Chapter 504: The Battle Begins

Patton was actually very eager to launch the attack first, because he knew that the German army opposite him was not truly prepared for battle. However, he could only wait patiently for his moment of advantage to arrive.

Everyone was actually very clear in their hearts that even with the M4 Sherman tank, the Anglo-American armored forces were still no match for the German panzer forces. If they were to attack rashly, the limited armored strength under Patton’s command would suffer very serious losses.

Intelligence from the Soviet Union showed that the German panzer forces were equally formidable on the defensive. They could often achieve astonishing results by fighting a delaying action. And Patton, who was familiar with armored warfare, knew that the German tank cannons had an advantage over the American ones in both range and power. If the German panzer forces were to be let loose, they would very likely achieve an overwhelming victory.

So Patton could only wait, wait for his rear-echelon troops to catch up, to bring the 155mm howitzers—the pride of the Americans—to the front line. This way, the American army could rely on timely fire support to divide the German armored forces and then use their victory in the artillery duel to support their own tank operations.

The patient wait finally paid off. The German army opposite them also seemed to be waiting, so Patton could wait with a clear conscience for his artillery to select their positions, and then launch his tank attack.

While Patton was waiting for his artillery trump card, Rommel was also waiting. But he was not waiting for his own artillery; he was waiting for an opportunity to arrive. Rommel was skilled at destroying the enemy’s fire support system; this was a little secret to reducing his own casualties.

He quickly drew up a bold operational plan. He would concentrate all the Tiger tanks under his command and arrange them on his right flank. He had decided to use a second flanking maneuver to rout the Anglo-American Eighth Army in front of him.

A flanking maneuver required time, so he could only wait patiently, waiting for the enemy to launch the attack first, or for the time for his own counter-attack to arrive, so he could pin down his opponent.

For these reasons, neither Patton nor Rommel launched the attack first. They were both in a seemingly hesitant wait, waiting for the opportunity that best suited their own side. But after a long wait, they had both more or less completed their operational deployments, and so the real battle began.

Patton’s tanks were the first to attack, after a round of artillery preparation. Over a hundred tanks, providing cover for the infantry, began to approach the German defensive lines. From time to time, an M3 tank would stop, fire at the distance, and then be overtaken by other American tanks and fall behind.

Soon, Rommel’s armored forces began their counter-attack. But the first units Rommel sent into the battle were his light tank division, equipped with the older P-3, or Panzer III, tanks.

These tanks, after being modified, were equipped with a medium-length 75mm cannon. Although its power was not as great as the Panther tank, designated P-4, it was still considered a mainstream firepower configuration in the world at that time.

Under the cover of the Panzer IIIs, the German infantry quickly stabilized their positions. Machine guns and assault rifles opened fire fiercely in retaliation, repulsing the ferocious American attack. But before the German soldiers could breathe a sigh of relief, the Americans’ second wave of fire suppression began.

Shells rained down on the German positions. A few Panzer IIIs that had not had time to withdraw were destroyed on the sand dunes. The combat effectiveness of the well-trained and formidable Anglo-American Eighth Army was clearly not comparable to the enemies the Germans had encountered before. Their combat quality was not actually inferior to the Germans’, and in some areas, their training was even better.

In terms of combat experience, these Anglo-American forces had already encountered the German army before, so they were not new recruits who had just entered the battlefield environment. Although they still lacked experience, they had improved a great deal since 1937.

The Americans didn’t know how to fight; they had forgotten how they had won that distant victory 20 years ago. They were accustomed to covering the enemy’s positions with a dense barrage of fire and then crushing the enemy with superior numbers. So, it could be said that the Americans didn’t know how to fight, but they used various methods to cover up this fact.

When a nation that doesn’t know how to fight can mass-produce countless tanks and planes, and can make these tanks and planes have the most advanced performance in the world, they cover up their weakness in combat very, very well. It wasn’t until 1950, when they encountered an Eastern Dragon that had been fighting for 110 years, that they learned that there are some things in the world that cannot be solved by planes and cannons.

But at this moment, the American firepower did indeed exceed the Germans’. Their artillery frantically poured out their ammunition, blasting the German defensive positions into a pockmarked,惨不忍睹mess. The German grenadiers stubbornly held their hastily dug trenches, not yielding an inch in the face of the American covering fire.

Many German machine-gun teams deliberately let the American tanks pass, then suddenly emerged to attack the infantry following behind. They had no intention of leaving alive but were attacking fiercely with the mentality of fighting until their ammunition was gone and then dying. Soon, the casualties on both sides began to rise sharply. On many positions, the bodies of the soldiers from both sides even filled the deep trenches.

“Hello? Hello? Speak more clearly! Yes! The American shelling is still ongoing? Hold the line!” a German officer shouted, holding the telephone receiver and asking about the casualties of a battalion at the front. But the American artillery fire was so intense that he couldn’t even hear what the other person was saying.

“Here and here, and here and here, the American tanks have broken through the defensive line and are advancing into the depth of our positions,” the chief of staff reported to Rommel, pointing at the map.

“Send the 1st Regiment of the 7th Panzer Division up to block the American armored force on the right flank at the second defensive line! Give them a do-or-die order, not one step back,” Rommel ordered. He was waiting for his flanking force to attack from the side, so he had no choice but to use his weaker forces to defend his front.

Although the light tank division did not lose out in its engagement with the American armored forces, it did not gain any advantage either. Because they had not yet received air support, the Germans had already lost 47 Panzer III tanks. The supplies that the Italian logistics units had risked their lives to bring to North Africa had now become piles of burning scrap metal.

The American offensive capability was a bit higher than the German High Command had estimated, and a new type of American tank had already appeared on some of the defensive positions on the right flank. All this bad news made Rommel feel uneasy. For the first time, he doubted whether the troops under his command could hold out until the counter-attack began.

It wasn’t all bad news. Ten Stuka bombers, risking being shot down, had arrived in the combat airspace. These ground-attack aircraft accurately greeted an American artillery position, completely destroying some of the American howitzers and alleviating some of the pressure. However, British and American fighters soon arrived and drove off these German bomber units.

Because of the appearance of the new American P-40 fighter, the struggle for air superiority over North Africa was even more brutal than during the Battle of Britain. The American fighters, using British engine technology, performed very well. Although they were still not as good as the German Air Force’s Fw-190D, the “generational gap” no longer existed, and the loss rate for German fighters had also become higher.

Since April 15th, the Germans had lost a total of 37 fighters in North Africa, and had shot down 19 P-40s and 85 other types of aircraft from the British and Americans. This combat record, compared to the Battle of Britain, was somewhat of a skirmish. But in a place like North Africa, neither side had a large number of planes, so they could only fight a war of attrition.

After committing nearly a hundred Panther tanks to a local counter-attack, the German army seemed to have regained the initiative on the battlefield. The two sides fought a super-large-scale tank battle in an area of about 10 square kilometers. In the end, the Americans left behind the wrecks of 41 tanks, while the Germans lost 12 Panzer IIIs and 7 Panthers. What the German panzer forces could boast about was that most of the Panthers had been destroyed by American artillery; only 3 had been destroyed by American tanks.

To compensate for their own lack of artillery firepower, the Germans used their 88mm anti-aircraft guns as support fire, but they still could not compete with the American artillery units. The artillery duels between the two sides basically ended with the Germans ceasing fire last. This was not only because of the significant gap in the number of cannons on both sides, but also because the German artillery had weakened its range and other performance indicators in its emphasis on mobility.

In just half a day of fighting, the German army had already lost over 700 soldiers and had lost its front-line defensive positions. Rommel’s defensive line had been set up on the fly, so it was somewhat of a struggle to hold against the Anglo-American offensive. Now the German situation was a bit bad. Their carefully prepared flanking attack had not yet been launched, and the Americans were attacking their front like a tide.

Rommel was furious. He really didn’t know where his opponent got the guts to charge over so recklessly. Didn’t this Patton know how formidable the German panzer forces were? And to attack so fiercely from the very beginning, without leaving any room for maneuver?

In fact, Patton was also very furious at the moment. He had thrown in his most elite troops from the very beginning, hoping to crush the German forces opposite him in one fell swoop. He was very wary of the armored forces under Rommel’s command and, fearing that a long night would bring many dreams, did not intend to give Rommel any breathing room. He was afraid that if he gave Rommel time, he would come up with all sorts of tricks.

But Patton had thrown his most elite American division and his most elite British division into the battle from the very beginning, yet he had not achieved the pre-planned results. The German defensive line, although crumbling, had not yet been broken through.

Published: 2025-08-31T02:17:35.000+00:00
Last Edited: 2025-12-04T03:38:27.000+00:00
URL: https://www.patreon.com/caleredhair/posts/mtr-c504-battle-137749999

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