What do you think of the Siege of Tobruk

The pacific war was still in full swing and they needed all Anzac troops to defend and eventually force back the Japanese.

 

Rommels squandered supplies which couldn't be replaced amd against the wishes of Paulas,Hitler,Guederian and von Rudestadt...yet he is scene as a fox...lol...he was told not to carry forth...and by not securing his supply lines, repairing the railroad left in shambles ended up dooming his Afrika Korp...even his retreat to Tunisia allowed the allied airfield to now reign destruction upon Rommels ports so vital for his supplies

 

In reply to wtid45 final lines..

For the last year I have been researching certain elements of WW2, in particular the involvement of Polish forces, central and eastern European forces, politics between the USA, UK, Poland and the USSR and the beginnings of the Cold war.

On the 11th of November last year I took to visiting the British Legion and the Polish SPK (Polish ex-combattants association) in London, and spoke to veterans of the war. I met a British soldier who had fought at Tobruk although he was very frail, on the Polish side I did not manage to find anyone from the Carpathian Division but I met other Poles who were in Egypt at the time still in training.

What is most apparent is how little credit Poles get at Tobruk, according to Norman Davies the poles made up over 20% of the total fighting force in the most critical period of fighting at Tobruk, this was confirmed from a number of other sources both from the British and Polish side.

Likewise the Poles always seem to be categorised with the Czechs, which is largely wrong on all counts both militarily and politically.

The czech soldiers saying in North Africa (and largely throughout WW2) was:

"...I won't fight for English marmelade..."

...in other words I won't fight for English money, ironically while most of the Poles were equipped and trained by Britain (with exception to certain units such as the Carpathian Division) they were not fighting for British money (it is not that anyone was fighting for money but all armies recieved pay including the British) but recieved their pay from the Polish Gold reserve which had miraculously been smuggled by ships out of Poland just at the outbreak of war and was held by authorities in Canada (this was to be later confiscated in 1945 by the British government as the repayment for equipping and paying the free Polish forces during WW2)..

That the czechs simply did not want to fight is both backed up by the accounts from Polish veterans and by British North African high command archives.

-According to the Polish veterans I spoke to the czech attitude to them (there is some similarity in language with Czech and Polish) was that they were fools for fighting with the British (which ironically turned out to be true) and that they were wasting their time.

-The British high command archives denote that the Czechs were "...unsuitable..." for front line service, and were subsequently used for rear duty as a last resort (such as supply duty or when marching the Italians off to captivity).

Likewise the Czechs seem to get far more praise and/or recognition when it comes to the Battle of Britain when only a handful took part. In the year 1941 and in particular september the most crucial month of the Battle of Britain, hardened veteran Polish fighter pilots again made up over 20% of the RAF (this is including the PAF units under the wing of the RAF). Flight No.303 was the highest decorated unit of the RAF(PAF) in the whole of the war, and a pole flying in the PAF/RAF had the highest total kills of any allied pilot in the whole of WW2, flying in the Poland '39 (where he was already an ace), France '40, Britain '41-'43 and Wester Europe '44-'45 campaigns respectively (this is negating Soviet propaganda of ace pilots who downed 300+ planes, meaning in total the soviet air force shot down 3 times more luftwaffe planes than the nazis managed to produce in the whole war).

While there were no ethnic polish pilots on the German side during the war (despite those of mixed german/polish background), there was a large contigent of czechs flying in the luftwaffe (there is a Me-262 in the Czech Air Museum), including the czech medium bombers which had been captured by Nazi germany before the start of WW2, these were subsequently used to bomb london and in some cases were still manned by their original czech crews. Likewise the proportion of czechs who flew over to fight on the British side is a miniscule percent of the total czech air force (and virtually non-existent compared to the Poles).


The reasons why the Poles are usually wrongly thrown together with czechs and other central/eastern european groups that participated on the allied side is quite clear as I will go onto explain.


Amongst the Czechs are many other groups of ethnicities such as Ukraine, Lithuania, Hungary etc. that adhere to the "we were betrayed by the West at Yalta, by the British (and Americans) to Stalin etc." view of WW2. Britain had made no firm promises or written agreements to any of these ethnicities or countries concerning their future borders and autonomy, and conveniently the Poles fall into this group.


For example, the surrender of the Cossacks in Austria 1945 to the British who subsequently handed them over Stalin (and their deaths), is regarded as the British Cossack betrayal. But this is grossly wrong, the other side of the story that most people amazingly don't hear is that this was the same ruthless XVth SS Cossack Cavalry Corps who brutally murdered thousands of innocent people and were considered one of the most cruel wings of the SS. Besides which Britain had no political or moral obligation to help this ethnic group and there were few who had sympathy for the Cossacks who were reported to have committed inhumane atrocities against resistance fighters in Eastern Europe.


This case and many others like it are collectively known as the "Western Betrayal", and is the claim of many central/eastern european countries that ended up behind the iron curtain.


The fact is Poland was the only country out of all those that found themselves on the wrong side of the curtain, that Britain had a real obligation to. There were written agreements, (despite the entente between France, Britain and Poland the reason why Britain went to war) between Churchill and Sikorski. Poland had a substantial force fighting along side with the British and was the 4th largest allied army (after Britain and her colonies), the Poles took part in every major British battle in Europe including the fall of france, taking more losses than the combined US and British armed forces during the whole war. When it was clear that Britain had betrayed Poland (it was the German Secret service that informed the Poles in Italy over the radio of their betrayal at Tehran), the poles decided to stop fighting meaning the virtual collapse of the Italian east front, Churchill flew straight to the Polish front in Italy to pacify the Poles and re-assure them of his promises and obligations..


It was British policy to ignore the poles after 1945, and largely to diminish any part that the Poles played in the war thus distancing British responsability for Poland. In this way Poland was and is collectively thrown in to the camp of "Western betrayal" countries, and/or thrown together with the czechs or free french when regarding any military action.


It is amazing that many of the archives in London concerning Poland in the war simply went "missing" at the end of 1945, especially concerning the enigma (Alan Turing was given the enigma machine + the continental code by the Poles). All the files and documents from Poland's Home army decoding branch (which located the V1 sites from code decryptions) Poland's Bletchley park, handed over in 1945 to the British were destroyed "by mistake". Likewise 95% of the documents concerning the suspicious death of Sikorski (Gibraltar plane crash '43) which were supposed to be released on Churchill's death have not been released despite what the secrecy act has to say 65 years on, the British government has extended the release date by another 25 years so we will have to wait until 2020+ when all the veteran poles of the war are for certain in their graves to find out the truth.


Sorry for the rant. What I am trying to get at is it's not right to line Poland up with countries such as the Czechs in WW2, and especially not when it comes to Tobruk. This has been the policy of the British establishment, historians and apologists in order to dilute Poland's huge contribution in the war, when the more I read about Poland's contribution the more I realise without Poland we would have very possibly been praising Hitler and speaking german, as the Queen said in 1992 "..if it were not for the poles, the candle of freedom may very well have been snuffed out.."

If you would like to know more, or find this too much to swallow, there is a great book you can start with...

"For our freedom and yours" by Olson and Cloud

 

informative post TB and nice add on to my earlier post

 

Well gents this is all very interesting but what about the German attack on Mersa el Brega (March 31 1941) which began German involvement in North Africa. Was the defence all it should have been. Why were Australian troops not in the forward positions they had at least one fully equiped brigade.

 

thrombox,

My (step) father in law was a member of the 18th Brigade, 7th Div, 2nd AIF.

He served through most of the Seige of Tobruk, and when the Polish 'Carpathian Brigade' arrived he was attached to them to assist with their transition to desert warfare.

He had a high regard for them and in particular their sense of humour. They hated the germans and had no hesitation is taking them on at every opportunity.

Bob related the very amusing incident when they were listening to the BBC reports of a clash on the Russian Front. The BBC said "10,000 germans killed" and the Poles cheered wildly. The BBC then said '10,000 russians killed" and they cheered even louder!

He reckoned they were good blokes!


John.

 

I am a 59 yr.old man from New Hampshire USA. I am currently writing a screenplay about an Australian man, who was one of the Rats of Tobruk. I have a few questions, which I'd like to pose to all of you gentlemen.


Regarding the Rats of Tobruk, who defended the Anti-Tank Ditch:

1. What kind of hand held weaponry would an infantryman use to disable a tank (a lighter armored Italian tank and a heavier armored German tank)?

2. Does anyone know any of the songs that the men would sing to keep their spirits up?

3. What commander did the Rats serve under?

4. What Division, Batallion, etc. were the Rats from?

5. Does anyone know of stories I could read detailing the night time raids the Rats made across the Ditch into German encampments?

6. How would the Rats disrupt the German night time inspection of the anti-tank ditch, as they searched for a good place to cross the ditch, to stage their invasion on Tobruk?

Thank you very much for any and all help you might give me with these questions. My father, Arnold Bennett, served in North Africa. He entered in the invasion force at Oran. I need to honor my father and all the Allied men with accurate information in my depiction of events and details in the story that I'm writing. Thank you for your help.

 

I don't have access to my references right now, but from the top of my head I will try to remember some things for you.

I have references of Australian infantrymen laying on the ground with c4 explosives covered by sand, and they would allow the tanks to roll over them and they would attach the c4 to the bottom, thus disabling the tank. This of course was a dangerous course of action for the men involved, but was effective at disabling a tank.

Mainly though the British and commonwealth defenders relied on large minefields covering the area as well as the artillery from tobruk herself, and of course antitank weapon pits. The standard infantrymen also had boys antitank rifles that could be used on the lighter tanks. There were also matilda tanks in tobruk.

9th Australian Division under Major-General L.J. Morshead, Australian 18th Rifleman Brigade, a few British artillery regiments and a mixed brigade of tanks.

When I get some more time I will type the many from my books into here.

The Australian troops were not the only ones in Tobruk at all, they were replaced later in the siege by the the British 70th Infantry DIvision, the Polish Independant Carpathian Rifle Brigade and the Czechoslavokan Battalion and a British tank Brigade.

Here is an excellent site I found for you regarding the Australian units in Tobruk, showing their formations and some stories for you,
Tobruk; Australian toughness beats Rommel

I remember something one of the other Australian members wrote, which was along the lines of,

What will it take to take Tobruk, (a question asked to Rommel)
Rommel Replied, An Australian Unit to Rout.

 

Hey there my friend just wanted to point out that C4 was a post war development. During the 60s.

"During and just after World War II a number of new RDX-based explosives were developed, including Compositions C, C2, and eventually C3. Together with RDX these incorporate various plasticisers to decrease sensitivity and make the composition plastic."

http://www.ww2f.com/weapons-wwii/25360-types-plastic-explosive-used-americans.html

 

I stand corrected, thankyou JCF.

 

I hadn't heard the word pommie for years

Amazing thread, quite a lot of fine posters around here!

 

Tomcat and others.


Combined Arms Research Library


A long and most interesting and comprehensive study of the Seige of Tobruk.


John


PS,

If any of you have Google Earth, it is possible to zoom in to the perimeter of the garrison, in particular the southern section where the Easter Battle took place. The tank ditch is still clearly visible, and the oval shaped infantry strong points are positioned every 3 or 400 yards. These held mainly men with Lee-Enfield rifles and Bren LMGs.
It was from these that the aggressive night patrols were launched every night.


PPS,

I went to boarding school with the son of the CO of the 2/48th Battalion, 9th Division, H.H. 'Tack' Hammer. 'Tack' Hammer ended the war as a Lt General, and he died in the 1960s. His funeral was one of the biggest ever seen in Melbourne, and most surviving members of the 9th Div, the 18th Brigade and the 'Rats of Tobruk Association' attended.

 

terrybtt,

I may have related this somewhere before, but it was my privilege to spend many hours talking to Bob and his 'Rats of Tobruk' mates over a glass of cleansing ale.

This was in the 1960s, 70s and early 80s.

I was but a young man of ~20 to 40 at the time, and I listened fascinated to their stories and of course asked dozens of questions. I got the distinct impression that most of the blokes actually enjoyed the experience, and also that they were absolutely determined that Rommel was NOT going to get Tobruk! They had respect for the Africa Corps, but little regard for the Italians.

Of course the good times were related more than the bad times, but over the hours I gained a good picture of the events.

If you can imagine an old truck 'mud-guard' of pre war motor vehicles, this was Bob's home for the duration. He scrounged it from somewhere, and it covered his "rat-hole" and kept at least some of the sand out of his stuff.

He died at the ripe old age of 94, after having his 36th birthday in Tobruk. His mates called him "Pop", and the Army thought he was 8 years younger than he was.


John.

 

Australian forces had a busy time in the Middle East. They achieved the first Allied victory of the war against the Italians, successfully held Tobruk and had the major role at El Alemain. And Royal Australian Navy ships played a vital role in the Mediterranean. Few people seem to know that Monty and his family grew up in Australia.

Then attention swung to Syria. When the Australians entered Syria - to defeat the French - they were led by the guide Moshe Dyan. He earned his eye patch fighting with the Australians.

In this campaign, Gen. Blamey (2IC Middle East) took decisive action to resolve the command difficulties caused by Gen Henry Maitland Wilson's attempt to direct the fighting from the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. Later Blamey forced a showdown with Auchinleck over his insistence that the Australian 9th Div be withdrawn from Tobruk, allowing his command to be concentrated in Syria. Blamey was supported by Prime Minister John Curtin and Auchinleck was forced to back down.

Curtin insisted that the 9th Div be returned to Australia to fight the Japanese menace. Churchill's response was to order them to Burma. Curtin had to insist 3 times before the troops were diverted to Australia. They were at sea when the change occurred. The troop ships had to travel home without any escort.

The battles in New Guinea are almost completely unknown outside Australia mostly due to Macarthur's policy of only pushing American stories. Yet the fighting there was some of the bloodiest of the war, especially at Milne Bay and Sanananda. These were the first defeats for the Japanese.

Yet after New Guinea, the Australians were restricted to mopping up despite strenuous objections from Blamey.

The names of Macarthur and Churchill are not popular in Australia. Churchill was prepared to sacrifice the Dominions in order to achieve victory in Europe.

Yet this was very short-sighted. The 20th century was a time of battle between East and West (it still is). The battle for Europe whilst important, wasn't all that important. It just seems to be so important because Europeans write the histories. The Americans and the Australians fully recognised the Eastern threat and acted accordingly. The British understandably were far more concerned protecting their island.

To me it is a feature of European Colonial policy to use their captured domains to the full for gain yet when they come under threat, to abandon them.

 

Now now mate, we must never forget the role both of Britain herself in the Desert but also the many other commonwealth and allied units that fought. In reality the Australian troops were relatively small in number, but they certainly achieved much considering their equipment, they were issued with.

A common misconception is that the Australians alone held the harbour town of Tobruk, well we know that is not true, and we must applaud every unit that was there,(for example) because if the polish failed in their defence, the staut defence by the Australians would have been for nothing, but togethor they held the town.

A great post about the Australian forces nonetheless.

 

My grandfather fought in new guinea and i know for a fact that australians at the time resented the the fact that they were'nt fighting under purely australian command. they had tension with the americans to eg. the battle of brisbane. Even in regards to the way the australian and british armies were structured could cause tension the british were very official and regulated australians were fairly relaxed and the chain of command was very accsesible. I'm not sure if this was ww1 or 2 but there are stories of australians fighting in womens clothing they had found as a laugh, i couldnt see british finding that very soilder like.
As far as rommel goes im sure he knew the state of mind of the enemy he had captured a few aussies and seemed to only heap praise on them. Besides he probbly knew using propaghanda against the australians and there counter parts had a reverse effect after the radio berlin propaghanda remarks "trapped like rats" only rallied them together

 

There is a debate with Tomcat and other members on the first page of this thread about britain not caring for Asia and Australia!
Churchill could have easly supply Australia if Churchill did not decide to defend greece.
Churchill chose the greece compaine over the asia singapore defence for Australia,this to me means that Churchill did not really care for asia and Australia.

 

I have a novel on the great war where exactly that happened. A British Lieutenant had tried to order around Aussie troops which resulted in a Burly man approaching the LT and saying " I dont take orders from Brits"

From my understanding the Aussie officers and enlisted men were on a first name "friend" basis.

 

I have to give our guys the 2nd New Zealand Division a mention they played a major role in Operation Crusader where Rommel had to retreat after hard fighting and we also had big role to play at alamein 4 infantry Divisions were involved in the attack

2nd New Zealand
9th Australian
51st Highland
1st south african

 

I,ve got books at home that state that Montgomery considered freyberg his best divisional commander not that it really matters.

The New Zealand division was already committed in Italy when Montgomery requested them and there were problems with shipping so they stayed where they were and it was a shame they didn,t fight in Normandy the terrain would have better suited our set up which was along the lines of a german Panzer division.