(dramatic music)
- [Presenter] Italy's entry into the war
on the 11th of June, 1940
posed a serious threat
to Britain's position in the Mediterranean
and in Egypt and Palestine.
It also jeopardized her oil
supplies in the Middle East
and her vital line of
communication with India
and the Far East through the Suez Canal.
The Italian Air Force had 330
frontline aircraft in Libya,
150 in East Africa and
some 1,200 in Italy itself.
(dramatic music)
The RAF meanwhile could
muster no more than
205 serviceable aircraft
in Egypt and Palestine
and only a 163 in East Africa.
What's more most of these
were obsolete types.
(dramatic music)
On the ground,
the disparity in numbers
was even more mapped.
Commander of the Middle
East Forces, General Wavell,
had only 63,000 troops
opposing 250,000 Italian
and native troops in Libya.
Further adding to his
problems, Wavell had the task
of policing Iraq and Palestine
following an Arab rebellion in June 1940
and also to keep an eye on
the Vichy French in Syria.
In Abyssinia, a further 300,000
Italian and native troops
opposed the force of little
more than 10,000 British troops
who were based in scattered
garrisons in the Sudan,
British Somalia and Kenya.
The picture looked very
bleak for Wavell and his men.
On the 11th of June, the
day they declared war,
Italian aircraft bombed
Aden and Port Sudan
whilst the RAF attacked Italian
held airfields in Libya.
British troops crossed
from Egypt into Libya
and ambushed an Italian truck convoy.
These were the opening shots
of the war in the desert.
On the 4th of July, the
Italians attacked and captured
the British post on the Sudan borders
with Eritrea and Abyssinia.
A month later, they invaded
British Somalia land.
At the same time, a revolt by Abyssinians
loyal to the Emperor Haile
Selassie also got underway.
On the 22nd of August,
Churchill ordered a
heavily escorted convoy
carrying 150 tanks and
reinforcements to the Middle East.
The Italian invasion of Egypt began
on the 13th of September.
The British Western Desert Force
immediately began to withdraw.
Its orders were to fight a delaying action
back as far as Mersa Matruh,
then stand and fight there.
By the end of September however,
this drive into Egypt came to a halt.
Mussolini, aware that
the reinforced British
now outnumbered his tanks in Egypt,
decided to turn his attentions to Greece
which he invaded in the late October.
Shortly after the invasion,
the Greeks mounted a counter-attack
would sent the Italians
reeling back into Albania.
Wavell now considered his own
plans of counter-attacking
with the objective being the
Italian divisions in Egypt.
However, whilst considering
this new objective,
Wavell had to consider the
possibility of the threat
from the Italians in East Africa
and also the fact that
he might at short notice,
he ordered to send part of his force
to counter any threat in Greece.
The Italians, although strong in numbers,
had one major weakness
which Wavell had spotted.
Their troops and artillery
were spread in separate camps
over the wide area.
Consequently, they were too
far apart from each other
to pose a threat as a whole.
By the 11th of December 1940,
Wavell had already
captured 38,000 prisoners
and a large number of guns and tanks
leaving the Italians with
only three positions in Egypt.
By the 28th of December,
there were no Italians left
on Egyptian soil.
The counter-offensive began in earnest.
On the 5th of January, 1941
Australian forces
captured Bardia in Libya.
Another 38,000 Italians
were taken prisoner
at a cost of only 500 Allied casualties.
Later that month, the port
of Tobruk was captured.
25,000 more prisoners were taken
along with a further
200 guns and 87 tanks.
The British government now
ordered Wavell to press on
and capture Benghazi.
The 6th Australian Division was sent north
of the Jebel Akhar in Cyrenaica.
The 7th Armored Division were deployed
in an outflanking
movement south of Benghazi
to trap the Italians as
they've tried to breakout.
The Allies entered Benghazi
on the 6th of February.
This was the first real victory
for the British on land.
The resulting euphoria,
however, was short lived.
In that same month, the Italians received
the support they needed.
When Hitler fearing
Italy might lead the war
ordered three divisions
along with anti-tank units
and aircraft to reinforce
the Axis troops in Albania.
A new commander entered the theater,
General Erwin Rommel.
Landing of Tripoli along with
two divisions of infantry
and panzers,
the Afrika Korps were
immediately sent into action.
Rommel's immediate orders
were to recapture Benghazi,
then Tobruk.
Wavell now had a problem.
Whilst his other divisions
were successfully clearing
the Italians out of East Africa,
the war in North Africa
was to take a term.
Wavell's worst fears were
realized when the British ordered
four divisions of
Wavell's troops to Greece.
This represented the substantial slight
of his already stretched forces.
By March, Rommel with
his 5th Light Division
and 15th Panzer Division
had moved on Benghazi
driving the British back
on the defensive Zewed.
Unopposed, the Afrika
Korps entered Benghazi
on the 4th of April.
Seven days late, Rommel
began to attack Tobruk,
but unlike Benghazi, the British
garrison there held fast.
Despite failing to take
Tobruk, Rommel's entry
into the campaign had been
little short of sensational.
Numerically inferior to his enemies,
he had driven the British
back to where they had been
five months previously
behind the lines in Egypt.
For Wavell, the fact
that apart from Tobruk
which was now cut-off,
he had lost all of his
gains of the winter.
This was only one of many
problems that he now faced.
In Greece now in German hands,
many of his men had been captured.
The remainder had retreated to Crete.
In Iraq, there also been a turn in events.
Rashid Ali, the newly
self-appointed leader of the Iraq,
turned his troops on the British airbases
which now came under siege.
In neighboring French-ruled Syria,
the vision presence to threaten
British-controlled Palestine
and pro-British Transjordan
and thus the Suez Canal
was also under threat.
Furthermore, adding further
to Wavell's problems,
a directive was issued by Churchill
to drive Rommel's divisions back
and also to secure Syria and the Lebanon.
This directive was supported
by the arrival of a convoy
carrying supplies, tanks
and aircraft at Alexandria.
On the 8th of June,
British, Indian, Australian
and Free Frence Forces
crossed into the Lebanon
from Palestine and Transjordan.
30,000 Vichy French troops
dug in along the coastal roads
resisted furiously.
But after a month of savage hostilities
with the Syrian capital Damascus
falling on the 21st of June,
a cease fire was negotiated
giving the Allies the right to occupy
both Syria and Lebanon.
Also on the 15th of June,
Wavell's men attacked the
German garrison at Helfia Pass.
The battle was a bruising affair
and both sides suffered heavy casualties.
Following a counter-attack by Rommel,
the British had to withdraw.
And as a result, their
losses were much higher.
91 tanks were lost against 25 panzers.
(dramatic music)
For Rommel, this was a victory,
but Tobruk was still holding
out denying the Germans
the much needed port to
bring in reinforcements.
For Wavell, it was the end
of his desert campaign.
He was sent to India to exchange
jobs with his replacement
General Auchinleck.
There now followed a
five-month lull in the war.
In the besieged port of Tobruk,
with the threat of attack at any time,
the troops remained on constant alert.
In September, they
survived the mass attack
by 100 dive-bombers of the Luftwaffe.
(guns firing)
In October, eight months into the siege,
they beat off numerous tank attacks.
On the 18th of November in
a bid to relieve Tobruk,
the British crossed the
frontier from Egypt into Libya.
The next day, they clashed with
the Italian Armored Brigade
at Bir el Gubi.
Meanwhile, a secondary unit
seized the Sidi Rezegh.
The Italian defenders were
caught completely unaware.
At the same time, the
British were also attempting
to breakout to Tobruk, but
the Italians held firm.
Rommel now alerted to the
offensive sent in his panzers.
There followed the first
large scale tank battle
of the Desert War.
Rommel's Afrika Korps then attacked
the British 7th Armored
Division at Sidi Rezegh.
Hopelessly outnumbered, the
7th was almost wiped out
reducing them to only
10 serviceable tanks,
but for the British,
this was only the start
of a much worse scenario to come.
In some of the fiercest fighting
of the whole Desert War,
a Panzer Division found its way blocked
by the 5th South African Infantry Brigade.
They refused to give ground to the panzers
and died where they stood.
One British tank commander
later described the scene.
It was a frightening
and wholesome spectacle.
The dead and the dying
strewn over the battlefield
in trucks and bran carriers, in trenches
and toppled over in death.
Trucks, guns and ammunition
was smoldering or burning.
Tanks of all kinds,
British, German and Italian,
littered the whole area.
However, although this
was a German victory,
Rommel's Afrika Korps
was badly battle-scarred
and he had neither the
manpower left nor the resources
for any further engagement
with the British.
The Allies relieved Tobruk
on the 10th of December.
Rommel's campaign had not gone well.
He had received no
reinforcements, whatsoever,
not even a single tank
to replace his losses.
In addition to which,
he was running desperately low in fuel.
By the end of January,
Rommel was back on the offensive again.
However by the time his
panzers reached Gazala,
only 50 kilometers from Tobruk,
they were virtually out of fuel
and certainly not strong enough
to take on the British 8th Army.
It wasn't until the 26th of May
that Rommel was once again on the move.
His aim, to punch his way
through the Gazala line of defense.
By June, he was gathering momentum
and was bringing up his reserves
for the assault on Tobruk.
Auchinleck launched a counter-attack.
It went disastrously wrong.
On the 11th of June,
Rommel trapped a great deal
of the British Army at Knightsbridge,
and by the 13th, had destroyed it.
By the 14th, Rommel was within
15 kilometers of Tobruk.
The Allied Defenses held,
but the British could not
keep Rommel at bay for long.
On the 16th, the British withdrew
and by the 18th, Tobruk
was completely cut off.
Rommel launched his assault on the city.
On the 21st, Tobruk finally fell to Rommel
and the British began
a desperate withdrawal.
Churchill later to refer to this day as,
"One of the heaviest blows I
can recall during the war."
Rommel had achieved his prime objective,
but not only did he have
control of the port,
he had also captured
thousands of gallons of fuel,
tons of supplies and rations
and over 2,000 vehicles.
Two days later, a resupplied
and re-equipped Rommel
was on the move once more.
This time, crossing the border into Egypt.
The British had pulled
back to Mersa Matruh
which Rommel took on the 27th of June.
General Auchinleck hotly pursued by Rommel
was deliberately falling
back to El Alamein
and it was here that he
intended to stand and fight.
His tired and much depleted army
began the task of digging themselves in.
The Allied Front consisted of a series
of belts of minefields with strong points
along with machine gun and
anti-tank emplacements,
here the men waited for
Rommel and his Afrika Korps.
The position looked bleak,
but this was about to change.
Help was on its way.
Winston Churchill visited the scene
in one of his morale boosting tours.
He brought with him hope
and inspiration for the men.
He also brought good news.
Reinforcements and fresh
supplies were only days away.
Churchill spent five days
visiting as many men of the army
in the RAF as possible.
He explained the task
ahead and its importance.
He also brought with him two new generals.
General Alexander and General Montgomery.
Alexander was one of the last
men of the beaches of Dunkirk
and it was his small army
which held off the Japanese
throughout the length of the Burma.
He was to take overall command
whilst Montgomery was to assume command
over the 8th Army.
An expansion of the 8th Army began.
Into Middle East ports came reinforcements
from Britain, India, and South Africa.
Two divisions had left Britain in May
along with a new supply of tanks.
The first American Sherman Tanks,
courtesy of President Roosevelt.
Long-range planning by the Allies
was now beginning to reap its rewards.
Into the Western Desert poured
a seemingly endless convoy
of men and machines.
Overhead, the Royal Air
Force kept a constant lookout
for enemy aircraft.
Rommel was also bringing in new tanks
and fresh reinforcements.
General Montgomery's 8th
Army was being supported
in the desert by the RAF under
Air Vice-Marshal Coningham.
At the request of Montgomery,
there was no divided command.
They worked and planned together.
Monti as the men called
him was a firm believer
in making sure that
every man in his command
knew what was going on and
what was expected of him
in the months to come.
He saw to it that the plan of battle
was passed down through the ranks
and shown and explained
to every man in the chain
from general to private soldier.
Not for the first time
Rommel was facing problems.
He had been suffering ill health
and had to return to
Germany for treatment.
Furthermore, extra supplies
which he had been begging for
failed to materialize.
(dramatic music)
The British plan code
named Operation Lightfoot
was to draw Rommel's tanks
away from the northern area
which would then allow the
British Armored Divisions
to break through the German defenses
and the establish itself in a position
to threaten Rommel's
dwindling supply lines.
By the 23rd of October, all
was ready for the attack.
The main phase of the Battle of El Alamein
began that evening.
As the light failed, the
final moves were made.
(dramatic music)
(explosions)
By early morning on the 24th of October,
the first objectives had been achieved.
The nightlong barrage of
guns had completely taken
the Axis forces by surprise.
Fighting amongst the infantry
however had been severe
and losses were high on both sides.
Meanwhile, the RAF continued
to attack the German defenses
clearing apart for the
infantry to move up.
This was a model combined operation.
Infantry, tanks and air force
all working as one unit.
(ominous band music)
(guns firing)
The RAF flew sortie after sortie
keeping the German fighters
and dive-bombers at bay.
The skies became a place of deadly peril.
But it wasn't only in the
air that the Luftwaffe
suffered heavy losses.
Those machines that didn't
get airborne in time
were systematically
destroyed on the ground.
(explosions)
Despite the superiority of
the Allies, progress was slow.
The Axis forces were
fighting back desperately.
(guns firing)
(explosions)
In the north, progress was difficult
as the infantry had to work their way
through deep enemy minefields
holding up the 1st Armored Division
in the partially opened lane behind them.
Allied bombers continue
to pound the Germans
and Italians from behind their lines
cutting off any hope of
reinforcements being brought up.
(explosions)
General Georg Stumme,
Rommel's deputy in charge
whilst he was in Germany was
killed on the 25th of October,
Rommel was forced to return to the battle.
On the 27th of October,
Rommel used his armor
to try and counter-attack,
but these attacks were soon
beaten off by the Allies.
By the 2nd of November,
the battle having raged
for a week or more,
Montgomery launched a new
plan code named Supercharge,
a concentrated and mass
effort to hit Rommel.
It began in the early
hours of the morning.
Rommel's troops were soon under pressure.
And with fuel by now desperately short,
he was forced to begin the
withdrawal of his forces.
An order from Hitler told
him to stand and fight
to the last man, but it was too late.
By the 4th of November,
the 8th Army was ready to break out.
Unlike a few months earlier
when Rommel had pursued
Alexander's men to El Alamein,
the Afrika Korps hopelessly broken
had no other choice than to pull back.
This time, it was the turn of the 8th Army
to do the pursuing.
But this new 8th Army
under General Montgomery
was a much larger and
much more powerful force.
On the first day of Rommel's retreat,
he lost a further 50 tanks
with no losses to the Allies.
Behind him on the battlefield,
lay over 500 of Rommel's tanks
and more than 1,000 pieces of artillery.
Tens of thousands of Germans and Italians
were taken prisoner.
Among them, Von Thoma,
commander of the Afrika Korps,
Buccat, leader of the German parachutists,
and no less than eight Italian generals.
20,000 men had died in the battle.
In the air, the RAF
continued to chase Rommel
out of North Africa attacking his tanks
and convoys as they
race against the desert.
(guns firing)
On the ground, Rommel's
flimsy rear guard was crushed
in the wake of the advancing Allies.
On the 7th of November,
Mersa Matruh was back in Allied hands.
By the 10th of November, the
8th Army was making its way
through the twisting
mountain path of Helfia Pass.
Tobruk was recaptured
on the 13th of November
reopening the port for further
Allied shipping and supplies.
Meanwhile, Rommel continued
to pull back even further.
On the 20th of November,
Allied troops were once again
re-occupying the port of Benghazi.
Montgomery's Supercharge
was gathering momentum.
At El Agheila, Rommel's forces halted.
Hitler and Mussolini had
ordered that he should launch
a counter-offensive from here.
Rommel wanted to withdraw to Europe.
That being impossible,
with all the ports now in
Allied hands, Rommel considered
that the only way to
salvage something from this
was to join the Axis forces in Tunisia.
And by the 13th of December,
continued his withdrawal.
Montgomery was to pursue
Rommel for the next 41 days
over a distance of 800 or more kilometers
fighting all of the way
with Rommel's rear guard.
General Montgomery said
in his orders of the day,
"Nothing has stopped us since
the Battle of Egypt began.
"Nothing will stop us
now and nothing did."
By the 22nd of January, 1943
Montgomery and the 8th Army
had reached the outskirts of Tripoli
and a fierce battle opened once again.
(explosions)
The Allies entered Tripoli
on the 23rd of January
and the town was
surrendered to Montgomery.
Country by country, they
had systematically destroyed
the whole of the Italian empire.
- [Churchill] You have
altered the face of the war
in a most remarkable way.
What it has meant in the
skill and organization
of movement and maneuver,
what it has meant in
the tireless endurance
and self-denial of the troops
and in the fearless
leadership displayed in action
can be appreciated only by those
who are actually on the spot.
But I must tell you that
the fame of the Desert Army
has spread throughout the world.
- [Presenter] Churchill and Roosevelt
had been finalizing plans
for Operation Torch,
the invasion of North Africa.
(explosions)
Three landings would be made.
Crucial to the success of the landings
was the degree of
resistance from the French.
At Casablanca and Algiers,
there was heavy resistance.
At Iran, signals were sent
out to shore installations
for them to indicate whether
or not they would resist
by aiming their searchlights vertically.
Before long, all along the coast of Iran,
searchlights could be seen.
Next morning, RAF fighters took off
from Gibraltar to Algiers.
By 7 a.m. the beaches
of Algiers were clear.
British and American troops
of the Eastern Task Force
had landed to the east
and west of the city
and secured all main
positions and vantage points.
Meanwhile, American paratroops
and airborne infantry
of the Center Task Force
were dropping onto the area
around the coastal city of Iran.
They had flown from Britain
some 2,400 kilometers away
to secure the airfields
whilst other amphibious troops
were about to attack the beaches.
At Casablanca, the landing
craft of the Western Task Force
led by Major General Patton
came under the protection
of the Royal Navy.
Their gunners beating off
enemy fighter attacks.
Dive-bombers, battleships,
and heavy gun boats
continue the heavy the barrage
on the French shore installations
which had still remained hostile.
(explosions)
Before long having taken the beaches,
the Allies had penetrated the city itself
and French resistance came to an end.
Meanwhile, the Germans were
pouring men and equipment
into Tunisia both by sea and air.
Allied infantry tanks and
artillery began to move inland
towards the hills.
By rail, went the French mountain troops
with mules for transport.
By air, went British
and American paratroops
to capture enemy airfields
and suitable landing grounds.
By sea, the No. 6 Commando battalion
traveled from Algiers to Bona and Bougie.
At Bona, some 100 kilometers
from the Tunisian border,
paratroops had already secured an airfield
which repeatedly came under
heavy attack from the Luftwaffe.
This was the only forward Allied airfield
and had to be kept at all costs.
By mid-November, over
1,000 German soldiers a day
were arriving at the port of Tunis.
Hitler was determined that
Tunisia should be held.
On the 18th of November,
Allied troops crossed the
frontier into Tunisia.
(guns firing)
Fighting all the way,
the units of British,
American and French troops pushed on.
Time was short.
Any delay meant extra days
allowing extra German
troops to be brought in.
By the 22nd of November, they
had reached the town of Beja
approximately 100 kilometers from Tunis.
50 kilometers away at Medjez El Bab,
the French armed with
little more than rifles
and machine guns were fighting furiously
against the Germans.
General Anderson commanding the First Army
moved his tanks up to support them.
Together, they forced the Germans
out of the strategic strong point
and the advance on Tunis
and Bizerta continued.
However, the step took the
Allies into the planes,
which meant that they
were much more vulnerable
and exposed to attacks from the Luftwaffe.
On November the 25th,
the first major tank battle took place.
(guns firing)
15 German tanks were
destroyed in the battle.
The remainder pulled back.
All was not well for the Allies however.
Supplies were being cut by the Luftwaffe
and supplies were running low,
but still the advance didn't falter.
And before long they were approaching
the coastal city of Bizerta in the north
and for the south, the city of Tunis.
There followed a ferocious
of bloody counter-attack
by the German tanks and artillery.
The Axis offensive worked.
The Allies were forced back
withdrawing to the safety of the hills.
This marked the final
attempt by the Allies
to break through.
Too few troops combined with the worsening
weather conditions proved decisive.
They needed time to consolidate
and repair their supply lines
before attempting again.
Rommel, meanwhile, still being pursued
by Montgomery's 8th Army
was fast approaching from the south.
Tunisia was packed with German troops.
15 full divisions moving
up for their offensive.
But these were no rookie troops.
These were some of the Wehrmacht's
finest battle experienced
veterans of Poland,
France, and the Balkans
along with seven divisions
of Italian troops.
Air Marshall Coningham,
commander of the Air Force,
and General Alexander, in
command of all ground forces,
worked together at their camp
in the Tunisian mountains
planning the next phase of the assault.
The first move was made
by Air Marshall Coningham.
A continuous 24-hour assault
was mounted from the air.
In the desert, Montgomery
was planning his attack
on the maddest line of defense.
On the 20th of March,
Montgomery began his attack.
By the following morning, only four tanks
had managed to break through,
but this was enough to form a bridgehead.
And the British infantry
fought long and hard
to keep that bridge head intact.
The Germans fearing another
defeat like El Alamein,
pulled their armor back from other areas
and threw it into the battle.
(explosions)
Meanwhile, Montgomery's armor
was racing across the desert
towards El Hama.
50,000 men on the ground
supported by the fighters,
bombers and tank busters in the air
were about to descend
on the German defenders.
Possibly fortunately for Rommel,
ill health, once again,
necessitated his return to Germany.
He was never to return.
His place was taken by Von Arnim.
Now pinned down, it was too
late for the German armor.
The New Zealanders plowed
through the Tobago gap.
Major General Patton
was sending his armor in
from the west towards the eastern dorsal
concentrating his attack
in cutting off Von Arnim
from the rear and securing
Montgomery's left flank.
(guns firing)
By the end of March, small pockets of men
from Patton's No. 2 Corps met
up with the advance parties
for Montgomery's battle weary 8th Army.
50 kilometers south of Tunis
with Von Armin closing up from the rear,
the French fought a long, hard battle.
The noose was beginning to
tighten on the Axis forces.
(explosions)
Montgomery's Armored Divisions
were closing in for the kill.
In a last-ditch attempt to reach Tunis,
Von Arnim and his Army Group Africa
called upon almost all
of his remaining tanks.
(explosions)
In three days of fighting,
Montgomery's purpose was accomplished.
Von Arnim's tanks and artillery
having been drawn into the
battle had been destroyed.
The Afrika Korps had
been all but wiped out.
In the hills overlooking Tunis,
the First Army fought
a long and hard battle.
(explosions)
(guns firing)
For 12 days, the hills
echoed with gunfire.
Positions were taken, lost and retaken.
When the German lines finally crumbled,
the dead lay in hundreds
across the battlefield.
As the Allied infantry advanced,
engineers and pioneer corp
built roads across the mountain ranges.
In 14 days they built
17 kilometers of road.
On this hilltop known as Hill
609, long-range artillery
of the United States
Army started the attack.
(explosions)
By the time they finally reached the top,
many Allied soldiers had been killed,
but with this and subsequently
others that followed,
one-by-one, the German
strongholds in the mountains
around Tunis were falling.
The Allied Commanders knew
then that the time was right
for the last final all-out offensive.
British and American Armored
and Infantry Divisions
spearheaded the advance.
In the hills, French artillery bombarded
the remaining German strongholds.
The Royal Navy pounded the
shore installations and ports.
This was a concentrated
effort on all fronts.
(explosions)
Hitler and Mussolini's
forces were being dealt
a taste of their own medicine, blitzkrieg.
By air, the Allied bombers
kept up the relentless attacks.
On the ground, the advancing Allies
smashed their way through.
The Axis forces were forced to withdraw.
(explosions)
After only eight hours of fighting,
German resistance was
beginning to flounder.
The Allied tanks and armor broke
through the final defenses.
By mid-afternoon on the 7th of May,
the Axis forces began to
surrender around Tunis.
At first, the soldiers
trickled out in small groups,
but before long, the
trickle turned into a flood
as the German and Italian
soldiers threw down their arms
and surrendered in their thousands.
In Bizerta, it was the same story.
275,000 men were taken
prisoner as North Africa fell.
There had been no chance of
a Dunkirk-type evacuation
for these men.
The Royal Navy had been waiting to strike
at any mass evacuation
attempt by the German Navy.
The orders of the day had read
"Sink, burn, destroy; let nothing pass."
The Allied Air Forces had
kept the Luftwaffe at bay
deterring any attempt to
land transport aircraft
to airlift the men out.
Of those troops that managed
to commandeer small boats
to take them to Sicily, only
700 managed to escape the net
cast by the Royal Navy
and Allied Air Force.
Von Arnim and his commanders
had followed Hitler's orders
fighting to the last
bullet, but surrendering.
Army Group Africa was no more.
The Axis forces overwhelmed
in terms of sheer numbers
had exhausted their supply
and reserves of petrol and ammunition.
Lieutenant General Hans Cramer,
heading the remnants of the Afrika Korps
had fought on bravely, but
having fired their last salvo
and final rounds of ammunition,
Cramer had signaled German high command.
Munitions expended,
weapons and war equipment destroyed,
the Afrika Korps has fought
to a standstill as ordered.
- [Reporter] In a German
cemetery, one of their tanks
which had taken cover
behind the graveyard hedge,
makes its own funeral pyre.
A direct hit from a shell
and it burns itself out
on the site of its own choosing.
The ruined docks of Tunis
from which escape was made impossible.
No wonder there was no
Dunkirk for the Axis.
The doors out of Tunisia
were sealed with debris.
For the moment, Tunis
is expecting an outbreak
of street fighting.
Slit trenches have been
hastily dug in the streets.
In buildings, behind barricades
groups of Germans are still in hiding.
Cornered men can fight desperately
so tanks and vehicles feel their way in
as the Allied occupation begins.
(explosions)
- [Presenter] General Alexander
signaled to Churchill,
"Sir, it is my duty to report
"that the Tunisian campaign is over.
"All resistance has ceased.
"We are the masters of
the North African shores.'
The Axis forces had put
up a fierce resistance
until the very last in a
situation which they knew
could have but one end.
The North African victory was a prototype
for future Allied joint operations.
Strategically, it provided a springboard
for further Mediterranean operations
including invaluable sites for airbases.
British losses in North Africa
from the beginning of the war
amounted to 220,000 in all.
The French lost 20,000,
and the Americans suffered some
18 and a half thousand casualties.
Axis losses in casualties and prisoners
in the North African campaigns
amounted to 620,000 soldiers.
One third of them, Germans.
Moreover, Hitler's grasp
on North Africa was ended.
(dramatic music)
