stg 44 wrote:Apparently by October Benny recognized that logistically further attacks were impossible and asked Graziani if he wanted to resign his command; perhaps at that point if they fell back and waited to build up a rail line from Benghazi to Tobruk they could have waited from November 1940 on at Halfaya? Or of Italo Balbo hadn't died he could use his political standing to resist the orders to attack and hold on the Pass until the logistical situation was better? Britain effectively would really not be able to attack prior to November 1941 when enough forces to match the Italians would be available (Op. Crusader). In the meantime the Germans are kept out of the region and can operate elsewhere, while Italy builds itself up without having lost all of those men in 1940, so would be even more formidable by 1941, both due to logistics improvements, but also the ending of the Greek campaign and reinforcements to the initial Libyan armies.
Withdraw, without a fight, after capturing those airfields and Sidi Barrani together with its tram system? That doesn't seem likely. Remaining in Libya seems more, if not very, plausible. But I'm puzzled by the reference to Operation Crusader. Clearly any attack by the Western Desert Force would operate in a Crusaderesque geographical context, albeit with weaker rail links and (presumably) worse roads. Other than that, the comparison seems odd. There's no DAK in the picture and probably nothing to match XX Corps either. Which leaves logistics. And politics of course.
Exactly how much *ASC support 8th Army had during Crusader & its precursors is something of a mystery to me, but there is some information here:
http://rommelsriposte.com/2013/11/17/mo ... mber-1941/. The numbers may seem daunting at first look, but there was more (and sometimes bigger and better) of everything to be supplied in November 1941. Just add lorries? South Africa seems to have been producing/assembling over 300 a week by late 1940, so there's one source. Then there's the UK, Canada, Australia, India, oh, and the USA too.
Politics then, and its cousin, grand strategy. Decisions to reinforce Egypt and the Middle East were largely taken in July (described in Playfair, M&ME, vol 1, chapter X et seq, available at Hyperwar). While the schedule might vary, Middle East Command could expect the arrival of 2nd Armoured Division, the balance of 6th Australian & (2nd) New Zealand Divisions, 5th Indian Division, two brigades from 7th Australian Division and a plethora of supporting combat, combat support and combat service support units together with relatively bountiful quantities of equipment by early in 1941.
It doesn't take a deep study of Winston Churchill's style of leadership to conclude that all of this largesse would have come with strings attached, first and foremost the expectation - indeed requirement - that the Prime Ministerial desire for
Action This Day should be indulged, and soon. Unless there were more plausible venues for this action than the Libyan frontier - and Playfair can be read as suggesting that the Western Desert was just where action was expected when the decision to reinforce was made in July - I rather suspect that Generals Wilson and O'Connor would have found themselves occupied with planning an operation against the Italian forces defending the frontier & Halfaya Pass.
Having disposed of
if - it's really not in doubt - that leaves two questions. What and when? What would they be expected to produce? Would it be a limited operation against all or part of the frontier forces (i.e. something like Compass was initially planned to be), or something larger (i.e. Crusader, except with a siege of Tobruk in place of a relief)? As for the when, that depends largely on logistical capacity, as discussed, and required force levels.
I suspect the what would be at the more modest end of the scale, initially at least. Reading Playfair again, I'm struck by British overestimates of Italian motorisation and mobility. Would a pair of strongly reinforced divisions - 7th Armoured & 6th Australian - have seemed adequate for a limited offensive? In that case, which seems unlikely given British assumptions about Italian capabilities, an attack in early January may be possible.
If, as seems more reasonable, a second complete infantry division were required, (2nd) New Zealand Division might be available by early February. With two infantry divisions, would a single infantry tank battalion (or more accurately, part of one) have been sufficient? If not, additional cruiser and light tanks would have been available, but even if efforts had been made to collect a battalion or so of the more heavily armoured tanks (heavily is a relative term) for close support duties, that does seem to be a weakness. But would WSC have been willing to sit back and wait, all for the want of a single infantry tank battalion? Suez was only a month from the UK by fast steamer, so even if another 50 Matildas were the sine qua non of an offensive, prolonged delay seems unlikely.
So, February then, which will probably make it one of those
Who won the air war anyway? operations if all goes well for the Western Desert Force, at least so long as Fliegerkorps X doesn't turn up. And it probably would go well, since there's no reason to think that replicating Operation Compass in a different location would produce vastly different results. Of course, Mussolini & Graziani can't know that, so this is not a reason in itself for them to reject the do-nothing option. But such reasons do exist.
Cheers,
Angus
