Montgomery

I think as far as I would go would be to suggest that he was looking for something inspiring - I still can't agree that he is saying close to point blank range - because earlier in the memo he talks about the 2-pr being able to penetrate Pz III/IV at normal battle ranges.

OK, I see that.

They [1 SA Div] had received a warning order to occupy el GUBI as a 'Bde defended locality' after the 7th Armoured Division captured it though hadn't they? That's hardly a warning order to join up with a Bde from another division and launch a joint or even simultaneous attack. The account in the SA OH hardly records them as being "primed to intervene", Pienaar being more worried about his petrol consumption. 30 Corps ordered 1 SA Division to move its two brigades at about noon - so clearly, if 1 SA Bde were to be launched into an attack against an Italian Armoured Division the orders would have had to come from Corps HQ.

Do you happen to know when the term "cavalry charge" started to be used for 22nd Armoured Brigade's operations on 19 Nov? In the SA OH it refers to an article by Brigadier R.M.P. Carver (in the RAC Journal of Oct 1948) which stated that the brigade 'ran headlong' into the battle. That's just not what the 22nd Armoured Brigade records suggest. Is there an account from the Italian perspective?

Regards

Tom

 

Yeah, and we should keep in mind that Scott Cockburn was ordered by his Divisional Commander to attack el Gubi and didn't launch his entire brigade into a headlong cavalry charge.

Regards

Tom

 

Hello Tom,

This is from Montanari's edition of the Italian OH.



Enjoy!

 

Andreas & Tom,

I think any discussion regarding Bir el Gobi, 22 Armd Bde and support needs to have this in the discussion.

 

True. He only launched one regiment into a headlong cavalry charge and then had another one hammered trying to extricate the first one.

All the best

Andreas

 

Andreas & Tom,

22 Armd Bde advanced "two up". That's to say, two regiments in front (4CLY left and 2RGH right) with 3CLY behind in reserve.

Both leading regiments bumped Ariete at about the same time, 2RGH more heavily than 4CLY who were then tasked to assist 2RGH on their right. A bit later, 3CLY was despatched around the right to attempt a flanking movement into the side of Ariete.

When the order to attack was actually given is difficult - if not impossible - to pin down.

 

You keep telling us that in your opinion 22nd Armoured Brigade launched a "headlong cavalry charge" but so far haven't provided any evidence. I don't get that impression from the sources I'm looking at including the RGH and CLY war diaries. I've asked a couple of times which accounts you are basing your opinion on, are you going to offer any or just keep repeating yourself?

Regards

Tom

 

I posted above the Op Instruction issued in the wee hours of 19 November.

In regards to what 22 Armoured Brigade are supposed to do there is room for confusion as to whether it is, or is not, supposed to secure LUTON itself (ie Bir el Gubi).

In regards to what support the brigade had in its task, 7 Support Group is to prepare to do two things of which the first listed is to support 22 Armoured Brigade's effort.

The 22 Armoured Brigade war diary indicates the order to attack Bir el Gubi (ie Ariete Division) was given (verbally) in person by Gott (GoC 7 Armoured Division) after they had begun their march forward that day.

Q1. Did Gott, and if so when, decide to remove 7 Spt Gp from the Bir el Gubi task?
Q2. Did he inform Scott-Cockburn of this?

22 Armoured Brigade also had 11H and two columns in support at Bir el Gubi. It had one column under direct command which seems to have taken no part at all in the proceedings. 11H was providing a forward screen in addition to recce and they had a column too under command. This column was involved in proceedings and tried to coordinate its effort with 4CLY and 2RGH but failed to make contact. Nevetheless, the guns blasted away where they could.

Columns were not seen as a combined-arms force to support the tanks in any sort of deliberate attack. Yes, the field artillery in a column could be asked to put up a bit of a stonk in advance of the tank attack, but that's about all. All the other elements of a column (Inf, ATk, AA, RE etc) were only there to provide close protection to the guns.

 

Tom

I sense some frustration here, so let's clear a few things up.

1) You introduced the term 'headlong cavalry charge'. Not me. I used this formulation: "Scott-Cockburn attacked a combined arms division with an unsupported regiment (not even a brigade) on 19 November." for a reason.
2) Thanks for MarkN for correcting me, yes, two unsupported regiments, not one. It doesn't alter the key term however, "unsupported".
3) I don't feel I have to provide evidence for a term I did not introduce.

To sum up: that Scott Cockburn sent in two unsupported regiments in full knowledge of facing a full Italian armoured division without making any attempt to reconnoiter the objective is a matter of the historical record, the war diaries of all the involved units make this clear. I'm not averse to some revisionism, but claiming that his decisions on this day made much sense or that somebody else is to blame for the mess that resulted is a step too far.

If you are of the view that this was not a shambles of the first order, or that Scott Cockburn was the unwitting victim of someone else's incompetence, you are more than welcome to provide the evidence for your view.

Which brings me to this: you keep mentioning that Gott ordered Scott Cockburn to attack Gubi. The only primary evidence I can find for that is the war diary of 22 AB, although I am missing the message log for the morning of 19 November. Is there any other?

All the best

Andreas

 

I don't trust the 22 Armd Bde war diary. I think it was written very carefully as a CYA document.

For the next day, 1 S.A. Bde was planning a proper brigade attack with tank support to clear el Gubi. This was cancelled when 22 AB was withdrawn as it was (rightly in my view) felt that this wasn't a job for an infantry brigade. If they had attempted this the day before we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Not sure whose guns blasted away, but it wasn't C Bty 4 RHA, who only report a short action by B troop with tanks, and then nothing.

Same goes for the infantry, who also report not being called upon.

All the best

Andreas

 

We'll just have to learn to disagree on that...after all what were the 11th Hussars doing on the evening of 18th November and again in the morning of 19th, and what were 2 RGH doing all morning? The SA OH makes the point that with such a small artillery allocation it was hardly worth hanging around waiting for them to register and, I would suggest, the same goes for infantry support. Was it a company to cover the whole battle area?

Essentially, in my humble opinion, Scott-Cockburn was put into an impossible position by his commanders as the forces allocated to him were incompatible with the objective given him - there does seem to be some suggestion that his commanders thought the Italians at el Gubi would withdraw in the face of a British attack.

I'll have a look and see if there are any other records.

Is it only the 22 Armd Bde war diary that you doubt? I doubt the accounts of el Gubi by those who weren't there but could usefully conduct CYA activities by calling it a 'headlong charge' - such as staff officers at 30 Corps HQ.

Anyway

Regards

Tom

 

I have just finished reading James Colvin's excellent work the Eighth Army versus Rommel, Tactics, Training and Operations in North Africa 1940-1942 Helion & Co Ltd 2020.

I would commend this to anyone considering posting their opinions on this thread....

In answer to the topic

The answer is a resounding NO.

The Eighth Army was in a very poor state in August 1942. It had sufficiently low morale that at Mersa Mutrah and inferior Axis force hustled it in to retreat. Commanders of the commonwealth formations had no confidence in the corps or army commanders

Its senior commanders had introduced a set of ideas that had not worked in the past, were not thought through and inconsistently implemented. There was a culture of orders as the basis for discussion. Armoured formations in particular operated as a form of cavalry club.

In August 1942 the Eighth Army faced an imminent attack by the Panzer Armee, which at that time had rough parity in armour and, after receiving reinforcements would then need to break through the Axis defences and achieve what it had been unable to do in 1940 and 1941 - drive the axis out of Libya.

Montgomery was about the only man for the job. He was an utter sh1t and did not care about upsetting people or their clubs. He had a strong will and determination capable of stamping on dissent. His ego, self belief and study of desert warfare meant that he would not swayed by people telling him that this wasn't how things worked in the desert. He was an excellent trainer. He was a brilliant communicator and, unlike previous commanders visited the troops and inspired them with the belief that he meant business. He wasn't the worlds greatest tactician, but he picked simple direct tactics that could be understood and implemented by his imperfect army. He delivered successes that created self belief among his soldiers.

Was there anyone else who could have achieved that?

There has always been a debate about the extent to which Montgomery took over Auk's existing defensive plans. Colvin argues that Dorman Smith's concept was for a mobile battle fought by battlegroups. This probably would not have ended any better than Mersa Matruh..

Gott was the first choice. Colvin's analysis is that regardless of how Gott would have fought a defensive battle at Alam Halfa he did not have the stomach to engage in an attritional frontal attack on El Alamein - quoting Carver. "Out of Step"

Colvin identifies O'Connor as someone with the steel to make people obey - but he was a PoW. Pope and Campbell were dead.

Alexander was too much a nice chap and empty headed to have taken direct command of the army

Other senior-ish chaps from the UK might have been Anderson who commanded 1st Army in Tunisia. The talent pool was quite shallow.

Freyburg and Moreshead were two commonwealth soldiers who might have been groomed as Corps commanders.

Patton?

 

As exemplified by his treatment of Lumsden during Second Alamein. Even if Lumsden had a good point or wanted to ensure that Monty was fully aware of the consequences of what he was ordering (this was not the case), Monty wasn't about to 'open negotiations' in the middle of a battle, and to have Gatehouse on the phone, defending Lumsden's assessment must have made it look pretty close to a cavalry mutiny. Given Lumsden's battlefield success in 1940 (which rankled), his support from Alex and Churchill, and his society connections, you'd have to have sacksful of confidence to send him packing--Monty did. Making an example of him set a useful moral tone within Eighth Army--things had changed.

One single point at which I might demur from your excellent post is where you claim that previous commanders had not visited the troops; one counter example that comes to mind is the large number of men and their commanders who recall seeing Auchinleck at the roadside in the first few days of July, ushering back his retreating men with reassurances that they'd done well and he had the next move in hand. Of course, he was only in command of Eighth Army at that stage by dint of having stepped in to replace Ritchie (his choices of appointments were generally poor), but, all the same, I think he knew when it was the moment to 'get forward' to see and be seen.

I'd supply references for both of these points, but I've spent the whole afternoon packing up my library to move home.

 

Andreas & Tom,

203 Battery, 51 Field Regiment RA

The written Op Instruction for the day has 7 Support Group to "be prepared to support" the attack on Bir el Gubi. Historically, we know they did not support 22 Armoured Brigade at all that day.

Just like there is problems in determining when 22 Armoured Brigade were "ordered to attack" Ariete, there is no clarity when 7 Support Group was relieved of the need to "be prepared" to support them. The best one can get from the 7 Support Group war diary is that they sat around all morning doing nothing then, at 1330, the commander went off looking for somebody to tell him what to do, noticed that HQ 7 Armoured Division was heading north, so followed them.

Scott-Cockburn had a column under his direct command which he does not appear to have given a single task all day. At least one of the armoured regiments called for artillery support and heard nothing / were ignored.

He was also working with 11H which in the immediate area meant B Sqn. Working with B Sqn, 11H was another column whose guns were in action at Bir el Gubi but there was zero coordination with 22 Armoured Brigade despite the efforts of the column to effect such.

Scott-Cockburn's effort does indeed conform to the notion that somebody thought the Italians would just run away or surrender on first contact. But whether it was Scott-Cockburn himself or another is somewhat opaque.

I guess the simplist way to explain Scott-Cockburn's effort, given the unsupported tank attack, is to drop the word "Hobart". Sadly, that would only demonstrate a complete lack of understanding of almost everything.

 

Hello Sheldrake,

Here, I believe, is one of the key components to understanding the topic. Often neglected or glossed over.

Alamein presented the first opportunity geographically for a well defined front line to emerge with two sides facing one another across the battlefield. No troublesome open flanks to overly concern oneself with either in defence or attack. The chance for a big set piece attritional battle was afoot.

This was what senior British commanders felt comfortable with. They had the resources to man the line adequately which meant concerns such as whether to concentrate artillery or disperse were less, if at all, troublesome; they could now support everybody from concentrated locations if they so chose. Something that was simply not possible in earlier battles.

This type of battle very much suited Montgomery, but also many others too. It was the default scenario for the British Army mindset.

We will never know whether others could have achieved what Montgomery did. He was the man given the job and it was his to lose. He didn't. I suspect others may also have succeeded too. But he was the right man for the job and had been handpicked for good reason.

 

Is I mentioned above, there was more to El Alamein than fighting the offensive battle. Whoever took over needed to take over the Army in its early August state, plan, fight and win a defensive battle and then plan, fight and win an offensive one.

As James has written about with some rigour, British senior commanders in the Middle East were not at all comfortable with a big attritional battle.

If you think that any competent general could have done this please name your candidate from the pool of general officers available in August 1942.

 

Some new insights here, although many of the qualities and traits raised chime with those in the frank and pithy pen picture offered by the National Army Museum at:

Bernard Law Montgomery: Unbeatable and unbearable | National Army Museum

Returning to Paulyb102’s start piece above:

I do not think that Monty was ever ‘just a General’ - no sense of a ‘buggin’s turn’ about him, at least since when “Wavell asked that command of the brigade in Portsmouth, which was about to fall vacant, should be given to a Colonel Montgomery, of whom he thought highly ... This was done ..” (RJ Collins; ‘Lord Wavell ..”)

As for “the large number of supplies .....” Montgomery was also well served by some key staff, not least Major General Wilfred Lindsell, regarded by many as the best administrative brain produced by the Army in the Second World War - another of Wavell’s former chosen men, who Monty made sure became part of his team and who rightly earned Sir James Grigg’s accolade as mentioned in:
Wilfrid Gordon Lindsell - Wikipedia

Very Special Intelligence did afford all recipients a particular ‘edge’ (MARKET GARDEN being the exception?), but I am also minded of Montgomery’s use of Phantom and what it brought to the party.

 

What they weren't doing is undertake a detailed recce of the Ariete position at el Gubi. The extent of knowledge was 'tanks and MET on the objective'. No attempt seems to have been made to e.g. to draw fire or poke around the position. 4 CLY war diary makes that clear.

We can find any excuse we would like to I guess, but both the artillery and the infantry mention that they didn't get into the battle, the infantry that this was despite them offering to go forward and e.g. secure broken down tanks (they could also have collected POWs).

As an aside, I'm working off the fairly detailed statement in the 1 S.A. Bde war diary regarding the planned attack on the 20th. There is no meniton of concern regarding artillery.

Then it is the responsibility of the commander to either try to get the resources together by asking for them, or to at least maximise his own resources. Neither happened. I also might look at Scott Cockburn more favourably if he hadn't manage to have his brigade destroyed (again) in the Wadi al Faregh battles at the end of December. Someone clearly figured out then that he wasn't much use as an armoured formation commander and he never received another frontline posting again.

Thanks

That 30 Corps conducted an utter sh*tshow throughout CRUSADER doesn't absolve individual unit commanders from their responsibilities. I also doubt 4 Armd Bde war diary, for what it's worth.

All the best

Andreas

 

Thanks. That's a war diary I yet have to pull.

All the best

Andreas

 

Phantom, the GHQ Liaison Regimen evolved to provide up to date information on own forces direct to Corps and Army HQ avoiding delays and distortions introduced by intervening battalion, brigade and divisional HQ watch-keepers. The scale was one squadron per army with team of ten LOs for each corps Jocelyn does not list any GHQ Liason squadron in the El Alemein orbat so they probably only arrived in North Africa with the First Army.

(As you may know, activities are not always accurately reflected in reports up the chainn of command, to protect the unfortunate or guilty. One exchange that sticks in my mind is the following on a regimental net. Hello Three this is zero, are you mobile yet". "Three wait out" "Three this is zero. Even a monkey knows if it is mobile." )

Montgomery employed his own ADCs for the same purpose. These were personable young officers who acted as his own eyes and ears and applied tact and social skills that Monty lacked while snooping down the chain of command. I think he starts this practice in Eighth Army.