Lybia 1942 ▶ Tobruk German Africa Corps / DAK Deutsches Afrika Korps Rommel - Italian Royal Army (Regio Esercito) British landing attempt British POW (Sep 42) El Alamein
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On January 22, 1941, the Tobruk in Libya was captured by British units and about 25,000 Italians went into captivity. The German advance in North Africa under the command of Erwin Rommel was characterized by speed, so the heavily fortified town was initially only surrounded and not captured in order to be able to advance quickly. Tobruk was defended at this point by an Australian unit that repelled two attempted conquests by the German Afrika Korps in April, and from August 1941 the town was additionally reinforced by Polish units. Deeply staggered defensive positions consisting of tank trenches, bunkers, machine gun and PAK nests made an advance into the town almost impossible. Until the end of 1941, the village was besieged and bombed massively by the German Luftwaffe. During "Operation Crusader" in December 1941, the defenders received relief. In May 1942, the town was again the target of German-Italian advances during "Enterprise Theseus" and after two weeks of fierce fighting, the defenses were finally breached. The Allies surrendered on June 21, 1942, with 32,000 Allied soldiers taken prisoner and some 5,000 tons of supplies and 10,000 tons of fuel falling to the conquerors. As a result, Rommel was appointed field marshal general. In September 1942, a British commando raid on the city was foiled, but Tobruk had to be abandoned after the defeat of the Axis forces at El-Alamein in November 1942. Tobruk is also the site of the central German war memorial to the German soldiers who died in Libya, located on a hill overlooking the city. It is a square building of 40 by 40 meters with four round towers at the corners. In it 6,026 soldiers were reburied, among others the German fighter pilot ace Hans-Joachim Marseille ("The Star of Africa"). The Afrika Korps or German Africa Corps (German: Deutsches Afrikakorps, DAK) was the German expeditionary force in Africa during the North African Campaign of World War II. First sent as a holding force to shore up the Italian defense of its African colonies, the formation fought on in Africa, under various appellations, from February 1941 until its surrender in May 1943. The unit's best known commander was Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. The Afrika Korps formed on 11 January 1941 and one of Hitler's favourite generals, Erwin Rommel, was designated as commander on 11 February. Originally Hans von Funck was to have commanded it, but Hitler loathed von Funck, as he had been a personal staff officer of Werner von Fritsch until von Fritsch was dismissed in 1938. The German Armed Forces High Command (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, OKW) had decided to send a "blocking force" to Italian Libya to support the Italian army. The Italian 10th Army had been routed by the British Commonwealth Western Desert Force in Operation Compass (9 December 1940 – 9 February 1941) and captured at the Battle of Beda Fomm. During the summer of 1941, the OKW increased the presence in Africa and created a new headquarters called Panzer Group Africa. The Panzer Group comprised the Afrika Korps, with some additional German units now in North Africa, plus two corps of Italian units. The Panzer Group was, in turn, redesignated as Panzer Army Africa on 30 January 1942. After the Axis defeat in the Second Battle of El Alamein and the Allied landings in Morocco and Algeria (Operation Torch), the OKW once more upgraded the presence in Africa by adding first the XC Army Corps, under Nehring, in Tunisia on 19 November 1942, then an additional 5th Panzer Army on 8 December, under the command of Colonel-General Hans-Jürgen von Arnim. On 23 February 1943, the original Panzer Army Africa, which had since been re-styled as the German-Italian Panzer Army, was now redesignated as the Italian 1st Army and put under the command of Italian general Giovanni Messe. Rommel, meanwhile, was placed in command of a new Army Group Africa, created to control both the Italian 1st Army and the 5th Panzer Army. The remnants of the Afrika Korps and surviving units of the 1st Italian Army retreated into Tunisia. Command of the Army Group was turned over to Arnim in March. On 13 May, the Afrika Korps surrendered, along with all other remaining Axis forces in North Africa.

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