3rd and 4th RHA Shootout with Pz Abt. Hohmann

[ClintHardware]

Hi All

By 0700 hours 15th May, 7th Support Group [previously Mobile Force H.Q.] had this to add to the battle between Hohmann's panzers and the 3rd and 4th RHA with UVOR Column on the 12th May 1941. This is from Section 1 of 7th Sp Gp's Intelligence Summary No. 25

Quote:
1. General Situation
It now appears that in the enemy sortie on 12 May, approx 60 Enemy Tanks were employed. At least 10 of these were hit but all were recovered by the enemy - as well as one of our Light Tanks which was abandoned on the Coast road. (WO 169/1154)

End Quote.

Does anyone have any German data?

[Urmel]

The Germans didn't report any losses. They reported the following as successes:

Captured:
1 Off 3 OR
2x 25-pdr with prime movers
1x light tank with weapons and equipment
1x motorcycle

Destroyed:
1x armoured car
2x 25-pdr
2x ammunition carriers
2x AT gun (portee)
several motor vehicles

Also 2x Hurricane shot down by ground troops

[ClintHardware]

Hi Urmel

Thanks, nice data. Can you please quote the sources of the data.

In the fire fight 'B' Troop 4th RHA claimed one panzer with turret shot off by one of their 25-Pdrs. 'B' Troop 3rd RHA claimed 5 panzers disabled by their three 2-Pdrs. Where 7th Sp Gp gets the figure 10 from two whole days later is unstated. However, the RHA claims would have been for panzers they saw damaged by their fire which was extremely close at the end. This seems to indicate that when the Germans recovered their panzers, their temporary inoperability was not recorded so we are left with the understanding that all the panzers were operable even if one had a turret shot away.

I am surprised that a turret shot away did not involve a level of damage that the Germans considered worth reporting. Or perhaps the explanation is that 'B' Troop 4th RHA only believed they saw the turret shot away even though it happened 30 yards away from their muzzles.

My money is on both RHAs' figures but not those of 7th Sp Gp or the DAK.

[Urmel]

D.A.K. war diary.

I have no opinion on the validity of this. Unfortunately there is no report in my files covering this operation. It was part of a larger sweep of Gruppe Herff to clean the desert of those pesky Brits.

[ClintHardware]

They really were and keeping the Axis worn out to boot. Here are two German End User compliments on British Mobility

Leutnant Joachim Schorm, 6./ II. Panzer Regiment 5
“11th May. An English reconnaissance party wakes us. This time they noticed us.” – “In my zug there are 25 men in all. At 1800 hrs panzer 625 arrives. All five panzers are with the zug. It is said that the enemy has got a strong force near EL HAMRAH. We are to bring five fighting units against him. It is really not a job for panzers. I consider it a mistake to strike at an extraordinarily mobile and fast opponent in the desert after making a journey of 100Km.

At 2100 hrs we start up. Shortly afterwards we pass the frontier. Plain as flat as a table. At SULIMAN we stop to fill up at 0100 hrs [12th May]” (WO 169/1436) (WO 201/353)

Deutsches Afrikakorps Kriegstagebuch, 12th May
The area was combed from south to north and the enemy cleaned out. Because of their great mobility and speed the British succeeded in evading decisive action and withdrawing the main body of their forces, apparently in the direction of Sidi Barrani.

Listening posts reported however that the enemy had been taken completely by surprise – for instance Vorausabteilung Knabe had reached Gasr el Abid and Gruppe Wechmar was just in front of Der el Hamra before they were recognised. A special operation took place simultaneously on the coastal plain but there again the enemy succeeded in evading decisive action. (CAB 146/10 page 51)

Funny how we never read of British mobility in the desert being greater than that of the Axis forces unable to catch them decisively when the British troops chose to be mobile.

Thanks for the source.

[Urmel]

T
Funny how we never read of British mobility in the desert being greater than that of the Axis forces unable to catch them decisively when the British troops chose to be mobile.

It maybe because it was futile mobility. If that's all you have, you haven't got much. The way the British columns were organised was fast and flexible. But they lacked striking power.

[ClintHardware]

I can't agree because the mounting damage caused to German troops by that mobility and firepower was progressively significant.

If the tactics had been futile the DAK would have taken Tobruk and gone beyond Suez during April 41.

Hohmann's 42 operational panzers at the border are substantial evidence of that decline - and six or perhaps up to ten of those 42 were damaged on the 12th May.

[Urmel]

Well I can't agree with that. The only thing that stopped the Axis was the resistance of the Tobruk garrison to the two assaults. The columns keeping some Panzersoldaten up at night didn't make a difference. If Tobruk had fallen, the odd mobile column between Bardia and Alexandria wouldn't have stopped the Axis troops.

[ClintHardware]

BUT the troops in Tobruk that did the most concentrated damage (10th, 11th and 14th April) were under command of CYRCOM including the infantry of the 9th Div and they included: the 104th RHA and 'J' Battery from Mersa Brega, the 1st RHA and the 3rd Hussars/5th RTR from 3rd Armd Bde, the Indians and also M Battery from Mechili (all from 2nd Armd Div command). CYRCOM HQ left Tobruk and was absorbed into significant elements of 6th Infantry Division HQ on the 16th April at Matruh which was the basis of the reformed Western Desert Force HQ under Bereford-Peirse. Without the Tobruk artillery fire plan (thanks to Brigadier Thompson from XIII Corps) including the 51st Fd Rgt attached to 20th Bde and the added 107th RHA (from XIII Corps) there would not have been the firepower to defend Tobruk or the infantry of the 9th Division from further retreat towards 22nd Guards Bde, 7th Australian Div and the Mobile Force under command of WDF HQ.

The Axis troops were split, lacking logistics to get to Suez in strength, lacking the strength to take Tobruk and continually under attack and being out manoeuvred at the border and suffering losses. These achievements were built upon the fighting and logistics under CYRCOM's organisation.

[Urmel]

There was no exchange between Tobruk and the troops on the border, or co-ordinated offensive or harassment activity, so this is irrelevant in my view.

My point is simply that we don't hear about the great mobility of the British forces because it was meaningless in the overall context. If the Axis had dealt with Tobruk, then the odd highly mobile column west of Matruh would have been nothing more than a speed bump. The Western Desert Force HQ three times demonstrated its inability to deal with the Axis when it came to a crunch. BREVITY, Skorpion, and BATTLEAXE.

They could have stayed at Sidi Barrani or El Alamein twiddling their thumbs instead of motoring around the Playground, and the Axis would still not have been at Suez, because they needed to deal with Tobruk. In fact, if they had only stayed at Sidi Barrani instead of attacking in May and June, Middle East Command would arguably have been better off. In my view CYRCOM can take no credit for saving Tobruk against the assaults in May, since it wasn't there (and it's May we are discussing here). And it can take no credit for preventing the Axis from advancing past Halfaya in May, since the siege of Tobruk prevented that from happening. CYRCOM was irrelevant in the operational context, and that's why we don't hear much about their mobility and columns. Because they didn't matter.

[ClintHardware]

You mentioned the siege of Tobruk and that is why I mentioned the troops under CYRCOM which included the 9th.

The mobility of British troops and the RASC support to the 9th Div is critical to the whole history because without that mobility 2nd Sp Gp, 3rd Armd Bde and 20th Bde (at Er Regima) and 26th Bde (Tocra) would have been overrun and Tobruk could not have been held.

Despite being surrounded at Mechili half of those present broke out towards Derna and Tobruk (mobility again), although some units of more than others.

The 2nd Sp Gp/Mobile Force under CYRCOM/WDF can take credit for fighting a flexible series of engagements leading upto Brevity that continued to wear down the Axis units present. The 12th May was just one example.

Yes I agree that Brevity and Battleaxe look like resources wasted. Both battles look like the DAK being used by the Empire to exercise and test its troops for something bigger.

[Urmel]

Running away is not the same as military mobility

As for your last point - if this had really been the very clever design of the whole thing, don't you think somebody would have mentioned it after the war, or there would be documentary evidence? So to me, they don't 'look like', they were a waste of resources.

[ClintHardware]

If CYRCOM's forces had run away they would not have been able to rally to fight at Agedabia, Er Regima, Derna or Mechili, and then at Tobruk. Derna was an all day rearguard fought on the 7th April by the 1st THR and 1st KRRC (with support from the KDG, 5th RTR and 1st RHA and 'J' Battery 3rd RHA) that appears only in the War Diaries and the regimental history of the KRRC.

And if you are thinking of Mechili as a running away instead of a planned breakout towards Tobruk, that approach does not account for the deliberate bayonet attack on the Italian battery as the first part of the breakout. The Italians were slaughtered.

The GSO1 of 2nd Armoured Division was one of the first to organise the defence of Tobruk for CYRCOM taken over by Major-General Lavarack - here is an eye witness account:

Captain Dent, CYRCOM H.Q.
[Brigadier Harding] “was simply wonderful and everyone there was full of admiration for the way he got people and units together, got out his orders clear and concise and so sound, sent people off to collect stragglers and others to make a hasty defence of Tobruk with Tank Corps men without tanks, RASC drivers without lorries, gunners without guns, signallers and sappers all collected and given jobs of defence and it is entirely due to John that we still hold Tobruk today.” (54)

And here is CYRCOM's commander (Lavarack) telling the troops well done for the 8th - 14th April in his last Order of the Day 14th April before joining WDF HQ:

Major-General John D. Lavarack, G.O.C. CYRCOM
"Stern determination, prompt action and close co-operation by all arms ensured the enemy's defeat, and we can now feel more certain than ever of our ability to hold TOBRUK in the face of any attacks the enemy can stage. Everyone can feel justly proud of the way the enemy has been dealt with. Well done TOBRUK! "

Rommel allowed his forces to be stretched out and then pinned in combat in two locations separated by 100 miles and unable to overcome either pinning.

[Urmel]

If CYRCOM's forces had run away they would not have been able to rally to fight at Agedabia, Er Regima, Derna or Mechili, and then at Tobruk.

That's self-evident, because then they would either have died at Mersa el Brega, or succeeded in holding the Axis troops off there. In order to fight at five places hundreds of miles from the original fight, they had to rapdily retreat (let's be polite) in the first instance (and I don't see the fights at Agedabia, Derna or Mechili as something to crow about - they were all defeats, in various ranges of severity).

I don't see how this statement by you is incompatible with what I said. If they had managed to stop the Axis west of Tobruk, I'd accept that my criticism is too harsh. But they didn't, and Rommel's force becoming stretched out was the key factor in it becoming pinned, together of course with Middle East Command's ability to reinforce Tobruk. But that's not surprising, I believe you can read this sequence of events (offensive peters out, defensive strengthens as it falls back on its own rear) up in Clausewitz, if not Sun-Tzu.

Mobility without fighting power is not something to get excited about (Jock columns). Sure, you can pinprick your opponent and annoy him, but it is clear that i) you cannot defeat him, and ii) you are still giving up the operational initiative to him. The same goes for fighting power without mobility (that's called Army Group Centre in 1944, or the Maginot Line). The Empire forces in the desert did not manage to combine mobility and hitting power in the same way the Axis did until it was far too late (and no, that doesn't meant the Axis didn't fail at times, e.g. on 3 December outside Bardia).

Even the Italians did that better than CYRCOM or 7 Armoured Division in 1941 did in assembling a balanced force at short notice. See here: http://rommelsriposte.com/2013/08/10/ar ... io-column/ - by comparison, a week or so later some brainiac in 30 Corps had the brilliant idea of sending an armoured car regiment (3 South African Recce) on a raid to the west of Tobruk. What followed was a display of excellent mobility, and a total defeat of the operation at the hand of the Axis air forces. The mind boggles.

[ClintHardware]

No.

The X Armata had to surrender at Beda Fomm to a small mobile force whose presence covering the road was at that moment only a tiny fraction of the Italian force.

CYRCOM's very limited troops (half a Sp Gp) pulled back from Mersa Brega from the clutches of 5. leichte Division to positions on the 1st April - but there was no ground contact 1st April - so they pulled back again and fought on the 2nd April supported by eleven A13s 5th RTR facing I. and II. abteilungen from Panzer Regiment 5 - and still they were not eliminated.

The 5. leichte Division failed to capture this highly mobile very limited force. And in addition Mechili was not a Beda Fomm equivalent because it was the pivotal position south of Wadi Cuff and Wadi Derna in an attempt to buy time for the evacuation of troops in the Jebel Akhdar - and they managed to achieve just that.

That the 5. leichte Division failed to eliminate CYRCOM in the open desert led to the disruption of subsequent German operations.

There were no forces that could come to the aid of CYRCOM in March 41 and therefore there is no need to blame those troops for using the one thing they had most - Mobility. No wonder Rommel is often mentioned hurrying his troops forward - and yet they still failed to take CYRCOM. AND then the DAK continued to have to fight those same units they had chased until 1943.

Had Rommel followed senior Italian and German advice to wait for 15. Panzer Division he might have caught CYRCOM.

In respect of the force that fell back from Tobruk on the 11th April and grew into the Columns supporting 22nd Gds Bde at the border - they were facing the Hohmann's composite abteilung of 42 panzers by the 11th May but the Columns were not destroyed by Hohmann either.

Job NOT done Generalleutnant Rommel.