A close thing indeed
Folks often forget just how close Rommel and the gang came to knocking the British out of North Africa in late 1941.
The haunting image below is from 85 years ago this month.
A Panzerkampfwagen III (Pz.Kpfw. III) of the 15. Panzer-Division moves forward in North Africa just east of besieged Tobruk as a British truck burns, November 1941.
One of just two Panzer divisions in North Africa at the time (along with the 21st), the unit’s 8th Panzer Regiment had upwards of 105 Panzer IIIs in November, the division’s most common tank, balanced with a smattering of Panzer IIs and IVs.
Afrika Korps PzKpfw IV Ausf. D Pz. Rgt. 8, 15th Panzer Division, Tobruk, 1941
Sent to Libya in April 1941 to join the Deutsches Afrikakorps (DAK), the brand-new 15. PzDiv was formed up in Tripoli and moved to the front lines by June, under the soon-to-perish Generalmajor Walter Neumann-Silkow, who wore two Iron Crosses earned in the trenches of the Great War.
When the British Eighth Army under Lt. Gen. Alan Gordon Cunningham (who picked up a DSO and MC himself during the Great War) kicked off Operation Crusader on 18 November to lift the siege of Tobruk, it had 770 tanks, including many new Crusader Cruisers and American M3 Stuarts. By comparison, Rommel had fewer than 500 tanks, with over half being poorly armed Italian models.
The 15. PzDiv took a great mauling over the next six weeks, losing at least 435 killed, 1,361 wounded, and 1,820 missing out of its 5,300~ men, with Neumann-Silkow picking up a posthumous upgrade to lieutenant general.
By Christmas, the division, which started Crusader with 146 operational panzers, had only 31 Panzer IIIs and IVs remaining, plus an additional 12 light Panzer IIs, on its order of battle.
While rebuilt under Rommel, the 15. PzDiv ceased to exist after surrendering in Tunisia in May 1943.