Italy
General Paul Deichman, Kesselrings Chief of Staff, the 2d Air Fleet & German Forces South, sipped a small cup of the Italian Coffee. The Italians could be depended on to provide good coffee. So was the lunch, a excellent pasta & a soup. His Aide was clearly impatient to get back to the room where their brief cases, reference papers, and the other staffers he had brought along were. To meet and talk before the conference resumed at two o’clock. The aide, a Captain, thought it important they study some information on the delivery of transport aircraft to the groups. It would, the young Captain thought, make some sort of difference in the calculation of cargo deliveries to Africa over the next three months. The assistant transportation officer, anther Captain was a good friend of Deichmans Aide and that young Capitan wanted his friend to shine for a moment. Deichman had no particular problem with this. What he knew & the young Captain did not understand is the information on deliveries of the Ju52 transports was useless. It was clearly something Goering & Milch had fabricated to please the Grofaz. Anything with that history was worth little attention and of no value in planning. Perhaps the Reichs factories would delivery that many aircraft, but Deichman wanted to see the evidence from some other source than a report to OKW from the likes of Goerings office.
The afternoons meeting was already guaranteed to be a long one, and everyone present would be fortunate if it resolved more than one or two of the items on the agenda. So far the participants had managed to arrive at a figure for how many tons of fuel the Italian oil tankers might deliver to Tunis in the next ninety days. Then find a firm estimate for the bulk cargo capacity that could be depended on for the same 90 days. He suspected they really needed to be working on determining the deliveries to Africa and Tunis for 180 days, but OKW had demanded a plan for defeating the English in Tunisia, and driving them back to Algiers in just three months. Perhaps ‘Army Tunisia’ could. Things were looking better since Arnim had replaced the defeatist Nerhring. Still to many questions remained. The enemy had surprised everyone repeatedly in the past six months. There were likely to be more suprises & a more methodical & robust series of operations would be better. The long series of hasty and risky operations of the previous three and a half years had been successful. But more costly than many of his peers cared to admit. General Deichman also thought the results smaller each time. But they continued. Since the collapse of the Bolshiviks the entire Wehrmacht had been in chaos with hasty redeployments from the east to every other possible front. The results were not what most might have hoped for. Train loads of worn and mismatched equipment mostly. Vehicles for a entire Panzer corps lay scattered about Italy as the maintinance units worked endlessly to get enough for the next ship load in working order & off to Africa. It was only in the past month enough repair companies had arrived in Italy to handle the task properly.
So Deichman sat a few minutes longer at the lunch table and savored the demitasse of Coffee, while his Aide suppressed his fidgiting. When he arose his Aide set straight off for where the other staff were assembling, but Deichman turned to opposite direction and slipped into the latrine nearby. Then finally on to join the others. The young Captain as expected had the transport aircraft delivery schedule at the ready. Deichman politely looked it over, then was rescued by his Aide attempting to stall a communications officer with a message copy. Obviously the message was important or it would not have been sent to him here this afternoon, rather than to his office. But, the man was new and trying to prove himself by being officious with a Lieutenant. Deichman brusquely stepped away from the earnest Captain, and addressed the Lt directly, then quickly taking the message from his hand. It is a section from the newest intelligence summary on the enemy air effort in the Mediterranean. Reading thru its clear why the Intel chief sent it direct by messenger. He’d made it known to the intel chief the information would be germane to the planning conference underway. In its essence there were two points; first the enemy air strength across Africa is placed at some 2,400 aircraft. While not suprising the number is still higher than previous estimates predicted. The Americans newly formed 12th Air Force was already 490 operational aircraft. Hardly eight weeks after the first America soldier set foot in Algeria. The English were there as well in large numbers. In Egypt twice that many were divided between the English tactical air force and the heavy bomber force of the combined English and Americans. The raw numbers did not disturb him nearly as much as the second critical point. That is the intelligence estimate predicted the enemy air forces in Africa would double in 90 days. This he saw reading between the lines, was a conservative estimate. The actual numbers thought to be arriving by April were offset by a prediction of large losses. If the losses were less he saw the enemy would have more than parity across the Mediteranean, but a marked superiority. A thought about the mass of Luftwaffe aircraft arrayed in France & attacking England came & was dismissed. The English needed to be struck directly at home if they were to be forced to accept the inevitable. So the Luftwaffe returning from the east has been split. The bulk deployed across the north western French airfields, and the remainder to Italy, bringing the strength across the Mediterranean to some 2,600. That and the Italians had eight months earlier been thought to be enough to properly support The Africa war. Now what had seemed a easy victory half a year earlier was becoming a bloody contest in the air.
TheGeneral hands the paper to his Aide, he never keeps anything in his hands, & prefers not to file it himself, in his brief cases or cabinets. Ignoring the still waiting Capitan with the transport delivery schedule he confers briefly with the Luftwaffe Liasion Officer. The reports on combat aircraft strengths and projected deliveries for the coming year are to be sorted out of the briefcases and brought to the Chief of Staff imeadiately. Then he indicates the staff officers will move to the main conference room to continue the afternoons planning session. As they pass thru the corridor he considers both Kesselring and the Luftwaffe chief for the Mediterranean have or will receive the same intelligence report he has just read. Either way it will be urgent topic between himself and Smiling Al today. The latter will be joining the conference late in the afternoon to review their work.
Instead of the group imeadiately picking up the mornings unfinished subject Kesselrings transportation chief interjects with a review of the jammed Italian railways, and docks. Tediously he covers ground they all understand. Deichman understands the junior staff have to be aggressive, but he’d rather have returned imeadiately to the questions of sea transport to Tunisa rather than this longwinded recap. The Transport Chief gets to his point, he asks if the mechanics repairing the backlog of vehicles on the Italian docks and rail yards can be increased yet again. This point had been made before, the difficulty in bringing more vehicles to Italy when many thousands of worn automobiles & panzer are already there. Clearing the storage sites faster would ease the demand on the railways and coastal traffic. General Deichman cuts off the transportation chief before he runs on to repeat his argument. With the necessary Italians now present the discussion returns to the problem of getting those vehicles and much else across the sea. That might be more straight forward. But, as usual nothing is certain. The African dockworkers are not as efficient; the enemy bombs the docks and ships at sea enough a increasing wastage of material and time must be allowed for. The Italians also complain how there are not enough cargo ships. The CoS rather understands that. Despite the inclusion of Greek, Yugoslavic, and French cargo ships the Italian cargo fleet has shrunk and new construction is thin. There is the remaining cargo to the Tripoli “Festung” and the transport of the thin stream of cargo from nuetral Turkey and Spain. Now its suddenly necessary to set up a new army in Africa, so ships must be scheduled for the run to Bizerte. Deichman is certain there will not be a problem for the near term, tho the Italians are less certain. Near a tedious two hours later and they have determined all they can about the quantity of cargo that can be sent in the next few weeks.
Its been over a hour since the conference resumed and the participants scatter for a piss break. The logistics & transport officers will slip into another conference room to fuss with details for getting this new army to Tunisia. With only the intelligence and operations staff present the plan for how they will get to Algiers will be worked out. Kesselring did not provide a exact time he would join but the CoS is certain it will be after16:00. Another 90 minutes probablly. That will cut the operations planning short as Kesselring will want to review everything before picking up the Algiers plan.
Technically the army commander on the spot should be making this plan. But Arnim hardly has a Army, let alone a complete staff. His ground force defending the small enclave around Bizerte & Tunis is little more than a glorified corps, which had through December been short of everything including a complete corps HQ. In any case Arnim was fully preoccupied in managing the current battle and had no time for thoughts on the next one.
The next session starts with the respective German and Italian intelligence chiefs giving a joint review of the enemy forces across the entire Africa littoral. In Egypt sits the rear & logistics base of the English 8th Army & a sort of rear defense force. The latter includes ground and support formations extending to Palestine & Syria. There is no evidence those forces are being drawn down. They & the English forces in Lybia are both reinforced with fresh Common Wealth formations and others from England. The CoS interrupts to ask how much the English home army has been drawn down? The German intelligence officer has no answer. The CoS anticipated that, but asking makes the point that a answer might be important to understanding the reinforcements actually sent to Africa. Also in Egypt the English have built a powerful air force. It has been separated into two, with a tactical support division moving its bases west, far into Lybia. One of the identified such bases of this tactical air force is marked on a map as hardly 120 kilometers from Tripoli. The other a heavy bomber division remains in Egypt, its long range aircraft roving across the Eastern and Central Mediterranean. The English had their habit of making such raids at night. In the past few months the Americans had added hundreds of their own Fortress and Liberator four engined monsters. This new American Army Air Force, titled 9th Air Force was still increasing its sorties, despite substantial confirmed losses. Curious how the Americans had retained their air force under the control of the Army. Compared to the far to independent Luftwaffe the American arraingment seemed better than the chaotic management of Goering & Milch. They were flying a impressive number of the heavy long range bombers after just six months presence in the Mediterranean. More than the RAF perhaps. Next came a overview of the enemies Lybian army that had among other things just enveloped Tripoli. The Intel officers, neither Italian and German were able to guess if the enemy intended to assuallt Tripoli, or simply screen it and pursue the panzer Army Africa into Tunisia.
The Intel briefers insisted on including too much information about Malta. Perhaps the respective Italian and German intel officers thought to excise last summers fiasco by providing masses of information now? The CoS was already painfully familiar with the current state of the islands defense, having read a detailed report the previous week. OKW had wanted a new appreciation of a attack on the island during the winter. He’d made a few minor up dates to the intel report on Maltas defenses that had already been in OKW hands two weeks, then noted no viable airborne or amphibious force existed Now to execute such a operation. The formations not lost on Malta were now deeply committed in Tunisia. He recalled the happy optimism in which the attack on Malta had been ordered and planned in late spring 1942. The Bolshiviks collapse in Europe had freed a enormous quantity of ground forces and as the summer passed virtually the entire strength of the Luftwaffe in the east. Much of the army had returned home for demobilization and returned to industry. Impressive projections were made on the new equipment, weapons, and other necessities. But the Grofaz had wanted the English defeated sooner, rather than after a couple years of production reequipped the armies. Thus a attack on Malta was launched with a lot of heady optimism. The plan looked like a good one, there was enough air transport for the Paras, there were more than enough battalions of paras, Italian Marines, artillery, pioneers. & the size of the Luftwaffe available for the operation more than doubled. Deichman still thought the plan a good one, if the Lufwaffe had been able to hold up its part of the operation. Or perhaps the intelligence on the English defense positions was bad. He had reviewed much of it himself, before and after the battle, and was still not certain. Others blamed the cowardice of the Italian seaborne soldiers. The claim went they had mutinied and refused to assualt Maltas shore. Perhaps some had, those of the last waves to try. If so he did not blame them. He’d seen the air reconissance photos of the coves and beaches jammed with wrecked or drifting hulks of the landing craft. Few had returned to the ships to take on the next waves of the landing force. The evidence of the photos showed the boats crews had driven on to the shore despite a murderous fire and soldiers aboard had not forced the crews to turn away. Others blamed the Paras for not securing the airfield, tho they had overrun one runway early in the assuallt. Another story was the English had marched thousands of Italian prisoners, taken on the beaches into the Paras lodgment, making the Paras situation untenable. Deichman thought the Luftwaffe had simply failed to destroy enough of the defenders guns. Those overlooking the beach, and the anti aircraft & heavy cannon. At the end of the day the attack had failed, the Paras with no relief had surrendered with severe numbers of wounded and dead. Enraged orders had come down from OKW for disbanding the Para formations, for punishing the Luftwaffe, and with restrictions of all sorts on future cooperation with the Italians. Yet now a few months later he was in a important planning meeting with the Italians, the punishment of the Luftwaffe aircrew waived away or mitigated, the shattered para formations still existant, and enquiries about new attack on Malta being made.
The briefing officers had gone on to the enemy in the north western African French colonies. Aside from the 700+ aircraft in the two new enemy air forces covering the area there was now nearly a full corps of ground forces facing Arnim outside Tunis & Bizerte. There were also advanced reconissance forces probing as far south as someplace called Gafsa in central Tunisia. Arnims rapidly growing strength was sufficient to deal with that.. But, three enemy corps had been landed and there was little reason to believe the other corps in Algeria would not soon arrive in the Dorsale mountains just west of Tunis. That complicated the offensive planning underway. The enemy dispositions were not clear. They actually seemed confused about them as well. Neither did the intel officers have any clarity to offer on the best roads west to Algiers. The enemy had brought much of the force in Tunisia east by boat to Phillipeville & Bone. Arnims force would not have that luxury. They’d be advancing entirely by road. Perhaps the French railway would useful for logistics support. Perhaps not. Again the intel dept could not come up with a useful evaluation. What they were more certain of was the ability of the enemy soldiers facing Arnim. Deficiencies in the enemy were described. All were new to combat, they failed to hold infantry positions, Their tanks were badly handled, their AT guns inferior, their air support badly coordinated, their tactics bad… General Deichman considers that this same enemy has pushed within fifty km of Bizerte, raided airfields outside Tunis holds the stratigic cross roads of Medjeb al Bab after weeks of battle over it & is still throwing its air force violently agains the Luftwaffe, inflicting losses at a far higher ratio than in the east.
