DESERT VICTORY

[Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the western desert is a place fit only for war thousands of square miles are nothing but sand and stone a compass is as necessary once off the road as it is to a sailor at sea water doesn't exist until you bore deep into the earth you bath in your shaving mug fliers have the tenacity ohms bruises readily turned to desert soft days that our very heart can be followed by nights of bitter cold when the hardcamp seen wind brings it's sandstorms life can be intolerable the Arabs say that after five days of it murder can be excused the tired of this war in the desert as empted flevit but as Rommel advanced after we lost to Brooklyn never had our backs been so close to the Suez war we had lost eighty thousand men and much booty [Music] donar summit rule for example that he was delivering back on El Alamein 60 miles from Alexandria British General Headquarters and Africa's principal city Alexandria Egypt chief port and basted our Mediterranean fleet and Suez gateway to the Far East all these must have seen Desmond linear as near as a mirage and as it gold as much an illusion it was a wise decision of general mechanics to come back to al alamin much the strongest natural line of defense between the Libyan frontier and the Delta more other rummells lines of supply were here stretched to the limit on the right our flank rested on the sea on the left it approached the katana depression atop the size of Wales 1/3 of its salt marsh and all of it territory that no vehicle can cross [Music] on this 40-miles front general Auchinleck took personal command his the total responsibility not another yard back where we going his much depleted on it dud blasted and why did serving and led protect his mind our front was one of discontinuous deaths of minefields with strong points and machine-gun and anti-tank gun emplacements but it was as yet extremely slender here general Auchinleck waited and with him men who had fought at Gazala consider as a mothers who had been twice to Benghazi others who had escaped from their Hakim mr. Brooke the eighth RA had made a fighting retreat of 400 miles and the battle which approached in its importance the Battle of Britain was now at hand the Middle East sewers and infinitely more was at stake a crucial days had come [Music] [Music] [Music] the line he'll after several days of attack and counter-attack the British Australians Indians and South Africans were still there fighting as dogged desire infantry at Waterloo the immediate crisis was passed but anxiety remained [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] into this situation stepped mr. Churchill bringing his own inspiration and vigor he brought good news of reinforcements potent men and supplies which had already rounded the Cape for five days he visited the Army and Air Force explaining the task and its importance and most dramatic of all he brought new commanders general Alexander and gentlemen governor Alexander one of the last men out of Dunkirk and whose small army would stood the Japanese the whole length of Burma and Montgomery who took over the Eighth Army and then who lives as sternly as a crumble and who is as much a part of his modern anxiety [Music] battles swallow up weapons faster than you can build them at home in Britain the machinery of war Lord from the bankers and British women worked alongside men on the shows ships the tanks aircraft the explosives in no country are women so thoroughly organized for war [Music] in the United States bigger and more powerful tanks were coming off the assembly lines the Sherman's for instance with their 75 millimeter gun and all rancheros going to Egypt for the first time although American material used at L&N was but a small proportion of the whole it was vital to our success [Music] the HRA had the longest lines of supplier that the history of law has ever known there are two main routes to the Middle East from Britain and America the first by sea round the King 12,000 miles menaced by u-boats which nothing but the resolution of our merchant seaman from the name has kept open under second by air across the middle of Africa over the Niger and then lost along [Music] landing guns have been kept from the jungle on this rope fly aircraft brought by ships on the west coast and they're assembled the work has its own problems among them malaria [Music] behind the line great reinforcements in Milan Rommel had come for us again it was two months later he told his troops that on this day they were going to Kyra but five days afterwards he withdrew he left nearly 300 tanks behind to prove his generalship [Music] [Music] in two or three months we recreated and greatly enlarged the eighth army intimately sports came mem from the United Kingdom India and South Africa the 44th Home Counties divisional and the 51st island division had actually left Britain in May and doom and it was at the time to Brook film the President Roosevelt who had mr. Churchill with him at the time ordered the first Sherman tanks to Egypt long-range planning was yielding its reward [Music] the air force kept God [Music] rummel with a supply line one-tenth the length of ours was himself building up his supplies as hard as he could go but for a considerable proportion of them there was no future our United Air Forces saw to that [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] the Royal Navy em fleet air arm also of desire destroying ramos confidence within a few weeks our Mediterranean submarines sank or damaged 24 enemy ships in August to learn of all it was shipped to him 80% went to the bottom [Music] meanwhile the Eighth Army trained to the last punch physical fitness and hardness of an army is one of the biggest battle winning factors in war when two first-class fighters meet he who sticks his longest wins in the end this has been proved time and time again and applies to all ranks from general officers to private soldiers and this includes all branches of the army whatever that job and wherever they be fight it and fit to fight [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] towards the middle of October preparations on both sides were nearing completion in the north Rommels forces stretched from the coast to a point ten miles inland here were the back of his German infantry comprising the 90th light of 160 fourth divisions together with the Italian Trieste division in the south holding a front of 14 miles were three Italian divisions these were strengthened by the rest of his German infantry the center was left deliberately weak held by a single Italian division the Bologna holding a front of 16 miles behind the infantry in the north were two armored divisions one German and one Italian and similarly in the side the British line began in the north with the ninth Australians than below them the first South Africans the 51st Highland division who had some valeria to avenge and the 4th Indian division veterans of Abyssinia and the western desert held the center in the south were the 50th division from the teasin time with the fighting French of their Hakeem and contingents of Greeks the tactical reserve was found by the 44th division from counties close to London our armoured divisions were three all United Kingdom men some veterans of a score of desert battles others new to the work wonder written the famous 7th held the extreme south the other two were in close support in the north with the 2nd New Zealand Infantry Division alongside [Music] rommel was full of confidence he was saying to journalists in Berlin you may rely on our holding fast to what we have done we hold the Gateway to Egypt with the full intention [Music] but the aam aadmi effect was experiencing one of his historic intuitions he saw before him the destined conqueror of Egypt and on him he bestowed the baton of Field Marshal Rommel hoped that if we attempt first we should strike at his center that helped we deliberately encouraged by the disposition of our forces having allowed our armor to break through he saw himself destroying it by attacks from both banks that done his own offensive would be launched [Music] general Alexander Admiral Harwood and Air Marshal Tedder clammed elemen together it was to be a joint operation unity of command had become a reality in the desert itself general Montgomery and air vice-marshal Cunningham live cheek-by-jowl there was no divided command said general Montgomery there was only one command general Montgomery in realizing that a citizen army fights best when it knows exactly what's going on and what it is going to do saw to it that the plan of battle was known to everybody from general to private soldier and it came down from one rank to another till the chain was complete so that senior officers fighting in their third desert winter shared the knowledge with troopers going into action for the first time the battle was against fixed lines and against fixed lines general Alexander said the tactics are just like breaking down a wall with a crowbar you'll drive it in as far as possible and then lever this way on that to make a small hole then you enlarge it as soon as you have made a hole large enough your armoured divisions go through direct the enemy's artillery and lines of communication as for general Montgomery he said his intention was to hit the enemy for six right out of Africa the final preparations began [Music] [Music] and now that all knew what was to be done and always made ready there were final moments of normal of desert life of rest of washing clothes from a swim in the sea for those near the coast of cooking the evening meal the coming of dawn over the Mediterranean the sunset with a touch of green in the horizon The Mirage turning sand into water and sprinkling that water with the sales of small ships many our soldiers saw these things perhaps for the first time and he wrote his letters home and smoked and talked things over or lay silent as he listened to the pipes playing Island led [Music] [Music] [Music] the Battle of elemen began in the evening as life failed the final moves were made the Eighth Army watch drummers lives lying in moon light and shadow at zero minus 30 the barrage begins at the same moment the sappers will move forward to clear gaps in the enemy minefield marking the gaps with white tapes after 30 minutes the barrels will lift from the first objectives and creep forward at zero hour 10 o'clock the infantry will advance [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] the guns have been heard in Alexandria some prisoners in their pajamas but elsewhere fighting was severe it was a good deal of their network [Music] and now our forces moved up consolidating and advancing further infantry tanks and air forces working as one [Music] [Music] after a hard day's fighting the Eighth Army had made a salient in the north six miles wide and two adept four miles beyond the first enemy minefields next day attacks were made in the center and such the attacks a trauma had been expecting and which he but they were merely diversions in fact our main attack was to believer this way and let in our salient the Australians were attacking again and secured the three-mile front running west Rimal can protect repeatedly during these days with on the ground and in the air [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] the air force was doing a magnificent job for the Luftwaffe the skies became a place of deadly peril and the machines that escaped us Vera were destroyed on the ground [Music] [Music] on the fourth day of the battle kidney Ridge was assaulted by troops of the 7th Armored Division riflemen like tanks and armored cars [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] the Reg was taken in the meantime the Australians that by participants were exploiting their former northward trust and driving a wedge still further into the German forces near the sea [Music] [Applause] rummel was now fighting back with little paws and with increasing desperation [Music] [Music] these four days guitar work cut off large numbers of rummells infantry some of whom for the time being fought on ice casualties suffered were heavy on both sides but large groups of prisoners were in our hands [Music] while the battle in the north was raging Rommel had been forced to end we had imposed our will on him he moved to pencils the 21st and areata from the South to just below our salient the Air Force began the task of preventing them from concentrating [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] general Montgomery now gathered his entire AMA including his division from the South ready for the crowbars final thrust the first phase was finished on the liver the first the ninth day of battle the 8th army had lunched on his entire front of 40 miles but the blow we meant to be mortal was struck at the head of the Bulge [Music] it was the breakthrough in twas light tanks were 40 miles behind rummells life it's destroying his tent will result was comes from nation and caps [Music] the moment that Alexander and Montgomery have been waiting for had come the entire weight of their armor was in readiness and like a feat of iron clads it sail through the gap its purpose was simple to destroy Rommels armor [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] throughout this day in November her firm the heaviest armored battle of the campaign had been waved fighting went on along the whole front but it was centered on LF you wear a tank battle the bitterest kind reached hour by hour a deeper and more bloody intensity three quarters of the exes tents were burning or otherwise raped the day that all Stilton delicate care we kept to the dominating written air force it almost annihilated the Luftwaffe and now our entire strength founded an enemy beginning to crap [Music] [Music] this is the BBC home enforces burger this is Bruce Bell fridge just some excellent news which has come during the past hour in the form of a communicator of GHQ caller it sells the Axis forces in the western desert after 12 days and nights of ceaseless attacks by our land and air forces are now in full retreat [Music] the Africa Corps utterly broken and possessed with no thought but flight was hotly pursued but the Eighth Army was not only the Thunder behind but the lightning ahead from hull-down positions on the road of escape our guns and tanks knocked out on the first day of retreat over 50 of rummells remaining Panthers without loss he had already left 500 tanks behind him on the battlefield we captured over 1,000 pieces of artillery up to 1,000 aircraft from troop carriers to fighters were records on the ground [Music] Italians in the south abandoned by Rommel with neither food nor water were swept up by us to the tune of five divisions [Music] in the north we took thousands of German [Music] among men were fond Toma commander of the Africa Corps the cot leader of the German parachutists and eight italian generals we buried 20,000 enemy dead but in rendering our own dead the same final duty great care had to be used for the Germans on several occasions that attached booby traps to our men's bodies [Music] the suit was remorseless every enemy column on the coast road or in the desert sometimes jammed head to tail was bombed blasted and machine-gunned they tasted what they'd administered in France and Poland [Music] [Music] [Music] our armored forces on the ground had crushed rummells flimsy rearguard and were sweeping on after two days pursuit rain fell and the chase was much impeded stretches of road turn to shallow streams aircraft landing grounds were waterlogged despite the rains however on the fourth day we had taken off to a brief fight mersa Matruh the first of the newly captured ports the Navy used to bring up supplies [Music] the first heavily mined roads were encountered at hal fire paths where the twisting road Rises 700 feet from then onwards to Benghazi 450 miles further west Everett Pass had been blown by the enemy and every mile of road had to be examined and cleared of Mines and obstructions the engineers worked night and day to saloum the Navy brought a million and a half gallons of water and other vital supplies by the eighth day the enemy been cleared out of Egypt tableau / whose name is written deep in our Middle East campaigns to book which we held as a fortress behind the enemy lines for nine months and which had already changed hands twice was ours once more the date was November the 13th [Music] in Cyrene ev8 army past from desert to a green countryside which is Italian colonists stood abandoned and it was no more than a week between are taking Tobruk and entering benghazi but then garden he paused to replenish our supplies the harbor bombed by us for over two years so regularly that the pilots called it during the mail run was now littered with sunken ships cranes installations and most of the keys were demolished yet the Navy and engineers worked to such good purpose that before long our ships were unloading by seen land we were still bringing up three million gallons of petrol a week and eight thousand tons of ammunition [Music] while we've been building up our strength Brummel had been digging in at La Jolla but after remaining three weeks preparing the fight he changed his mind and withdrew as soon as he felt the full weight of our attack his indecision achieved nothing except to intensify our new onslaught from ni gala to triple-a is 530 miles it took the 8th army 41 days to accomplish it during that time they fought several actions with rumbles rail guards putting down on one occasion of barrels rivaling that of El Alamein but there we were delayed our onward sweep was never in doubt just before the last stage began general Montgomery said in an order of the day nothing has stopped us since the Battle of Egypt began nothing will stop us now and nothing did eight days later we were fighting on the outskirts of Tripoli itself [Music] [Music] [Music] the surrender of Tripoli by the government of Libya and the mayor of the city extinguished the Italian overseas Empire country by country the British Army had conquered it Abyssinia Eritrea Italian Somaliland Libya Tripolitania not a single town now remained to them [Applause] in 80 days the Eighth Army had advanced close on 1,400 miles a feat unparalleled in military history throughout the battle and advance but every casualty suffered it had inflicted five on the enemy in the words of mr. Churchill you have altered the face of the war in a most remarkable way organization movement what I just mentioned italic endurance and self-denial of the truth in the fearless leadership displayed in action can be appreciated only by those who are actually on the spot but I must tell you that the fame of the desert army has spread throughout the world [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Applause]