The first elements of the Deutsches Afrika Korps (DAK) arrived in Tripoli on 14 February 1941 with the disembarkation of the 3rd Reconnaissance Battalion, 5th Light Division; other units, most notably two battalions of the 5th Panzer Regiment, followed. Shortly afterwards the 5th Light Division was renamed the 21st Panzer Division and it, along with the 15th Panzer Division, formed the core of the DAK. The key units were their tank regiments, the 5th Panzer Regiment with the 21st Panzer Division and the 8th Panzer Regiment with the 15th Panzer Division. The ad hoc 90th Light ‘Afrika’ Division controlled those units not assigned to either of the panzer divisions.
Strictly speaking, the term Afrika Korps applies only to the 15th and 21st Panzer Divisions. All other formations, including the 90th Light Division, the Ramcke Brigade and the Italian armoured and motorised divisions were part of Panzer Armee Afrika. Initially Rommel commanded the latter while Generals Cruewell, Nehring and von Thoma commanded DAK. What is remarkable is that although this force only existed for two years, thanks to its extraordinary operations in the desert it has acquired a certain mystique.
When the 5th Panzer Regiment landed in North Africa it brought with it 150 tanks, including seventy light Panzer Mk IIs; the rest were either Mk IIIs with the L/42 50mm gun or Mk IVs with the L/24 75mm gun. In the face of inevitable battle losses the Panzer Mk IIs were replaced with the two newer models and for much of the campaign there were two Mk IIIs for every Mk II and IV. The 5th and 8th Panzer Regiments also took forty Ausf D and E Mk IVs to North Africa.
The 605th Panzerjäger Battalion, part of the 5th Light Division, also arrived with DAK’s first self-propelled gun, the 47mm PaK(t) (Sf) auf PzKpfw I Ausf B (which was a Panzer Mk I chassis fitted with a captured Czech 47mm gun). These vehicles were later supplemented by Marder SP guns utilising Czech tank chassis. The tanks were also supported by assault gun and armoured car units. By March 1941 Rommel had amassed almost 160 panzers supported by sixty Italian tanks in Libya. After his experiences in France Rommel was very familiar with British armour. In fact, following Dunkirk four of the many British tanks captured by Rommel – two Matilda Mk Is and two Mk IIs – had been dispatched to Germany.
Two main anti-tank gun types were deployed by DAK: the 50mm L/42 (and later L/60 PaK 38) and the famous dual-role 88mm flak gun. The excellent 75mm PaK 40 was a later development and did not see service until the closing stages of the campaign. The reputation of the ‘88’ flak gun in North Africa almost reached mythical proportions and it was both feared and respected by the Allies in the Western Desert as no tank could stand up to its killing power. To hold Libya, Rommel dug in his 88s at Sollum and Halfaya and these guns reaped a rich harvest from Churchill’s ‘Tiger Cubs’, which had been rushed straight from Britain’s training grounds to the desert battlefield.
Having co-opted Mussolini’s armour, Rommel quickly recycled abandoned Italian vehicles and artillery. Italian guns appeared in German positions and reconditioned Italian lorries, cars and motorcycles were soon to be seen on the roads sporting the palm tree and swastika insignia of the Afrika Korps. When General Gariboldi, the Italian Commander-in-Chief North Africa, complained that the equipment was Italian property and should be promptly returned, Rommel expressed a very different opinion. His ally would have no real further say in the prosecution of the war in North Africa.
This gave the impending battle an entirely new complexion. British armour could cope with the Panzer Mk I and Mk II but not the subsequent two models. The Panzer Mk III armed with a 50mm gun was superior to any Allied armour until 1942, and although it had its shortcomings, the Mk IV with its 75mm gun was able to fire armour-piercing, high explosive and smoke shells so it could outshoot British Cruisers and shell exposed 25-pounder gun crews. While the Germans could fire from 3,000 yards (with high explosive), the British tanks would have to wait for them to close to within 1,000–500 yards before they could engage with their solid shot, and in the meantime the artillery would have had to retreat.
War correspondent Alexander Clifford, who covered the 1941 North African campaign, soon became aware of these shortcomings, reporting: ‘The Mk IIIs and Mk IVs both had more firepower than anything we had got. We found ourselves up against the Mk III’s 50mm guns firing four-and-a-half-pound shells … It meant that the British had to start every battle with a sprint of half a mile under fire before they could fire back.’ He calculated that to combat the Germans’ technological advantage the British would need to start with a 30 per cent superiority in numbers, adding gloomily: ‘Of course our military authorities had known and expected it. It was one of the risks they were prepared to take.’
When Rommel struck at Agheila on 24 March 1941, the British 2nd Armoured Division conducted a fighting withdrawal. Losses were not serious but the mechanical reliability of the British tanks was a concern and there were many breakdowns. Then on 2 April Rommel’s panzers ‘bounced’ the Support Group from Agedabia and a large part of the division was overrun. The 3rd Armoured Brigade was sent to Mechili to cover the withdrawal but by the time Rommel reached Mechili the 3rd Armoured Brigade had little or no fighting capability. The remains of the brigade, short of fuel and with just a dozen tanks left, sped north to Derna, only to be ambushed and destroyed on 6 April.
Rommel’s 15th Panzer Division was ready for action by the end of May, meaning that the bulk of those armoured forces facing the ‘Tiger Cubs’ would be German rather than Italian. The German 5th Light Division was south of Tobruk and the Italian Ariete Division’s tanks were on Tobruk’s perimeter, along with two Italian infantry divisions.
By late 1941 Rommel had 249 panzers, of which 174 were the more powerful Mk IIIs and IVs, supported by 150 obsolescent Italian M13s of the Ariete Division. Against these, the British could field 765 Cruiser, Matilda and Valentine tanks. Getting reinforcements to Libya meant running the gauntlet of the Royal Navy and the RAF, so obtaining replacement panzers was always something of a problem for the German commanders. For example, after the Battle of Sidi Rezegh in November 1941 the two panzer divisions mustered no more than a hundred tanks between them and on a number of occasions their strength fell even lower.
Despite Rommel’s setbacks in late 1941, the Gods of war smiled on him in early January the following year when a convoy berthed in Tripoli carrying seventy-five much-needed panzers and armoured cars. By 20 January his Afrika Korps had 111 combat-ready tanks with another twenty-eight undergoing maintenance; the Italian Motorised Corps had eighty-nine tanks. Even more crucially, ammunition and fuel also arrived so that more than 300 Axis aircraft could be put into the air. The Panzergruppe Afrika was now restructured as the Panzerarmee Afrika, and it included the Ariete Armoured and the Trieste Motorised Divisions. This enabled Rommel to bounce back and go over to the offensive again.
In response to the Matilda, the Germans dispatched the Marder self-propelled anti-tank gun to the 15th Panzer Division, though the units did not arrive until May 1942; it was really the 88mm flak gun that ended the Matilda’s reign as ‘Queen of the Battlefield’. The Matilda was withdrawn from service in North Africa by the end of July 1942. The British also seemed unable to learn from their mistakes. The Ariete Division and part of the 21st Panzer Division overran the isolated 3rd Motorised Brigade in the spring of 1942 and shortly after the 15th Panzer Division caught the 4th Armoured Brigade on its own and wiped out nearly half its strength.
During June 1942, following Rommel’s successful attack on the Gazala Line, he withdrew his armour into the ‘Cauldron’, in which the three German mobile divisions plus two Italian ones were cut off for a while. Rommel, though, triumphed thanks to his brilliant tactics, especially his anti-tank screen, and forced the British (including the 1st and 32nd Tank Brigades) to retreat from Tobruk. This was a disaster for the British.
Rommel employed superior tactics, training and communications; further, he appreciated the necessity for local superiority and the value of artillery and anti-tank guns. Both were used offensively in support of his panzers rather than as purely defensive weapons. Ironically, in June 1942 Rommel was far more appreciative of General Wavell’s efforts than Churchill was, remarking:
Wavell’s strategic planning of the offensive had been excellent. … He knew very well the necessity of avoiding any operation which would enable his opponent to fight on interior lines and destroy his formations one by one with locally superior concentrations. But he was put at great disadvantage by the slow speed of his infantry tanks, which prevented him from reacting quickly enough to the moves of our faster vehicles.
A young Afrika Korps private poses in his new uniform in Germany before his deployment to Tripoli. Although Hitler was preparing to invade Russia, Mussolini’s military incompetence in North Africa, Albania and Greece (coupled with a coup in Yugoslavia) forced his hand. In early April 1941 Hitler invaded the Balkans and dispatched Rommel to Libya. The diversion of British forces from North Africa to aid the Greeks’ short-lived resistance played into Rommel’s hands. (Dr Peter Caddick-Adams)
Under the codename Operation Sunflower, Hitler’s order to assist Mussolini in Libya was given on 6 February 1941. Two days later the first units departed Naples and arrived in Tripoli on 11 February. This DAK parade, put on for the benefit of local Italian military officials, looks very impressive, but little did they realise the true significance of allowing the panzers into Libya. The men are wearing tropical topees, tunics, trousers and long desert boots. (Dr Peter Caddick-Adams)
Two Afrika Korps soldiers pose with a local in Tripoli. The young panzer leutnant on the right is wearing early Afrika Korps desert boots, a tropical officer’s belt and jodhpurs (soon discarded); he has two ribbons, a tank engagement wound badge and an Iron Cross First Class. He is almost certainly with the 5th Light Division that became the 21st Panzer Division. The NCO on the left (who holds his cigarette cupped in his hand like a veteran) also has two ribbons, an Iron Cross First Class and a wound badge, and also, intriguingly, what looks like a blockade runner’s badge (Abzeichen für Blockadebrecher). This was instituted on 1 April 1941 and therefore the photo probably dates from April/May 1941; it almost certainly pre-dates July 1941, when the Afrika Korps cuff title was authorised, as neither man is wearing it. (Dr Peter Caddick-Adams)
The advance guard of the 5th Light Division (later the 21st Panzer Division) landed on 14 February 1941 and was rushed up the line to Sirte. The 15th Panzer Division’s 8th Panzer Regiment was shipped in three convoys to Libya between 25 April and 6 May 1941. The regiment initially fielded 146 tanks, comprising forty-five Panzer IIs (seen here), seventy-one Panzer IIIs, twenty Panzer IVs and ten command tanks. (Scott Pick)
A Panzer III Ausf E from the 21st Panzer Division with the 50mm KwK L/42 gun. The 5th Light Division did not get off to a good start: at Naples a cargo ship caught fire and sank with the loss of ten Panzer Mk IIIs and three Panzer IVs. The replacements for the 5th Panzer Regiment did not reach it until the end of April. (Author’s Collection)
From early 1941, when DAK’s armoured units first arrived, they were equipped with the Panzer Mk IV Ausf C and D and then later with the Ausf E and F1, which were armed with the 75mm KwK L/24 gun, which fired the same high-explosive projectile as the Ausf F2 (dubbed the ‘Special’ by the British), which was equipped with the L/43. While the Panzer IV was up-gunned with the long-barrelled 75mm L/43 gun to produce the Ausf F2 (seen here in Tunisia), which was capable of penetrating 85mm of armour at 1,000 yards and was superior to the British 6-pounder, its arrival was counter-balanced by the Grant. The F2 was never available in sufficient numbers, with around thirty in each of the panzer divisions at any one time, compared to a hundred Mk IIIs. (US Army/NARA)
This top-heavy self-propelled howitzer consisted of a captured French Lorraine Schlepper or ‘Tracteur Blindé’ 37L fitted with a German 150mm gun. This conversion, carried out in the summer of 1942, was especially for the benefit of Rommel’s forces and examples were issued to the panzer artillery battalion of the 21st Panzer Division. This one was captured in Tunisia. (US Army/NARA)
A side view of the sFH13/1 (Sf) auf Geschützwagen Lorraine Schlepper (f) (Sd Kfz 135/1) showing that the howitzer was really too big for the chassis. In fact, the tractor was unmodified except for a slight strengthening of the suspension. The superstructure was supplied by Alkett and assembly took place in Paris and Krefeld. (Author’s Collection)
The Panzerjäger 38(t) für 7.62cm Pak(r) was shipped to DAK forces during May–July 1942. They served with the 15th Panzer Division’s 33rd and 39th Panzerjäger Battalions, providing a welcome self-propelled, anti-tank gun capability. (US Army/NARA)
The smashed remains of a sIG33 auf Fahrgestell Panzerkampfwagen II (Sf) self-propelled 150mm gun knocked out on 27 June 1942 near Mersa Matruh. It consisted of a stretched Panzer II chassis (in order to incorporate the gun) and required an additional road wheel; production was supposed to have commenced in the summer of 1941 but design problems delayed this to the end of the year. In the event only twelve sIG33s were built and shipped to Rommel in early 1942; they served with the 707th and 708th Heavy Infantry Gun Companies until the last were lost the following year. (Steve Hunnisett/Ron Hunnisett RA)
Rommel received very few dedicated assault guns such as this Sturmgeschütz Ausf D (in fact he got three), and he was obliged to rely on a hotchpotch of hybrid self-propelled guns mounted on captured Czech and French chassis. It is thought that this particular vehicle may have been photographed in Greece in 1941. (L.J. Alexander/Corporal Eric Evans RASC)
This is the Sd Kfz 231 heavy armoured car with drive and steering to all wheels. Although only armed with a 20mm gun and a machine-gun, it conducted vital reconnaissance work for DAK forces in the wastes of the Western Desert. In parts of the desert armoured cars could perform as well or even better than tanks, though on soft sand and steep inclines they were at a disadvantage. (Author’s Collection)
American troops examine an armoured car support weapon in Sbeitla. The Sd Kfz 233 consisted of the heavy armoured car body fitted with the L/24 short 75mm gun and was intended to give reconnaissance units the ability to engage enemy armour. Although it did not appear until the end of 1942, some were employed along with the Tiger tank in Tunisia. (US Signal Corps/NARA)
The 88mm flak 18/36 antiaircraft gun could also be used in the anti-tank role. The ‘88’ was feared and respected by Allied forces in the Western Desert as no tank could stand up to it. This gun gained an almost mythical reputation and was to reap a rich harvest when Churchill’s ‘Tiger Cubs’ were rushed from Britain’s training grounds to the desert battlefield. (Author’s Collection)
A British Army officer examines a camouflaged anti-tank gun. Rommel’s forces became masters in the use of anti-tank guns, which were used offensively to support the panzers rather than solely in a defensive role. Time and time again they brought British armoured attacks to a halt, which then triggered a panzer counter-attack. The Italian technique of using light grey and dirty white colours to camouflage their guns made them virtually invisible at 500 yards. (NARA)
The backbone of German medium artillery during the Second World War was the sFH 18 150mm field howitzer developed by Rheinmetall & Krupp in the late 1920s; featuring a split-trail carriage, it had a range of 8.2 miles. This gun is deployed in the Western Desert with its half-track prime mover behind. Note the netting used to camouflage it in an attempt to avoid air attack. (Australian Army)
German troops in North Africa hitch a ride on an Sd Kfz 251/7. This half-track was used as a prime mover for artillery, flak and antitank guns and was one of the mainstays of the Africa Korps light armoured force. (US Army/NARA)
The battered remains of a German Kfz 31 Phänomen Granit 25H field ambulance and an Italian cargo truck. Rommel’s forces were forever short of motor transport and regularly made use of captured vehicles or indeed those belonging to the Italian Army. (US Signal Corps/NARA)
An Axis convoy under air attack. Note how the road has been built over the dunes. The main coastal road linking Libya and Egypt was regularly strafed and bombed by both sides. The wide-open spaces gave vehicles nowhere to hide and both sides’ lines of communication remained vulnerable throughout the war. (Author’s Collection)
Initially the Luftwaffe’s Messerschmitt Bf109s (seen here), Bf110s and Junkers Ju87s and Ju88s inflicted heavy losses on the Desert Air Force as the latter’s generally inferior Hawker Hurricanes and Curtiss P-40 Kittyhawks were often flown by inexperienced and under-trained pilots. Once Rommel had rolled the British out of most of Cyrenaica the Me109s and Ju87s were able to support his ground operations flying from Derna and Gazala. By 1942 the Luftwaffe’s preference for engaging enemy fighters rather than bombers often left Axis ground forces unsupported, with predictable results. (Author’s Collection)
However, the Stukas suffered heavy losses attacking Tobruk, forcing Rommel to withdraw a flak regiment that had been countering British armoured attacks. As the war progressed these dive-bombers became increasingly vulnerable. (Author’s Collection)
The Ju52 transport aircraft provided DAK forces with a vital lifeline throughout the North African campaign. Once established in Cyrenaica, they provided support not only to the Luftwaffe’s fighter units but also to Rommel’s ground forces. (Author’s Collection/Dr Peter Caddick-Adams)
The Panzer III was the mainstay of Hitler’s early offensives and in use with the Afrika Korps was far superior to any Allied armour before 1942. (Author’s Collection)
The Tiger tank featured in some of the battles fought in North Africa, but arrived much too late and in too few numbers to be of any help to Rommel fighting in Libya and Egypt. (Author’s Collection)
A seasoned-looking German NCO (a corporal to judge by his rank chevrons) in Libya wearing the distinctive Bergmütze peaked field cap. This cap was much more popular and more practical than the tropical topee. Uniform colours varied enormously, largely due to the effects of the sun. (Dr Peter Caddick-Adams)
