Race

A thin line of British infantrymen advanced slowly up the ridge. When they were some 40 yards short of the summit, the whole hushed countryside seemed to blow up. Mortars, rifles and machine guns from the enemy positions suddenly concentrated on them. The infantrymen wavered for a moment, looked up at the sky, then dashed on to the summit, where they dug in.

From an observation post in the rear, Drew Middleton of the New York Times described what happened next:

"Out of the northeast came the bombers. They circled the position leisurely, then bombed. The ridge ahead seemed to be a mass of flame and smoke and the ground where I was lying half a mile away jumped with each explosion. There were seven Junkers 88s with two Messerschmitts as escort. When they had gone the ridge seemed bare, but soon you could see men crawling on it and hear the snap of Bren guns replying to the German fire. . . . There was another bombing attack and two more strafes before dark."

Bomb & Strafe. That was the story of what happened last week along the whole northern Tunisian front. For Lieut. General Kenneth A. N. Anderson the Tunisian campaign had become a problem of air support and supply. His First Army had crawled along the Atlas Mountains, across ancient Roman bridges, through grey-green olive orchards, along roads choked with dust--long columns of light troops, motorized infantry, mobile artillery and some rumbling tanks.

They had swept past Tebourba into Djedeida, which is 15 miles from Tunis. They had succeeded in straddling the railroad line from Tunis to Bizerte. Under incessant bombardment and strafing they had pushed beyond Mateur, which is 18 miles from Bizerte. Then, after a two-day-long tank duel they had been forced to fall back. Losses were heavy on both sides. Djedeida, Mateur and Tebourba became the three corners of a no man's land (see map).

At week's end there was a momentary lull while they caught their breaths. General Anderson had not had time to bring up the heavy forces he needed to beat the heavy equipment the Axis had poured in. And Anderson had lacked adequate air support.

Back to Back. Major General Jimmy Doolittle's 12th Air Force probably had enough planes to provide support in the air. From North Africa came reports of P-38 Lightnings meeting and beating Focke-Wulf 1905 and Messerschmitt 109Gs in their first major combat test. The difficulty was the lack of airdromes near enough to the front. The small French bases that were available were not equipped. Oil, gas and equipment for servicing had to be laboriously moved up. The difficulty was supply.

That same problem delayed General Sir Bernard Law Montgomery in the east. His Eighth Army had moved some 700 miles beyond its base at El Alamein. Until recaptured Bengasi was restored as a usable port, each tank on Montgomery's new front required the exclusive service of a 1,000-gallon self-propelled tank truck. The gasoline supply problem alone was mountainous. The problems of food, ammunition and spare parts piled mountain upon mountain.

For the Axis the problem of distances was not so great. From Sicily supplies could be flown or ferried across the 150-mile wide straits to beleaguered Tunis and Bizerte. Rommel was falling back on bases instead of reaching out from them. The two Axis forces were back to back, and they still held the 950 miles of the coast from Bizerte to El Agheila.

But for the Axis the problem of sustaining communication lines was growing more acute. The Royal Navy scoured the coast (see Supplementary Report, p. 35). Flying Fortresses, A-20s (Havocs) from Doolittle's force, Liberators and medium bombers from the Middle East Command converged on Axis supply lines from both sides, plastered Tunis, Bizerte, Sicily and Pantelleria around, the clock. Malta-based bombers took a major part in the attacks, avenging that little island for two and one-half years of Axis punishment.

Within the space of two weeks bombers from Libya had dropped more than 200 tons of explosives on Tripoli. If the effect could be compared to the damage those same Allied bombers had wreaked on Bengasi, Tripoli was rapidly losing its value either as a supply depot for Rommel or as a possible port of evacuation. Bengasi, when British infantry finally entered it, was a shambles.

Face to Face. At week's end, in the lull, the opposing forces gathered themselves. In Tunisia a growing force of some 20,000 to 30,000 Germans and Italians faced an Allied army of probably greater numerical strength. One quarter of General Anderson's forces were U.S. troops. The Axis, apparently recovering first from last week's bruising contact, reopened the attack. Anderson hung on until he could bring up his heavy troops. It was a race against time and a growing Axis tide.

From London came the announcement that Major General Carl A. Spaatz, commander of the U.S. Air Forces in the European Theater, had arrived in Africa. Spaatz was there as an "adviser," to reorganize the Allies' air strength, speed up the equipment of forward fighter bases.

In Libya Rommel had holed up at El Agheila, where Montgomery intermittently shelled him and peppered him with bombs. Montgomery was making no false step. He did not intend to repeat the mistakes of his predecessors and fling himself prematurely at Rommel's heels. He was making sure that he had the strength to follow through and finish the business up.

Bizerte, Tunis and El Agheila echoed with the roar of planes, the thunder of guns. Eastward and westward, all across the 2,700-mile-long north coast of the African continent, crawled ships, trucks artillery, men.

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