Whenever World War II is mentioned, most of the names that come to mind are: Montgomery, Zhukov, Patton, Peng Dehuai and other famous generals. The dazzling achievements of these famous generals shine in the history books. Because of the background of their opponents, their record is even more dazzling, and the most famous general of these opponents is the famous German general Ervin Rommel, who is known as the "desert fox".
The "desert fox" who galloped through North Africa was polarized by posterity: those who liked him called him "Nazi God of War" and "Imperial Eagle", and those who did not like him called him "tactical giant and strategic dwarf". He was an arbitrary character, a Nazi fanatic, a supporter of Hitler; at the same time he often disobeyed orders and tried to overthrow Hitler's rule.
The opponent Montgomery was the most outstanding allied general in World War II, but his personality was stubborn, he did his own thing, and his character evaluation was mixed.
Rommel
Rommel was born on November 15, 1891, to a family of secondary school teachers. The emaciated boy had no interest in military life and indulged in glider playing all day long, but his father, the principal, forcibly sent him to a military school. He graduated from school in 1911 and immediately went on to fight in World War I as a platoon leader and received the Order of the Blue Marks, the highest order of honor of the Wehrmacht.
In 1929, he was transferred to a military academy as a tactical instructor, a position he spent for nine years, during which time he wrote a book called Infantry Attack, which was well received in the market and gained a major fan of Hitler. In 1938 he was finally promoted to colonel, and on the eve of the German blitzkrieg against Poland, Hitler was promoted to general of Rommel.
After the outbreak of war, Hitler handed over the Seventh Panzer Division directly to Rommel. After Rommel took over, he conducted exercises day after day, training these German soldiers day and night. The effort always paid off, and in 1940 the Battle of France began, and Rommel broke through the border fortifications with lightning speed, and quickly crossed Belgium to the Meuse River, crushed a reorganized French mechanized division, and defeated the British army, pushing the wrong and rapidly into the English Channel.
With the end of the Battle of France, Rommel's name was well known.
North African battlefield
In 1941, Rommel received an urgent mission to the North African theater. At this time, the British army in North Africa had a numerical and geographical advantage, and Germany's ally Italy collapsed in this land, and 130,000 officers and soldiers were captured and killed. Rommel's enemies were not only the British, but also sand, lack of water, extreme heat, and difficulty in supplying.
In February 1941, Rommel set foot on this part of North Africa, and the first thing he did was to understand the situation in North Africa and the situation on the battlefield. Having learned this, Rommel ordered four motorized infantry and panzer divisions to move, advancing 400 kilometers effortlessly, forcing the British to retreat to Tobruk in eastern Libya.
As long as you can take Tobruk, the best port in Libya, it is equivalent to opening the door of the Suez Canal. An extremely bloody battle broke out, Rommel, with his excellent command ability, caused heavy losses to the British troops, and the two integrated divisions that came to the aid were successfully intercepted by Rommel with cannons, and Tobruk was occupied.
At this point, Rommel completely reversed the situation in the North African battlefield and earned the nickname "Desert Fox".
Montgomery
For Britain, July 1942 was so torturous that it was forced to retreat to Egypt. The Germans had already entered the Egyptian border by this time, the Suez Canal and Alexandria were close at hand, and the British were under pressure at this time.
At this time, Rommel's supply was difficult, and at the end of August Rommel made his last attempt to attack Alexandria, facing the test of nature and the defense of the British army, Rommel was ultimately unable to take it.
At this time, the British side was doing personnel transfers, and Montgomery was replaced as commander of the 8th Army. With the pressure of the mountain port, the British army quickly received supplies, and most importantly, the British obtained M4 Sherman tanks and M10 wolverine tank destroyers through the Lend-Lease Act, totaling more than 500 vehicles.
At this time, German supplies were still the biggest problem, and Rommel repeatedly asked Hitler for reinforcements, but they were rejected. In Hitler's view, the offensive on the Eastern Front against the Caucasus was more important.
At this time, Rommel's total strength was only 120,000 people and 600 tanks, while the British army had reached 220,000 people and 1,100 tanks, and more than half of them were M3 and M4 medium tanks.
In September, the Germans began to contract dysentery and jaundice, and the fuel would burn out, and the sand and dust would become worse, and morale would drop badly.
Rommel's request for Guderian to take his place was rejected by Hitler, but he agreed that Rommel could leave the front. So on September 23 Rommel went to Austria to rest. Before leaving, he laid more than 500,000 mines in front of the German line and promised to return to North Africa as soon as Montgomery began to attack.
Montgomery waited quietly for the opportunity, although Churchill urged Montgomery to attack over and over again. When the sand rose, Montgomery saw an opportunity to shell the German positions for five and a half hours with 882 guns, followed by 500 tanks advancing the positions, followed by more than 1,000 active air raids.
The Germans began to counterattack the British 51st Division, but made little progress. In the evening, the German 15th Panzer Division and the Italian Litreo Panzer Division set out from the Kidney Ridge to meet the Australian armored forces, and the two sides invested more than 100 tanks to engage in a tank battle, although the two sides were deadlocked, but the tanks lost by the German army were extremely valuable, because the supplies could not keep up.
Destroyed Panzer III
On the night of 25 October, Rommel hurried back, then assessed the situation on the battlefield and found that the tanks had suffered heavy losses. Moreover, the fuel in Germany and Italy was only enough for three days, and everyone had only half of the rations left.
On the night of 30 October, Australia broke through the German lines, further worsening the situation of the Germans. At 1 a.m. on 2 November, the British pressurization operation began, targeting Ter al-Achachir, the last line of defense for the Germans.
The British bombed the last German line of defense from the air for 7 hours, followed by 360 artillery shelling for 4 hours.
Yellow sand filled the sky, and there were crushed corpses everywhere, and then there was a tank battle again. At noon, a total of 120 German and Italian tanks and the British army encountered each other head-on, and after a day of fierce fighting between the two sides, the German army was almost completely destroyed, leaving only 30 tanks. On 4 November, the British broke through the last german line of defense, the German army collapsed completely, the three Italian divisions were completely destroyed, the German army lost a total of 60,000 people and 500 tanks, and Rommel returned to Germany. In this battle, Montmartre rose to fame and established the status of a famous general.
Later, Rommel was forced by Hitler to commit suicide by poisoning for plotting to overthrow Hitler's rule, and the "World War II arsonist" ended his life.
Any war of aggression will not have a good end.