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Theatre of War 2 - Africa 1943

North Africa
Main articles: North African Campaign, Western Desert Campaign, Operation Torch, and Tunisian Campaign
On 11 June 1940, the day after Italy declared war on the Allies, the campaign began when Italian and Commonwealth forces began a series of raids on each other. Among the more notable achievements of this were the capture of Fort Capuzzo.

Benito Mussolini was anxious to link Italian North Africa (Africa Settentrionale Italiana, or ASI) with Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale Italiana, or AOI). He also wanted to capture Egypt, the Suez Canal, and the Arabian oilfields. Early in July, Italian forces in AOI crossed the Sudanese border and forced the small British garrison holding the railway junction at Kassala to withdraw. The Italians also seized the small British fort at Gallabat, just over the border from Metemma, some 200 miles (320 km) to the south of Kassala.

Even the villages of Ghezzan, Kurmuk and Dumbode on the Blue Nile were conquered. However, lacking fuel, the Italians decided to venture no further in the Sudan and they proceeded to fortify Kassala with anti-tank defences, machine-gun posts, and strong-points. Ultimately, the Italians established a brigade-strong garrison at Kassala.

On August 8, Mussolini ordered the Italian forces in Italian North Africa to invade Egypt. On 13 September 1940, Italian forces crossed into Egypt from their base in Cyrenaica, Libya. The Italian invasion only made it as far as Sidi Barrani and accomplished little. Within the year, British and Commonwealth forces under General Archibald Wavell launched Operation Compass. By February 1941, this operation resulted in the defeat of the Italian Tenth Army and the taking back of all of the Italian gains in Egypt and almost all of Cyrenaica. In March, the Battle of Kufra ended with the Italians losing the desert oasis of Kufra in south-eastern Libya. Kufra represented a vital link between ASI and AOI.

While the fighting was taking place in Libya, Axis forces attacked Greece. General Wavell was ordered to halt his advance against the Italian Army in Libya and send troops to Greece. He disagreed with this decision but followed his orders.

Maximum area of Italian control in the Mediterranean theatre in summer/fall 1942. The area controlled by Italian forces is outlined in green. The area controlled by British forces is outlined in red.

The Allies were unable to stop Greece falling to the Axis forces and, before they could retake the initiative in the western desert, the German Afrika Korps led by Erwin Rommel had entered the theatre. It would not be until early in 1943, after another year and a half of hard fighting and mixed fortunes, that the Axis forces would be finally driven out of Libya and into Tunisia by the British Eighth Army under the command of General Bernard Montgomery, after their decisive victory at the Second Battle of El Alamein.

By that time, the United States ground forces had entered the war and the theatre, beginning with Allied amphibious landings in north-west Africa, on November 8, 1942, codenamed Operation Torch, under General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander AFHQ Mediterranean.

Though the Italian and German forces, no longer led by an ailing Rommel but by Italian general Giovanni Messe, were now pincered between American and Commonwealth forces during the Tunisia Campaign, they did manage to stall the allies with a series of defensive operations, most notably with the Battle of the Kasserine Pass, but they were flanked, outmanned and outgunned. Messe achieved a defensive victory at the Mareth Line. But his continuous tactical delay of the Allied offensive could not prevent the inevitable defeat of the Axis in North Africa. After shattering the Axis defence on the Mareth Line, the allies managed to squeeze Axis forces until resistance in Africa ended on May 13, 1943 with the surrender of nearly 240,000 prisoners of war.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediterranean,_Middle_East_and_African_theatres_of_World_War_II