On September 2nd, 1945, six years and one day after Hitler invaded Poland, Japan signed the instrument of surrender aboard the USS Missouri. No one will ever know how many died. No one will ever know the name of the first or the last victim. But they are the story of the Second World War—not the tanks that could not move, or the planes that could not fly, or the ships that could not sail without them.
War is about people. People in cities, villages, jungles. Strangers as allies, neighbors as enemies. Hundreds of millions of people for whom, for six years and one day, there was hell on earth.
The war entered its third year with battlefields in Eastern Europe, North Africa, and the Asia-Pacific. Before the year was out, hammer blows would transform the complexion of the war in each theater. Advance would become retreat, and the lives of scores of millions of people would be defined by violence. The Italian invasion of Egypt started on September 13th, 1940.
The British countered, and within days no Italian troops were left on Egyptian soil. After less than fifty hours, advanced elements of mechanized forces pushed through Italian positions and cut off enemy divisions attempting to hold Sidi Barrani. The Duce’s men, both native and Italian, were on the run. At the beginning of January 1941, Hitler announced plans to support Italy.
On February 6th, he appointed General Erwin Rommel to command the German Libya contingent, which became the Deutsche Afrika Korps. Rommel’s leadership qualities have always been a subject of great debate and great myth. On February 24th, British and German troops clashed in Libya for the first time. On June 15th, Wavell launched Operation Battleaxe, hoping to sweep east to west across North Africa.
After three days, he cabled his government: “I regret to report the failure of Battleaxe. ” Churchill said, “Rommel has torn the new laurels from Wavell’s brow and thrown them in the sand. ”
Defeat persuaded Churchill to send Wavell to India. Rommel’s aide-de-camp, Lieutenant Heinz Schmidt, reported the opposite effect on the Axis.
Everywhere Rommel went, troops beamed at him. He was becoming a hero. Dr. Goebbels lionized the marshal, using him as a heaven-sent piece of propaganda.
On January 21st, 1942, Rommel attacked with three German and seven Italian divisions. Mersa Brega fell to the 21st Panzer Division, with the 15th Panzer on its right, sweeping the British out of Wadi Farigh. Place names often seemed, as one soldier recalled, without associated places. “When you hear the names, you can’t visualize what it is.
You sit and say, ‘What would you expect to find there? ‘ Nothing. It’s just a name. ”
Rommel pushed northeast of the Gazala line, opening the Battle of the Cauldron at the end of the month.
Brigadier Claude Valentin was an early casualty. “I spotted two tanks about 1,500 yards ahead. We pulled up, and a quick look through glasses made me suspicious of their silhouette more than ever as two gun flashes from them were followed by a shell arriving about twenty yards away. I halted to collect my thoughts.
While doing so, I got Cutler to lug out my bottle of whiskey, and we all had a small tot. ” Valentin was taken prisoner on June 10th. By June 18th, Rommel had isolated Tobruk. He wanted Tobruk to bring up his supplies by sea, making his push toward the Egyptian border much easier.
The fall of Tobruk triggered a no-confidence motion against the government in the House of Commons. The member for Kidderminster moved that the House, while paying tribute to the heroism and endurance of the armed forces of the Crown, had no confidence in the central direction of the war. Rommel, the celebrity super general, served in some ways as an excuse for the British. Why were they being defeated?
Because they were fighting a superman, not because their tactics were poor, their equipment poor, or their leadership hadn’t got its act together. On July 1st, Rommel resumed his offensive and continued attacking through the end of the month. A staff officer, Friedrich von Mellenthin, wrote, “On paper, we seemed to have won the crusader battle, but the price paid was too heavy. The Panzer group had been worn down, and it soon became clear that only one course remained—a general retreat from Cyrenaica.
”
The theater of war grows large, with many players and perhaps many acts before the tragedy’s finale. On August 13th, General Bernard Montgomery assumed command of the British Eighth Army at a critical moment. The Germans were exhausted, strained to their limits, and their tanks were reduced in number and quality. Montgomery planned a set-piece attack at Alam Halfa, which broke the German offensive.
Rommel’s forces were then pursued across the desert to El Agheila. Fast forward to the broader war. The conflict would see millions dead across all theaters. And when it was over, entire populations had been wiped out, communities destroyed, their cultural identities and memories erased.
Still to this day, many of these communities have never recovered, or never will be able to recover. Millions died. Many more millions survived, fought, or suffered, or just got by, and then stepped away from history and got on with living ordinary lives. They never forgot the war, but they had families and friends and better things to think about.
By our own agency, we made hell on earth. But earth is not hell.
