The War in the Desert 1940-1943 mapped
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- Опубліковано 28 вер 2024
- The campaign in the desert of North Africa in World War II was special, because it heavily relied on tank combat. Join us, as we map out the tank movements during the desert campaign.
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Nerves Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
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BTS Prolog Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
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Music provided by MAGENTAMUSIC, Tinley, JMSOUNDS/ Pond5"
The advantage the Allies gained in holding the chain from Gibraltar to Malta to Cyprus to Suez cannot be overstated.
Those four colonies holding the line is legit one of the things that won the war for the British Empire and kept them in the fight.
Yes! Weren't they all former or current 'coaling stations' like Aden further out?
Love it - well done Eastory
the 2 war map goats
Yeah
Love y'all
The North African campaign is one of the most chaotic of the entire war. The amount of times that the mobile front swung back-and-fort was just insane. Probably the most mobile of all the fronts in the entire war.
Not insane - but surprising I think you mean, surprising if you fail to take into account the difficulty in fighting at the end of your supply lines using late 1930s designed kit. Kit that is now clapped out due to driving and fighting over the last 500 miles of harsh desert. That is what each side encountered when it pushed to the ends of its limits only to be pushed back in turn.
Very similar to Napoloen's Italian Campaign in the 1790s.
@@yereverluvinuncleber A little passive-aggressive, but thanks for the extra information.
@@hirocheeto7795 No, just trying to understand your use of insane, which typically means mad here. Assuming you mean surprising - If you don't know or don't take the vast distances into account then it may seem surprising.
@@yereverluvinuncleber What's really insane is not noticing that I'm not the guy you first responded to. Also, you *were* passive-aggressive (and still are), and just saying "no" doesn't change that.
“They sent Erwin Rommel, who turned out to be an aggressive commander.”
Thats a RAF level understatement
Eastory has returned! All aside, this is very interesting and useful because this part is lesser known to my knowledge, especially compared to the Eastern or Western front, while still being valuable for some events like the landings of Sicily in 1943, which influenced the landings of Normandy in 1944. Good job
Great video. But i did miss a mention that, despite armoured units being key in battle, since it's difficult to contain the battle to an area or to use geographical features to defend, most tanks were lost fighting against infantry anti-tank units, artillery and aircraft, not against other tanks!
Yeah, tanks were crucial for offense, but infantry were still very useful for defense, especially if they had fortified position. Importantly though on the African front, without any tanks, there was little a force could do to punish their enemy for going around them, through the open desert, flanking them, and cutting off their supply. To defend such an open front, they must always have some tanks and offensive potential or they are screwed.
@@Michaelonyoutub no necessarily tanks but mobile units!
Gazala contains one of the most beautiful pieces of british understatement in history. When the german tanks were attempting to retreat and were effectively running straight through the rear of the commonwealth defensive positions, the man in command sent the sitrep, "Situation not in hand."
Awesome as always! I didn't think your visuals could get any better, but you clearly proved me wrong
Shaun
ㅤ
This was great. North Africa as sandbox for tanks battle. Was there any plane involve (attacks, not recon)? What happen so many POW during war? Was there any prisoner exchanges as we see now?
Comparing tank numbers in battles between WWII and current conflict is insane. Cost of tank productions & effectiveness is totally other scale
Yes, the planes did play a large role in the latter part of the campaign by defeating the Axis tank offensives and also cutting their supply lines by sinking the Axis ships coming from Europe. As for prisoner exchanges, I did not come onto this information during my research.
Member gang
Wait…. HOW DID YOU COMMENT 3 DAYS AGO!?
@@jettmckay2985 that's what a patreon member is.
@@Eastorythis video was the perfect video for a WoT or WT sponsor :>
My most profound compliments on a masterpiece! Not only the beautiful and carefully detailed maps outmatch ALL of even the greatest ...every daymonthyear videos but you have a talent bringing complicated circumstances on the point. You already showed this in your great Eastern Front Videos!!! Many thanks for contributing to a detailed whole and better history understanding!👍👍👍
Great video!
I also think a video about naval combat in the pacific or the mediterranean would be really interesting!
Like seeing the different fleet movements and battles over ww2
This was excellent! Well done again 👍
What I find particularly exciting here is that there was no continuous front line like in the other Videos, but apparently it was more often possible to simply flank the enemy unnoticed through the desert.
(I suppose the yellow parts are dessert?)
I believe non coloured in parts are the areas of which arent governed
I would assume non coloured parts have no permanent populations in the countryside. They can still have towns around oases, but with no people in between, there is no one there to notify either you or the enemy of each other's movements through the region, making it perfect for flanking around and surprising your enemy.
@@Michaelonyoutub I always find it interesting in warfare, some spaces are so vast its just strange that people can effectively still fight in it
Most places didn't have a 'continuous' front line
Even in Normandy, you had strong points/positions that overlooked certain areas
And then a lot of those side by side create a 'front line'
But there were no trenches connecting _everything_ together, and unmanned (but watched) areas in between positions
@@MrNicoJac yeah its pretty interesting, stuff like that often makes me wonder how many soldiers were able to slip by. somewhat unrelated but it also makes me think about how do countries such as russia actually govern many of the areas in the east, on a map showing the area of control in russia surely it would only show along major towns/cities and the trans siberian railways right?
I can’t thank you enough for creating this video. While I’ve studied the eastern front over these last two decades, I never researched the German order of battle during the Afrika Campaign. Great stuff. It’s surprising to me,
For whatever reason, how many tanks Hitler fed into the Afrika campaign. And Rommel was resupplied several times with new tanks.
Very good video! I do not see a lot of channels covering ww2 in the Middle East area, especially around Iraq and Iran
Could you do one video on east african campaign ww2?
Great video as always.
I've just finished listening to Hans von Luck's war memoir, and I'm most grateful for you to demonstrate what happened where. However, although it is important to note tank numbers, you may want to include aircraft as well. It made a huge difference to the German effort that they were almost totally without fighter support. Also, it might be interesting to mention what equipment who had. The Italians had "sardine can" tanks (von Luck's words), and initially the Brits were totally overpowered by the Panzer IV's, but when they received Grants they achieved parity and when they started getting Sherman's they were in the pound seats. Furthermore, it might be interesting to indicate who is running the show on either side - the Brits went through a couple of generals until Monty arrived, and he put up such a crybaby show and wouldn't move until he had enough stuff. Which brings us to logistics: The Germans were getting there stuff from miles away, the Brits got theirs from Aden and Alexandria (I think). Makes a huge difference, especially since a lot of German stuff got sunk in the Med. Also, von Luck loved the Italian infantry and tankers (thought they were very courageous), but hated the navy who didn't seem to be too serious about winning the war.
Stuarts probably had a greater effect than Grants. The light stuart was fast, numerous, and importantly, reliable. The British tanks tended to be horribly unreliable. Most of their losses were due to mechanical failure.
@@pax6833 According to Wikipedia, the Stuart had a dinky little fuel tank and under operational conditions it only had a range of 121 km (75 miles). Also, the 37 mm gun wasn't much use except against the Italian "sardine cans", and also had no HE shells. But as you say, reliable and comfortable inside.
Very interesting and well explained!! Always looking forward to an Eastory clip
I was just watching your other videos when i got a notification, Nice!
In the Medeteranian tanks arent key, ships are key.
This entire video takes effect under the fact that the Axis cant simply naval invade Egypt do to the royal navy. While the US can naval invade North Africa do to the US navy.
*The US and UK could naval invade North Africa due mostly to the Royal Navy. That would be a more accurate summary of Op. Torch
@@silverhost9782 Then why didnt they invade before the USA joined the war? The Royal Navy was streched thin and locally only had parity with the italians so didnt dare naval invasions.
@@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714 Because they didn't need or want too? Torch was an idea designed around the British allowing the Americans to get involved in the fighting. They had already refused the daft American idea to invade France in 1943. They signed off on it to to be nice, essentially. In the east, the British had already won the conflict, it was only a matter of time before the Axis were pushed out by that point. The naval forces in play during Torch were overwhelmingly British, and a large number- including many of the best performers- of the troops were British too. Torch gave green, inexperienced American units the opportunity to actually get involved in the fighting, that was its main reason for existing, NOT because it was an essential operation for actually winning Africa. Regardless, your reply doesn't actually make sense, no one was disputing that the USA didn't increase allied presence in the Med. I was saying that your failure to mention the British (and French) forces which were involved was dumb.
This video begins with historical errors of chronology and dives into operational strategy in place of looking at the grand strategy. It fails within the first minute. I’m giving it a pass and saving 20 minutes.
@@silverhost9782 "Because they didn't need or want too?" Because they couldnt. Britain alone was trying to fight the Axis on the preifery, it took a while of convincing by the americans that now the Allies have the strength to fight them head on.
"In the east, the British had already won the conflict, it was only a matter of time before the Axis were pushed out by that point." Pushed all the way to Casablanka? That would take years.
"The naval forces in play during Torch were overwhelmingly British" Such devides are pointless. Good allies fight with their forces being interchangable. If the US is doing convoy escort than the british can do naval invasion support, and they could just as easily swap roles.
Thanks for making this, these videos are so brilliant
Another thing i'd love to add is that king farouk of egypt had pro axis goverment in charge which lead general Robert stone to surround abdeen palace on 4 february 1942 to force the king to install a pro allied goverment , which would ultimatly sour the relations between britain and egypt
Can you do Winter War next
Calling it a tank campaign is a bit of a misnomer is it not? Tanks might have been the strongest maneuver element of the army, but their numbers paled in comparison to the hundreds of thousands of infantry on each side. Air power and artillery were also major components of Allied success that seems to be completely glossed over in this video. The British managing to largely overpower the Italian Navy in the Mediterranean also hindered Axis capabilities enormously.
I like your channel a lot, but this feels like forcing a narrative to me.
Tanks very much for this...
Babe, wake up! Map-man has blessed us with another video!
Best map guy on yt
Finally! This is the one part of the war that has always been a blur for me. The battle lines and such.
A very good overview of the Western Desert Campaign. While both sided tended to wait until they had an advantage to go on the offensive. Both sides were still tied to their supply lines . All too often either side tended to go on the offensive before they had built up sufficient supplies to support it. Offensives were often only limited because of this, they would leap forward only to run out of the chains that tied them in place until more supplies were built up. Montgomery after initial advances of October 1942 ensured he continually built up his supply bases behind his offensive. This lead to short pauses in his advance but did not allow Axis forces to build up enough supplies to go on the offensive. This is one of the reasons for his slow pursuit of the Axis that he is often accused of being to slow with.
You deserve more views :(
These videos are so good
I simply love your detailed videos!
People often hear the ‘before el alamein we never had a victory..’ quote and take it as gospel, but it is not exactly true. This video shows this perfectly
I hope you also do Italian Civil war (1943-1945)
what does the x and numbers mean?
Excellent video - as always!
Very nice video! But I'd like to know how the Naval and Air forces contributed to the campaign. I remember there were good stories there, like the survival of Malta.
The North Africa campaign has always been talked about as a legendary campaign of back and forth mobile warfare, but rarely has it ever been covered as well in its entirety as you have done. I could not wrap my head around how interesting it was until it was animated and covered so well in this video. It is especially interesting for me as my great uncle fought in North Africa and then in Italy where he eventually died. Thanks for covering the North African campaign, can't wait to see the Italian campaign.
Where did all the POW's go - seemed to be so many of them?
i am a brit but i knew so little about this campaign.
Could you publish a video about Wagner-Putin war?
I wonder what would happen if Rommel received enough reinforcements (for example close to 1 to 1 situaiton on tanks) I think African campaign was important and Hitler had underestimated importance of the campaign. It would be a major blow to allies if Axis had reached middle east they might even linkup with Iran and (maybe) attack from caucasus to Soviets. Plus Axis would theoratically threat British India
They hade to invaded the soviets because every day they got stronger
A few important bits i feel a bit missing here:
Tank numbers are not all, as a smaller more trained force can still achieve a higher combat value than a larger froce (see eastern front)
Especially north africa shows this, as at El Ala the brits won, by outlasting the germans in tank losses --> thus montgomery move to wait till all was set in his favour was smart.
for those wondering why the brits earlier lost even tough they had more tanks:
The reason why the 8.8 became so famous and a tank threat was due to the Germans realising that the training needed to fight aircraft is also handy when fighting tanks and ground targets. Thus the crews were trained for this too and commanders were willing to use the 8.8 in ground combat. See Operation Barbarossa the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis and Military Simulation Volume IIA, Askey Nigel page 51-52
--> i suppose nobody is suprised that i have to bring up the 8.8 here. The germans used their flank in the anti tank role while the brits didnt, giving them an advantage
Tank heavy units are endangered to counter attacks and have a hard time dealing with infantry and AT guns. See Operation Barbarossa the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis and Military Simulation Volume IIA, Askey Nigel page 343
The Germans were the first ones to realise the mistake of tank heavy divisions. The French and British divisions were way more tank heavy than the Germans. The French outset this by dispersing the tanks into their infantry divisions. The brits meanwhile hat two armoured brigades with 342 tanks while having only 2 infantry Battalions. Thus these units suffered heavy losses especially in North Afrika in 1941 and 42 against the Africakorps. See Operation Barbarossa the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis and Military Simulation Volume IIA, Askey Nigel page 344
--> the brits like many other realsied quite late how bad tank heavy formations are. When a tank heavy formation losses many of its tanks, it also looses most of its comabt power. Panzer divisions also had many other elements and thus could hold out even with less tanks. You will find many authors stating, that a german tank division with as few as 50 tanks would be capable of all operations. The brits thus got a bloody nose, when they attack with their tank heavy formations, lost many of them and then didnt had the sufficent strenght to stop the german coutnerattack.
Panzer divisions showed numerous times, that with as few as 50 tanks they were able to do very effective offensive Operations. See Operation Barbarossa the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis and Military Simulation Volume IIB, Askey Nigel page 182
And one always needs to keep in mind, that the germans had the superior training and tank doctrine too! also according to one source the germans had some form of air superiority for parts of the campaign.
Fliegerführer Afrika albeit being outnumbered managed to achieve a degree of air superiority till early 1942, mainly due to the battle-hardened I./JG 27. The kill to loss ratio was better than 4 to 1 and aces like Hans-Joachim Marseille [known as the Star of Afrika] were born in this units. See Operation Barbarossa the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis and Military Simulation Volume IIB, Askey Nigel page 247
it still an wonderful video, but i feel like it shows a bit too much the numbers without the context. After all combat power is what matters. To exxagerate it:
20 Leopard 2s will very likely win against 200 T26. As their comabt power is vastly diffrent. Even tough the comabt power of the individual tanks in north africa wasnt too diffrent, the training and leadership was. And tank warfare after all calls for mobile operations, something the germans back thenw ere leading in. So it is really intresting to see, how they always succeded in north africa in these operations, while the brits succeded in their well planned battles (something they were suited for)
Dude, you've ruined the comment section 😅
@@sergeyk9060 why and how?
Ah those Germans...
Masterful tactics
Amateurish logistics
They could get away with it in Europe, but no in the deserts of North Africa
@@simonrobillard it always matter how good/bad your enemy logistics are. and the allies (western ones) were clearly better, while te Soviets worse. So i wouldnt say the german logistics were bad, they were just bad in comparision to others.
@@tizi087 the soviet had realy good logistic to maintain such a massive army in such a massive front
Literally my last Hoi4 game
You have the Pacific campaigns to cover too! Great video l
I'm on LIVE CHAT!!!!!!!!!!!
You can see me at 9:05
things you failed to mention as to the why of fighting in North Africa:
- The Axis went after Suez instead of Gibraltar because it was seen as (and was, in practice) an easier nut to crack
- doing so would break the spine of the British Empire and force any supplies to go all the way around Africa
Nah, no way in hell they were going for the Suez, simply too far away, they resorted to bombing it instead
This is wild that they lost a quarter of a million soldiers in North Africa one month before the Battle of Kursk. The defeat in N. Africa sheds light into Hitler's decision to risk an offensive that would shatter the front irreparably if unsuccessful, and so it was.
I love the "clean war" of the Africa Campaign.
It certainly had atrocious acts in it, but very small compared to the Eastern Front.
There's nothing clean about it. The Afrika Korps put both Libyans, Tunisians and Jews into concentration camps, like in Benghazi and Jado. The Tunisian pogroms happened under their watch, and after they were defeated by the Allies and booted out of North Africa, they eventually deported their captive Jews and others to concentration camps in Europe like Bergen-Belsen and Innsbruck-Reichenau. Walter Rauff of the SS, famous for him pioneering gas vans, also tacitly worked with Rommel's Afrika Korps to terrorize North Africans.
In summary, it is well known that the Holocaust extended wherever the Nazis go, and that is evident enough when they were in North Africa.
All Nazis and all the soldiers who fought for them are goddamn fucked up bastards, and deserved to be put to death. Nuremberg didn't kill enough of them.
makes sense considering that the nazis wanted to genocide the entire soviet union while they didint really care much for africa
Clean war is a myth.
@@hq3473yep even a fast war as the Iraq invasion had war crimes
Theme of the video: it costed them a lot of tanks
Great video!
I love watching these videos
Tanks for the video
Could you maybe add a scale in kilometres or something on the map whenever it zooms out or zooms in, because we lose all idea of how large the distances are
Hey man such a great video but unlike the others you didn't put any music in the background.
Great video :D
Really good video
Tanks for the memories
The quality of this video seems to be way worse than before(compared to your eastern front videos for example).
I mean, there weren't as much divisions in north Africa compared to Eastern Europe, also give the man a break these animations take such a long time to make
@@Plab1402 I know, but i mean the overall quality, not the number of the units.
@@maximpact4070 gotcha
I'd really like that you animated this video in a different way. The desert isn't equal to Continental Europe and there isn't a long front line fron noth to south.
Very well
Drinking game : take a shot every time he says „Tank”. GG
💀
Thank you
When Italian Campaign
i waited for that the whole time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
cool video 🔥
Well-played!
3:13 Australian and Polish garrison
You forgot that in Tobruk not only where Australians, but also Poles. Good Film
I'd say the main and initial reason why they fought it out in North Africa was the Axis' attempt to expel the British from Egypt to be able to take control of the Suez Canal. Suez canal was a main route of resources from British controlled Asian territories going to Europe. It was also the gateway to the middle east. In the end, after El Alamein, the British was able to push the Axis forces away and meet up with US troops in Tunisia which then led to invasion of Sicily.
You might consider rephrasing your sentences as to not use the word "tank" as frequently.
Everyone gangsta until Rommel joins the chat
I would love to see a detailed map with commentary of the US Civil War.
Well done.
love the vid
Strap in buckle up, new Eastory video just dropped 🔥
Allies: we have more men, more tanks, better weapons and the air and sea sovereignty.
Germany: and we have Johannes Erwin Rommel.
Thanks for tanks :D 0:01
The whole story looks as the commanders on both sides had played Hearts of Iron.
I understand tanks played a massive part but I thought the royal navy harassed the axis the entirety of the North African campaign?
Also, why did aviation not play a large role in this theatre?
Yo can you do a british vs usa video?
There isn't that much information on Military Divisions to make a American revolution video or even just a war of 1812 video
@@Plab1402 oh
直播？
Amazing
♥️
The most forgotten front but also one the most importany
Very informative map 👍👍👍
Funny, that the only name pronounced in this video was "Erwin Rommel", but no comment when he was removed from the post of commander for his disastrous campaign.
May I make a suggestion? Consider changing the thumbnail because many people may think this is about some video game and therefor not click on it.
Sahara: the tanks’ dream, the infrantry’s nightmare and the logistics’ joke
Varrus, give me back my tanks!
Hi
Now only italiano campaign remains to complete ww2 frontlines
Drinking game idea: take a shot evertime eastory says "tanks".
Okay kil let because I’m going 😊
"Tank's" you for the video....
Noice video
Its satisfying to watch these things...
Why do they blame me?
Malta was the key. Italy missed the opportunity
Always spam the attack do not plan carefully lads
So to sum up. LINES GO BRRRR TANKS GO BRRRRR. ALL LOST THEIR TANKS ALL WENT FORWARD AND BACK IN THE SQUIGGLY LINE THINGIES
It's funny how bad Italian logistics were, they had the forces to really push into Sudan and Egypt, but literally couldn't do it.
Yaaaaaawn.