Tank Killers

by Harry Yeide

  The Germans struck at the juncture of the French and British sectors on 18 January, and the hard-pressed French appealed to Eisenhower for help. Eisenhower instructed the II Corps commanding general MajGen Lloyd Fredendall to send a suitable force, and the latter—bypassing the chain of command—told BrigGen Paul Robinett by phone that his Combat Command B, 1st Armored Division, had the job.77 On 20 January, CCB—with the 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion (less two companies) attached—was assigned to the French XIX Corps in the Ousseltia Valley. Company A’s TDs took up positions overlooking a valley dotted with small buildings and haystacks. Just as the sun was setting, the huts and haystacks transformed into camouflaged German tanks that assaulted the Americans. The tank killers pulled back gradually and then battled the panzers at a crossroads until it was too dark to fight. Only five TDs remained in action. The next day, CCB and the rest of the 601st arrived and drove the Germans off.78

  Allied troops over the next week pushed the Germans back into high ground and captured a pass leading to Kairouan. For several days during the action, Company A of the 601st was reduced to a single officer because a captain had been killed and another captain and two lieutenants had become temporarily trapped behind enemy lines.79 On 28 January, Combat Command B moved to rejoin the rest of the 1st Armored Division.80

  The rest of the 1st Armored Division, meanwhile, was dealing with a German attack toward Sidi bou Zid, launched against French defenses in Faid Pass on 30 January. Combat commands C and D of the 1st Armored Division that day moved to intercept the German thrust. The 701st Tank Destroyer Battalion (less two companies) was attached to Combat Command D. The next day, the combat command launched an attack on Station de Sened and captured the town, which was lightly held by Italian troops. Assaults by Combat commands A and C on Faid and Maizila Passes ran into determined resistance, however, and both attacks were abandoned. American troops withdrew to Sidi bou Zid.81

  On 2 February, Combat Command B was detached yet again and sent north to join the First British Army. It would soon be missed.82

  An official observer who visited Capt Gilbert Ellmann’s men of B/701st on 31 January near Pichon noted that the unit had received no break since the landings in November. The company had earned a high reputation, but it had already lost twenty-five men killed in action, and the strain of continual fighting and repeated air attacks by both German and Allied aircraft was beginning to tell.83

  Some new blood, if not relief for the tank destroyer units already in action, was arriving. The 1st Tank Destroyer Group landed in Algeria on 17 January and took up the task of overseeing TD battalions when they were not directly attached to divisions. The 805th Tank Destroyer Battalion disembarked at Algiers and the 813th at Oran on 17 January, and the 894th shipped in about the same time. The 805th and 894th were transported to the II Corps area of the front by mid-February, but the 813th would not arrive until March. The 899th, meanwhile, arrived at Casablanca but did not rush to the line. Instead, the battalion was delighted to be issued the newest weapon in the TD arsenal, the M10. The men would have to learn to maintain and operate the new hardware before the unit would be ready for combat. The battalion CO, LtCol Maxwell Tichnor, had shown the foresight while still in the States of sending drivers for several weeks of training with a medium tank battalion, which made the conversion far easier than it might have been.84

  * * *

  By January 1943, a few tentative conclusions regarding the tank destroyers suggested themselves.

  On the plus side, the idea of light, fast, hard-hitting tank destroyers worked, at least under certain circumstances. The Tunisian Task Force would have had no mobile antitank capability when it first encountered Axis armor had it not been for the ability of the TDs to cover long distances at high speeds beyond the capabilities of tanks. Moreover, as of January, the cheap and easily produced tank destroyers were well ahead of the enemy tanks in terms of their kill/loss ratio in combat. Later critics would seemingly forget this stage of the campaign. The tank destroyer had also demonstrated its potential utility as highly mobile field artillery.

  On the negative side, the tank destroyer battalions had never been able to operate according to key prescriptions in the force’s doctrine. The companies were dispersed and generally at the front line, not held back ready to deal with armored penetrations. The TDs’ obvious tactical utility despite this fact suggested that the doctrine was, at least, incomplete. Fortunately, TD, infantry, and armor officers in the field were working out practical solutions as they went. Of course, some were better than others.

  The Germans, moreover, did not usually behave as the doctrine assumed they would. U.S. Army observers noted that typically, small groups of German tanks preceded attacking infantry. Well-concealed high-velocity 88mm guns were placed to provide a defensive base of fire if necessary in practically every tank movement. Indeed, German tanks often towed the 88s into position. The German gunners often waited to fire until American tanks passed them in pursuit of the German tanks, catching the Americans from the rear. German air-ground cooperation was excellent, and artillery fire was adjusted accurately.85 When the Germans had not acted thusly—as during the armored probe at Medjez el Bab on 10 December 1942—the tank destroyers had proved lethal in a scenario that at least approximated some aspects of doctrine.

  Finally, combat experience had demonstrated that the M6 was not effective as a tank destroyer. Troops complained that its rounds bounced off German tanks.86 In addition, the silhouette was too high, and there was insufficient space in the vehicle for the crew to properly serve the weapon.87 The ineffectiveness of the 37mm gun, which was the infantry’s standard-issue antitank weapon, presaged continual pressure from line units to parcel out TD battalions in order to provide the GI at the front with adequate protection against tank attack.

  Chapter 3

  From Gloom to Glory

  “Probably the worst performance of U.S. Army Troops in their whole proud history.”

  — Omar Bradley, A General’s Life

  Ike knew his front was not all it should be. After canceling offensive operations on 24 December 1942, he ordered II Corps Headquarters under MajGen Lloyd Fredendall to move from Oran to Tebessa and assume responsibility from the small Tunisian Task Force for guarding the flank of the main forces to the north. Second Corps’ initial component was the 1st Armored Division, which had been extricated from its support to British formations. The 1st Infantry Division, elements of which were scattered along the front, received orders to concentrate in the II Corps sector. The 34th and 9th Infantry divisions were to gradually move forward into the area, the former turning over security responsibilities along the lines of communication to the French. By early February, the 26th Infantry Regiment, 1st Infantry Division, and the 168th Infantry Regiment, 34th Infantry Division, were established in Fredendall’s sector.

  Eisenhower’s deputy and forward representative, MajGen Lucian Truscott Jr., later offered this description of Fredendall: “Small in stature, loud and rough in speech, he was outspoken in his opinions and critical of superiors and subordinates alike. He was inclined to jump at conclusions that were not always well founded. He rarely left his command post for personal reconnaissance and visits, yet he was impatient with the recommendations of subordinates more familiar with the terrain and other conditions than he was.”1

  Eisenhower visited Fredendall’s CP on 13 February and was appalled to find that he had hundreds of engineers digging tunnels into the walls of a ravine for him and his staff. Ike noted that it was the only time during the war that he saw a commander at that level so concerned over his own safety that he dug underground shelters.2 Omar Bradley, then a major general just arriving in North Africa, judged that Fredendall lacked personal courage.3

  German successes against the poorly equipped French troops in the center during January had necessitated the deployment into the area of British units as well as elements of the 1st Armored Division. By Eisenhower’s own admission, his front by late tha
t month was “a long tenuous line stretching from Bizerte to Gafsa, with units badly mixed and no local reserves.” On 26 January, Eisenhower gave British LtGen Kenneth Anderson command of the entire battle line in order to bring order to the chaos.4

  * * *

  Hundreds of miles to the east, Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel was nearing the end of his skillfully executed sixteen hundred-mile withdrawal through Libya, cautiously pursued by Monty and his Eighth Army. Hitler had lost faith in Rommel’s winning magic. On the same day that Anderson took command of the Allied battle line in Tunisia, Rommel was ordered to consolidate his forces in the modest French-built fortifications of the Mareth Line along the Tunisian frontier, turn his command over to an Italian general, and return to Germany “for health reasons.” The successes achieved by the German commander in Tunisia—Generaloberst Jürgen von Arnim—against the French during January, however, inspired Rommel to press again an idea he had formulated as he foresaw the merging of the two North African fronts.

  The Mareth Line, Rommel reasoned, would be in grave peril with American troops only some one hundred thirty miles to the rear at Gafsa. Rommel proposed leaving a holding force at the Mareth Line, shifting his remaining strike force westward, and in cooperation with von Arnim, launching a surprise attack deep into the Allies’ rear area in Tunisia. Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring, who was responsible for coordinating the two German forces in Tunisia, and the Axis Comando Supremo approved the idea. On 9 February, the three German commanders met at Gabes to discuss the offensive. Von Arnim would attack at Sidi bou Zid with the 10th and 21st Panzer divisions, and Rommel would strike at Gafsa with elements of his Panzerarmee, the remnants of the Italian Centauro Division, and any forces that could be spared from the 21st Panzer Division after its initial operations. Fortunately for the Allies, command arrangements were left rather vague.5

  * * *

  Two clusters of passes pierced the mountain chain—called the Eastern Dorsale—running north to south inland from the coast in eastern Tunisia. In the north, passes at Fondouk and Pichon debouched into the French sector. Roughly fifty miles south, the Faid and Maizila passes sent roads down to the American-held oasis of Sidi bou Zid. Von Arnim’s attacks in January had secured Pichon, Faid, and Maizila passes for the Germans.

  The British Ultra code-breaking operation detected the German preparations for an offensive and alerted Allied headquarters in Algiers. Intelligence officers deduced from the traffic that the blow would fall at Fondouk, in the north.6 Lieutenant General Anderson, acting on the best information available to him, decided to keep the 1st Armored Division’s CCB behind Fondouk to deal with the threat.

  To the south, II Corps’ own intelligence collectors—ignorant of the Ultra data—had pulled together a growing body of evidence that the Germans were preparing an attack at Faid Pass. Fredendall heeded the warning. He instructed 1st Armored Division CG MajGen Orlando Ward in excruciating and insulting detail on how he was to dispose of his forces in preparation.7

  On 11 February, Eisenhower received his fourth star. Nonetheless, a worried rather than cheerful Eisenhower inspected the II Corps area on 13 and 14 February. Despite Fredendall’s awareness of a threat, Ike later recalled that he detected a certain complacency among the line units, illustrated by an unconscionable delay in preparing defensive positions. Eisenhower concluded that lack of training and experience among commanders was the chief cause of the problem. He also recognized that the 1st Armored Division had been too thinly spread to fight effectively.8

  Two hill masses flank the road that runs from Faid Pass by Sidi bou Zid and thence to Sbeitla. To the north lies Djebel Lessouda and to the south Djebel Ksaira. In accordance with Fredendall’s orders, a battalion of the 168th Infantry Regiment, 34th Infantry Division, defended each hill. Local commanders had objected that this disposition risked having the battalions cut off and cut up because they could not support one another, but Fredendall and his staff had declined to take a personal look at the terrain. Lieutenant Colonel John Waters had been given control over the troops on Djebel Lessouda on 12 February. In addition to the 2/168th, Waters had at his disposal a company of light tanks, a battery of 105mm howitzers, and the 2d Platoon, A/701st Tank Destroyer Battalion.9

  Waters’s job was to stop any attacking force long enough for LtCol Louis Hightower to launch a counterattack from Sidi bou Zid with his mobile reserve of some forty tanks from the 3d Battalion, 1st Armored Regiment. The rest of A/701st and two artillery battalions supported Hightower’s force.10 Company A was the only line company in the TD battalion that had virtually no combat experience.

  * * *

  At 0400 hours on 14 February, Waters rose and went to the lookout position atop Djebel Lessouda. Before turning in the night before, he had called the commander of the 2d Battalion and told him to inform his company commanders to expect an attack. Peering toward Faid Pass, he could neither see nor hear anything. A windstorm was blowing through the pass, carrying an obscuring cloud of sand with it. Waters returned to his tent just as a call came in from Col Peter Hains, the deputy commander of CCA, who wanted to know what the shooting was all about. Waters was mystified but said he would check. He returned to the top of the hill. Now he heard the rumble of artillery through the wind.11

  Two battle groups of the 10th Panzer Division, covered by artillery fire and led by the Tigers of the Schwere Panzer Abteilung 501, were erupting from the pass. Dismounted panzergrenadiers from the 21st Panzer Division supported the attack. To the south, mobile elements from the 21st Panzer Division were preparing to sweep through the thin American defenses in Maizila Pass.

  A small covering force of American infantry and the tank destroyers of 2d Platoon barred the exit from Faid Pass. Lieutenant Armbruster ordered his green tank destroyer crews to open fire. Their 75s would cause no more harm to the advancing Tigers than would throwing rocks, though the men later said they had managed to knock out three or more panzers of some type. The German force quickly overran the American positions. Men broke in panic and pelted back toward Sidi bou Zid. “Tigers! The Tigers are coming!” men shouted as they reached Waters’ position. Two M3s and a few jeeps from A/701st joined the rout. These vehicles may have later fetched up with a combat group built around the 3d Battalion, 168th Infantry Regiment, which was deployed at Djebel Ksaira and at 1400 hours reported that it had been joined by some retreating tank destroyers.12

  At 0650, Waters reported that he was under attack by infantry and armor. Waters ordered his light tank company forward. Armed with 37mm popguns, the light tanks stood even less chance than had the TDs and were quickly destroyed. At 0730, Hightower received orders to launch his planned attack to stabilize the situation. Climbing into his command Sherman, he instructed the forty-odd Shermans of Companies H and I, 3d Battalion, 1st Armored Regiment, and the eight tank destroyers of A/701st under the command of Captain Wray to advance.

  About this time, Waters was able to count roughly sixty German tanks around his position, and there were more that he could not see. When Hightower saw the number of tanks that he faced, he radioed that the best he could do was to delay the enemy. He was not only outnumbered but outgunned.13

  The tank destroyers deployed to the right flank of Company I. They drove to high ground east of the Lessouda-Sadguia road, advancing through a cactus patch over the rise. The crews were shocked to see about thirty Mark IV tanks heading west from the pass a mere two hundred yards distant. The Americans opened fire, including small arms in the heat of the moment. But a slugging match against so many panzers at short range was utterly hopeless. Three M3s and two M6s rocked and burst into flames as cannon shells struck home.

  The outnumbered American tanks, meanwhile, were taking a pounding, especially from 88s, including those on a few Tiger tanks. Dust made identification of friend and foe extremely difficult.14 Four more tank destroyers were knocked out as the confused melee continued. Fortunately, elements of the 168th Infantry surrounded on Djebel Lessouda spotted a flanking
movement by six Tigers and were able to reach the tankers and warn them, which prevented a potentially devastating surprise.15

  Hightower knew it was time to go. He later told LtGen Omar Bradley that the TD men of Company A stuck it out to the bitter end and were utterly fearless.16 They had also earned the distinction of being the first Americans to knock out a Tiger tank by direct fire.17 As the attacking force withdrew, the remnants of the TD company turned and raced toward Sidi bou Zid. They linked up with the roughly twenty surviving tanks under Hightower, who ordered a withdrawal in the direction of Sbeitla. Just west of town, German fighters—which completely controlled the air during the initial onslaught—bombed and strafed the Americans, who were fleeing in no particular order across the plain. The air strike knocked out Company A’s last M3 and the maintenance trucks.

  The Company A party decided to cut southwest across a wadi. The men soon spotted six German tanks moving slowly toward the main clump of retreating Americans. Bereft of firepower, the men dispersed and hid in the grass. The panzers passed, and the TD men could soon hear their cannons firing.

  A radio message informed Hightower of the attack. He tried to reach some of his tanks up ahead but had no luck. The colonel ordered his driver to stop, and he traversed the turret and engaged the enemy himself. Although the Sherman was struck several times, he and his crew continued to slug it out. Finally, when he had only three rounds left, a German shell penetrated the Sherman and set it on fire. Hightower escaped with his crew and made it back to American lines. He had seven tanks left. According to the men from Company A, Hightower knocked out several of the panzers and saved the column.18

  The remnants of Company A also made it back to American lines. They left behind two officers killed, one officer who was both wounded and missing, five enlisted men killed, six known captured, and forty-two missing in action.