Op Crusader observations and initial lessons learned

[MarkN]

GHQ Middle East began sending out precis of the initial actions during Op Crusader to their subordinate major commands at the end of November 1941. 9th Army bundled these together and issued them as Lessons from Operations - Cyrenaica. I have so far found 7 of these. If there are more and you have them, please feel free to add them to the thread.

Here is Lessons from Operations - Cyrenaica No.1 which came in the form of two letters: CRME/9209/3/M.T.1 of 30 November 1941 and CRME/9209/17/M.T.1 of 5 December 1941.

[MarkN]

Here is Lessons from Operations - Cyrenaica No.2 which came in the form of a single letter: CRME/9209/17/M.T.1 of 10 December 1941. Note, this has the same reference as the former and thus appears to be the designator for the document as a whole. This letter refers to the armoured aspects whereas the previous letter of 5 December focused on infantry.





I will post the other 5 I have if there is further interest....

[Urmel]

Oh yes please!

[Tom from Cornwall]

Mark,

Fascinating - interesting to see whether these made it back to Home Forces.

Thanks,

Tom

[David W]

Brilliant, thank you, keep posting!

[Urmel]

Mark,

Fascinating - interesting to see whether these made it back to Home Forces.

Thanks,

Tom

I would presume so. Martel came out in either late December or early January, and also reported back. I am certain he would have gone through these.

The initial notes were further refined through a multi-office review process, which added to and deepened them, and were then issued again.

[Don Juan]

I'm guessing that these were written by Lt. Col. J.A. Barlow of GSD 5, but that's just a guess.

[Don Juan]

I would presume so. Martel came out in either late December or early January, and also reported back. I am certain he would have gone through these.

The initial notes were further refined through a multi-office review process, which added to and deepened them, and were then issued again.

Martel was there all along. He arrived in ME on 30th Sept 1941, and took over from Vyvyan Pope as CRAC on 7th October, after Pope's air crash the day before. I think Martel left for the UK sometime in late January, and delivered his notes on Operation Crusader to Bernard Paget in late Jan or early Feb.

[Urmel]

Thanks for the correction, I wasn't aware. London offered to Cunningham that Martel could stay in his role, my guess was that was politely declined.

[MarkN]

I'm sure each reader finds different parts of the report interesting to them.

For me, I noticed how these 2/3 parts cover a couple of topics recently under discussion on this forum.

Firstly, there is the comment regarding the A15 Crusader tank. So often criticised, and yet here given much praise. And, more to the point, completely contradicts what Peter Brown found in documents dated the very same day! In his article on the A15 Crusader 1 (Military Modelling Vol.37 No.8 2007) he wrote:

"There were a number of common problems. A cable from the Middle East dated 10th December 1941 reporting on the battle then in progress stated that Crusader tanks proved somewhat disappointing owing to the number of mechanical casualties from-
Leaks from oil galleries requiring engine removal to rectify.
Failure of fan drive, both original and modified patterns.
Excessive wear of sprockets and broken teeth.
Stretching and breaking of chains, (tracks) 500 miles proving to be lirnit.
Fracture of jockey sprocket spindles in modified assemblies.
Failure of front suspension levers, which were not modified by us.
Failure of Woodruff key in water pump drive."

and

"These faults are echoed in 'Notes on Performance of British and American AFVs in Present Operations in Western Desert' dated 14 December which adds that repairing the oil and water leaks is difficult due to the areas being inaccessible."

Strange!

The second element that caught my eye was the commentary about all-arms brigade level formations. Something that has been discussed in the 'Doctrine: British failures' thread. It reminds me of the quote by General Wilson...

In the training of the armoured divison, I stressed the need of full co-operation of all arms in battle. One had to check a pernicious doctrine which had grown up in recent years, aided by certain civilian writers, that tank units were capable of winning an action without the assistance of the other arms. . . . The chief agents in debunking this and many other fallacies of our prewar pundits were the Germans.

I guess he was thinking of the 10th Armoured Division at the time which was forming and training under his command in Palestine. I don't see him having had much influence over the 7th Armoured or the 1st and 2nd Armoured which came out from England and .....

[Urmel]

Well the Crusaders were shot up so quickly, they hardly had time to break down!

I have this list which Rich got out of Kew way back when.

http://rommelsriposte.com/2009/01/11/me ... -crusader/

[RichTO90]

Well the Crusaders were shot up so quickly, they hardly had time to break down!

I have this list which Rich got out of Kew way back when.

I suspect that may have been the fuller version of the report Peter Brown used. There are various files in the records for RAC BFME that address issues with reliability and various service tests that were done on various types during this period. They did investigations of mileage serviceability requirements, tests of armor vulnerability, and gun capabilities among other things (later, they did a fascinating study of the usefulness of the American stabilized gun as found in the Sherman...the conclusion was that it was very useful and very accurate - within the limits of crew experience and training).

Sadly, all those copies that were formerly easily accessible for me are now locked away in the bowels of TDI.

Cheers!

[Sheldrake]

Mark,

Fascinating - interesting to see whether these made it back to Home Forces.

Thanks,

Tom

The remarks about the artillery being parcelled out to the brigades was received, understood with the response that this was something that was going very wrong in 8th Army. Over the same period the Home Army was making efforts to restore some centralised control over artillery with commanders in Ex Bumper being castigated for failing to concentrate artillery at the critical point.

[MarkN]

I suspect that may have been the fuller version of the report Peter Brown used.

Most likely.

The remarks about the artillery being parcelled out to the brigades was received, understood with the response that this was something that was going very wrong in 8th Army. Over the same period the Home Army was making efforts to restore some centralised control over artillery with commanders in Ex Bumper being castigated for failing to concentrate artillery at the critical point.

It is interesting that one component of the Army is going in one direction with what to do with artillery, and another heading in the opposite direction. One of which has significant operational experience, the other hardly any.

Of course, the Home Army was able to theorise on how to do things with equipment in relative abundance and, perhaps, a poor understanding of the operational efftiveness of their toys. ME Command was having to juggle limited resources to effect success on the battlefield. Field arty is indirect fire support, it doesn't need to be right up the front of a Jock Column - more on those in part 4 of Lessons from Cyrenaica. However, anti-tank arty is a completely different kettle of fish. The Germans had theirs at the head of almost each column - and did huge damage with them. That lesson should have been learned in France. Calais is the prime example.

Now, I would suggest that ME Comd was putting 25-pdrs into penny packets with individual columns as much for its Atk role as its Fld role; the 2-pdrs were not doing the job well enough for technical reasons. This operational reality may not have been fully appreciated by Home Army.

[Sheldrake]

I suspect that may have been the fuller version of the report Peter Brown used.

Most likely.

The remarks about the artillery being parcelled out to the brigades was received, understood with the response that this was something that was going very wrong in 8th Army. Over the same period the Home Army was making efforts to restore some centralised control over artillery with commanders in Ex Bumper being castigated for failing to concentrate artillery at the critical point.

It is interesting that one component of the Army is going in one direction with what to do with artillery, and another heading in the opposite direction. One of which has significant operational experience, the other hardly any.

Of course, the Home Army was able to theorise on how to do things with equipment in relative abundance and, perhaps, a poor understanding of the operational efftiveness of their toys. ME Command was having to juggle limited resources to effect success on the battlefield. Field arty is indirect fire support, it doesn't need to be right up the front of a Jock Column - more on those in part 4 of Lessons from Cyrenaica. However, anti-tank arty is a completely different kettle of fish. The Germans had theirs at the head of almost each column - and did huge damage with them. That lesson should have been learned in France. Calais is the prime example.

Now, I would suggest that ME Comd was putting 25-pdrs into penny packets with individual columns as much for its Atk role as its Fld role; the 2-pdrs were not doing the job well enough for technical reasons. This operational reality may not have been fully appreciated by Home Army.

It is reasonable to assume that greater weight should be given to those parts of the army with operational experience compared to those exercising out of contact with the enemy, However this is only true if those engaged with the enemy learn from their experience.

In several respects Middle East Forces and Eighth army did not learn from their experience of facing the Germans.

1. They persisted with the false lesson drawn by the Batholomew committee that the Brigade group was superior to the Division as the key tactical formation and that the division was too un wieldy an organisation to be used in mobile warfare.

2. Middle east Forces were slow to identify the key technology needed to combat tanks in the desert. As early as July 1941 Alan Brooke as GOC Home Forces had worked put that the 3" and 3.7" AA Guns were capable anti tank weapons and had earmarked 100 of the former to deal with any German heavy tanks and instructed the ministry of supply to generate AP ammunition. MEF did not deploy HAA guns with the field forces for a further year, until June 1942. Sure, MEF had to consider the AA defences of Egypt, Palestine, Syria and Iraq, but Rommel was more of a threat than the Luftwaffe. Had even a handful of 3.7" or 3" guns been available to the 8th Army the Germans would need to think twice about tacics based on out ranging anti tank guns. There were quite a lot of French 75mm guns from Syria and 3" 20 cwt Guns from the Egyptian army which could have been deployed.

In some ways it was easier for the Home Army to innovate, because it had more time and resources to put things right. The major reason why the Bartholomew committee concluded that Brigade groups were the way forward was because of the failure of the BEF in 1940 to make wireless communications work. Sorting out C2 for divisions and divisional and corps artillery needed time to develop procedures and train HQs.