By the ABC Australia, Commentary of Chester Wilmott, Sir Max Hastings, Stephen Bungay as well as interviews with Australian and British and German soldiers who were there. The BBC movie on the subject does not work for me. Length 57 minutes Part 2 Alamein
It's the same as BBC version apart from this one has replaced the Scots narrator with an Australian. Think it was a joint BBC/ABC production. It's available in HD from the BBC Store website for a fairly low price.
Showed clearly how Rommel was not the "brilliant" strategist all believed him to be. No doubt he was good however his brilliance came from intercepts knowing where and when the British were going to attack. How many lives that American, Brevet Colonel Bonner Frank Fellers unwittingly cost the British and Commonwealth would be staggering. His one saving grace was that it was from his recommendation that Roosevelt began sending equipment to the British. A move that Eisenhower had apparently argued against. Fellers retired a Brigadier General after serving in the Pacific under Macarthur!
Good to watch them. I too knew nothing of the German unit 621? picking up all the intelligence data. It lead me to wonder how much that affected Churchills decision to change Wavell for Auchinleck and then Auchinleck for Monty. It may also add to the situation that Monty was able to defeat Rommel because he was not having his plans leaked. I wonder how Wavell and Auchinleck would have got on if they had had secure comms........................................ TD
Like you and many others no doubt, the thought crossed my mind as well however the "What if" scenario applies so we will never know. Enough to say that the loss of "surprise" in any battle would put you at a great disadvantage. We were receiving "Ultra" however the Australian infantry coming across the German/Italian intercept "headquarters" was most fortunate and allowed us to find the leak and have the Germans back to a level playing field.
There is a book titled "Rommel, and the Secret War in North Africa, 1941-1943" by Janusz Piekalkiewicz that details the German intelligence units in N.A., including Nahaufklarungskompanie 621. I have a number of books by Piekalkiewicz (primarily on the Russo-German war) and, as you would expect, he uses German sources but does includes a few Allied accounts as well. There are some issues with the captions under a few of the photographs e.g. " May 1942: A smashed British reconnaissance unit." which clearly shows two "Quad" artillery tractors, probably over-run in the "Cauldron", but I'm not sure if the author would be responsible for captioning photos. The other drawback, in my opinion, is that there are no footnotes, only a bibliography. I don't have any reason to question his motives, but the lack of footnotes always makes me wary - even though I couldn't check them if I wanted to as I can't read German! Dave
