretended to deceive us. They didn't blow up that batch of supplies!"

General Auchinleck immediately contacted the 7th Armored Division and the 6th Infantry Division without saying a word, and the result was exactly as they expected. They did not dig out and verify whether the supplies were really bombed...

But then again, who would verify it in that case?

"We were fooled by them again!" General Auchinleck said, "Are we too stupid?"

"No, General!" Major General Rich replied: "They are too cunning!"

"Do we have the troops to reach Sidioma?" General Auchinleck asked.

Major General Rich looked at the map and then shook his head: "All nearby troops are involved in the pursuit. They cannot reach Sidioma ahead of the Germans!"

After being silent for a while, General Auchinleck said feebly: "Retreat!"

"Which troops are you going to withdraw, General?" Major General Rich asked.

"All of them!" General Auchinleck replied: "We lost!"

General Auchinleck was right, because the German 21st Armored Division had already obtained enough cars at this time. If they were allowed to return to Sidioma to fill all the cars with supplies, then you don’t have to think about what will happen next. How is it going:

The 7th Armored Division, the main force of the British army, has been defeated. The armored units of the 13th Army are all slow infantry tanks such as "Matilda" and "Valentine". The German army can make full use of the mobility of its tanks to defeat the British army. It was defeated one by one, just like it defeated each part of the 30th Army separately, and each part of the British army would not even have time to reinforce each other due to the speed of the tanks... This made the British army like a piece of scattered sand.