Seize and Ravage

by Richard Townsend Bickers

  His pleasurable anticipation was marred by one particular factor: the whereabouts of Brigadier Weatherhead. All he knew was that the Brigadier had left Scotland a day earlier than X Troop. He knew he must have a V.I.P. priority passage to Cairo: probably on a civilian airliner to Lisbon and on thence without delay along the rest of the route. Or perhaps an R.A.F. Sunderland flying boat was taking him all the way.

  Whatever means the Brigadier was using, Taggart was resigned to seeing him waiting for them in Egypt.

  If there had been any enemy interception, none of X Troop would have seen it. Every man Jack of them had to be roused from sleep to prepare for the landing on Malta. Shortly after taking off again, all three Valentias were reverberating to their snores once more.

  But everyone was awake to see the dawn rise over Egypt and watch expectantly for Cairo to appear on the horizon. Instead, they put down on an aerodrome which appeared to be surrounded by desert, without a town or village in sight. It was 2nd February, and the Scottish winter was far behind them.

  And there, to Taggart's relief, there was no sign of the Brigadier.

  He was met by a captain who greeted him without any sign of pleasure or friendliness. Suntanned, and in well worn corduroy trousers and a battledress blouse, suede desert boots, a brightly patterned silk scarf at his neck, his welcome was curt. ‘We hear you've come to stage some sort of special show; a kind of Crazy Gang turn, from what we can gather. Seems odd, sending out chaps who haven't fought out here, when there are several thousand of us on the spot, with experience of chasing the enemy from arsehole to breakfast time.’ His vulgarity hardly consorted with the badges he wore, of a fashionable cavalry regiment now equipped with armoured cars. ‘My Colonel wants to see you straight away. It seems we're under orders to give you ‘every facility’: whatever the bloody hell that means.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Taggart was carefully polite. ‘I don't think we'll be troubling you much. The whole point of the Commandos is complete independence and self-sufficiency.’

  ‘That, apparently, is what that bloody Brigadier of yours keeps saying. It's put a lot of people's backs up, I can tell you.’

  ‘You've met him?’

  ‘One doesn't need to meet the man to get a fair idea of his nuisance value: it's spread from the Delta to our furthest picquet post west of here. It wouldn't surprise me if even the Arabs have heard of him; and their bloody camels.’

  ‘In that event, General Borgonzoli might be aware of my Brigadier, too: which should put the wind up him; which would be useful.’ He gave the supercilious captain of cavalry a dirty look. ‘Bloody useful.’

  The captain raised his eyebrows, as though astonished that this hard-looking infantryman, whose face, though weatherbeaten, was not bronzed by desert sun or scoured by sandstorms, should know the name of the hugely bewhiskered general who commanded the division which had been defeated at Bardia and sent scuttling back to Tobruk; and was known derisively to the British as Electric Whiskers.

  THREE

  Capitano Bruno Penatti saw the sand rising under the wheels of armoured cars of the British Seventh Armoured Division and felt the spasm in his stomach which was partly shame, partly anger and partly fear.

  He was ashamed of the Italian Army's headlong retreat; angry with his superior officers for their failure to stand and fight, for the whole Italian failure to understand the desert, with the enemy for humiliating his country and himself; afraid because he stopped and fought back at every opportunity, and expected that one day he would fight a battle in which he would be killed or hurt.

  The day that the world had heard the news of the Greek Prime Minister's death, the Italian Army had pulled out of Derna, 180 miles east of the Egyptian frontier, and begun a precipitate move westward. Now, four days later (and the day after X Troops's arrival in the theatre), they were still giving ground and the Australians — those tall, terrible men with a love of hand-to-hand combat and the bayonet — were in hot pursuit.

  There were two routes westward across Cyrenaica, this eastern province of Libya: by the coast road along the narrow strip between the hills and the sea, or across the desert, to the south of the hills.

  Oh! Those green hills. Not only did they refresh the eye of Captain Penatti, who was a fair-skinned, well-knit man from the mountains of north-east Italy; but also, that, in Arabic, was their name: the Jebel Akhdar. For 150 miles, from just east of Derna to south of Benghazi, and fifty miles wide at their broadest point, they rose to a height of 3000 feet at their highest. The foothills were cultivated, the site of thriving farms and orchards.

  Penatti could see them now, to the north of him.

  Instead of making a stand 100 miles to the east, at Derna, the Divisional Commander had ordered his battalion to dig in here, at this place that was a mere name on the map, Bir Rawaayih, identified only because it was the site of an ancient well. A few miserable palm trees still formed an apology for an oasis.

  Is this where I was born to die? Penatti wondered. Is this where I shall leave my bones, and not in the family tomb in that small town near the Austrian border? Where in summer the hills are covered with wild flowers and in winter with snow, and the only sound is the hissing of skis as we skim down to the valley.

  He climbed out of his slit trench and walked along his company positions, talking to his men, encouraging his platoon commanders, reminding them of how well the regiment had fought in every engagement and retreated only on the orders of the High Command.

  We could all be obliterated here, he thought. What compensation is it to die in good company, when there is really no need to die at all? We could have held them at Sidi Barrani, 300 miles east of here, if we had sited our defences properly. We outnumbered them nearly three to one. Then he remembered those damned tanks, which outnumbered the Italians' by two to one, and he quaked all over again as he watched the dust cloud and knew what it portended. Behind the armoured cars would lumber the Matildas; and with them the lean, sunburned infantry with their wide-brimmed felt hats cocked rakishly up on one side, and the bright bayonets.

  But night fell and no attack had come. It was an uneasy night of being roused every two hours, on his instructions, to inspect his forward posts, to peer eastward through night glasses; to stand listening in the cold desert night for sounds of movement from the enemy.

  It was cold, but not with the same kind of chill as Pennati had known all his life in his mountains. Amid the snows, a man could clothe himself in garments that would serve him from rising to retiring. Here, even in winter the days were warm and the cold struck suddenly when night fell. At this season soldiers wore their winter uniforms and sweated by day; shivered at night, until they learned to protect themselves. The Italian Army was, at least, well provided with clothing and the comforts of life.

  He hated the desert. This abrupt change of temperature — even in summer the nights turned chilly — was just another treacherous facet of desert life.

  The British and their Commonwealth Allies, the Indians, Australians and New Zealanders against whom he had fought (the South Africans were still campaigning in East Africa) were masters of the desert. Even though the Commonwealth troops had arrived only since the war began, they had immediately learned from the British who were already there and had adapted themselves. The Italians, Pennati felt, made the mistake of trying to create their accustomed domestic surroundings. They had an abundance of comforts, a variety of uniforms, every man had an assortment of cosmetics; wine flowed, food was plentiful and the same as they ate at home. They established themselves everywhere as though their occupation were permanent.

  Look at the mistake they had made by building fortifications around Sidi Barrani and at other places. The enemy had driven through.

  The enemy, on the other hand, remained mobile, fluid, forced a war of constant movement on the Italians. They had learned at once to live in the desert frugally and accepted discomfort. They lived as the Arab tribes did, but with even fewer domestic possessions. They did not car
ry tents in their tanks, armoured cars or lorries. Their food was almost entirely bully beef and biscuits; a diet which would have brought the average Italian soldier to surrender without firing a shot.

  All Pennati's thoughts were sour that night. He was used to making week-long treks through the mountains: in tramping boots in summer and on skis in winter. He and his companions carried small tents, or slept in log cabins, according to the season. He had tried to live simply in Libya and Egypt, but it was not the way that the Italian Army did things.

  He quite liked the British and admired many of their characteristics and habits. His family owned two hotels at skiing resorts and had just bought a third on the Venice Lido when Italy entered the war. His father had sent him to Switzerland to train, and to England for a year to work at The Savoy. He spoke English, and, as was common in the Austro-Italian border country, where terrain had changed hands from side to side through the centuries, his command of German was as good as of Italian.

  Germany, he had also visited. He did not like the food or the people: they frightened him; they were not light-hearted and easygoing, like the Austrians, whom he knew well. He was thankful that Hitler had kept out of North Africa. But the Italians were being beaten by the Allies in East Africa and repulsed by the Greeks along the Albanian frontier. He feared that Hitler would intervene in Greece; and then here, in the desert. It could not be long before those bullying Nazis turned up to trample on their Italian allies, treat them with their usual arrogance and contempt, and prolong the war. Tall and lithe, with fair hair and brown eyes, he resented being patronised; as though some stunted, swarthy member of an inferior breed.

  Pennati would rather be defeated by the British than subjugated by the Germans under guise of ally. He had fought well throughout the desert campaign, and the fear of German intervention strengthened his determination to keep on fighting hard. He expected defeat; but it would be, for him, with honour: and not so bad, for as soon as they could get this war done with, the sooner could he return home and manage the Venetian hotel. One of the perquisites of running a hotel was the availability of a large female staff; who, if one chose wisely, could constitute an obedient harem. There had always been a number of amenable good-lookers among the maids in the two hotels the family already had.

  He was about to go into a sleepy train of concupiscent reminiscences, with an hour to go before his orderly roused him for dawn stand-to, when flares burst overhead and mortar bombs exploded among the outposts.

  At once the eight-millimetre and 6.5 mm Breda machine-guns opened fire. Pennati leaped from his camp bed and ran from his company command post towards the firing.

  He was always uneasy about those damnable Bredas. The Model 30, the lighter one, was subject to jamming for the slightest reason. In mountain warfare and exercises, snow penetrated its many apertures; in the desert, sand. As for the heavier gun, it was fed by flat trays containing 20 rounds; which small number meant reloading after every burst. He presently heard the familiar sound of B.S.A. 7.92 mm machine-guns above the noise of armoured car engines.

  How he envied the enemy their B.S.A., Vickers and Bren guns.

  He heard wounded men screaming and sergeants shouting fire orders. A sheet of flame lit the night and by it he could see figures tumbling from a burning armoured car.

  Shells began to whine overhead as the divisional field artillery opened fire. From the British tanks came the sound of two-pounder guns firing. Among the Italian slit trenches and sandbagged breastworks, the two-pound shells were bursting. Sand rose in thick clouds at each explosion.

  Another fire flared in a second armoured car. Pennati gave a shout of derision: he had seen a British shell hit it. But the Italian field guns had the range now and he could hear the armoured cars' noise receding. Not for long: there was a succession of two-pound shells as the cars stopped, turned and fired their own guns.

  Then came the chatter of a Bren, followed by the crack of exploding hand grenades; and Pennati knew that an infantry fighting patrol had come with the armour, and had stayed to grab a prisoner for Intelligence interrogation and unit identification.

  He shouted to his nearest platoon commander to follow him and in a moment was running towards the sound of the Brens and grenades. He carried a Berretta 9 mm submachine-gun. The platoon commander also had one; the other ranks, the Carcano rifle with bayonet. It was not much of a rifle, for it had poor carrying power, being of only 6.5 mm calibre; but there was no need for a long carry at this moment: the enemy was on top of the Italian position.

  Very obliging of them. Pennati enjoyed the grim thought. He had a 40-round magazine on his weapon and there were four Breda hand grenades at his belt.

  The two armoured cars were still smouldering. Occasionally there would be an explosion as a shell detonated, or a series of sharp cracklings when bullets went off in the heat. Spurts of flame and the bright colours of tracer accompanied these.

  Against the flickering light, Pennati saw two men in British steel helmets dragging a screaming Italian away. He aimed a burst at one of the men's back. A charging Italian soldier close behind bumped into Pennati. The barrel of the submachine-gun jumped and he lost control of it. He saw all three men pitch forward and lie twitching and kicking. One of the British soldiers was squirming round to shoot at him.

  The Italian's screams rose shrilly. Pennati felt sick at what he had done. He fired again at the enemy who was pointing a rifle at him. The rifle fired at the same instant. The bullet ripped through Pennati's right sleeve and he felt a burning sensation along the forearm. The wounded man fell back and did not move again. The second Briton was moaning. Pennati hesitated. The Italian twisted round, screamed for his mother and fell back dead.

  Pennati's hesitation ended. He had killed one of his own men. There was only one way to compensate for it. Anyway, prisoners, especially wounded, were a handicap. He put a one-second burst into the groaning enemy soldier.

  His forearm was throbbing. He had lost his temper. The enemy was moving back, stopping every few paces so that one section could retire under the covering fire of the other. Pennati threw a grenade and fell flat. Before it had burst, he tossed another.

  He saw a British soldier's arm jerk. A Mills bomb came arcing towards him. He hugged the ground. The grenade burst. Fragments screeched over his head. One clanged against his steel helmet and dazed him. He crawled cautiously a few yards, then leaped up and resumed the pursuit, firing as he went. He threw his two other grenades. The noise, the odour of cordite, the flames at the muzzle of his gun, and from the explosion of his grenades, excited him. He realised that he had outstripped his men. It was time to turn and run back before one of the enemy rounded on him.

  He felt proud of his wound.

  Reaction from having killed one of his own men made him tremble as though from ague. He arrived back at his command post shaking and panting, with blood dripping dramatically from his arm. He was conscious of the men in the sandbagged tent looking at him admiringly.

  ‘Give me a cigarette.’

  He thought that was suitably brave and nonchalant, and was disappointed to hear how shrill his voice sounded.

  A sergeant put a cigarette in Pennati's mouth and lit it.

  ‘Can you walk to the medical aid post, sir?’

  ‘Of course. It's only a scratch.’

  He was not entirely pleased when the medical officer found that he had described the trifling graze precisely. It needed only ten stitches. A real wound would have been welcome. He was sick and ashamed of this incessant helter-skelter retirement. Orders had just been given to prepare to withdraw, but to hold the position until sunset.

  When he returned to his company position, he saw sand rising from the tracks of Matilda tanks and wondered if he would still be alive at sunset; and, if he were, whether he would have been hit again.

  The enemy tanks were falling back to the far side of a high ridge of rock and dunes. He knew what that meant. The British were not pulling out: they were moving round
to both flanks for another attack. Daylight never stopped them.

  The terrain made it difficult to spot movement; especially when the sun was low and cast long shadows. There were square miles of sand entirely devoid of any growth, but there were as many where camel thorn grew in small clusters a few inches high, and thorny bushes stood waist-tall. Here and there the smooth sandy surface was broken by rocky outcrops. The desert was not all flat monotony: dunes rose as high as 100 ft in places. The prevailing wind usually gave them a crescent shape. The colour of the sand varied from white to yellow and grey. The thorny growths looked dark green or black. All vehicles, of both armies, wore dun paint as camouflage.

  Penatti heard aero engines ahead and looked up. He was able to discern a section of three Hurricanes in V formation only by the sun reflected from their canopies. Their undersides were duck egg blue, their upper surfaces pale khaki. Mobile anti-aircraft guns, Bredas which fired a 1.75 lb shell to 13,500 ft, shot at them. The Hurricanes flew on, apparently unperturbed. One of the division's few Ansaldo-designed medium guns, which could send a 22.7 lb shell to 39000 ft, opened up. The big clots of black smoke from the shell bursts stained the sky. Pennati judged the fighters' height as about 3000 metres and admired the accuracy of the gunners' fuse settings.

  There was a sudden bright glow accompanied by a billow of oily smoke. The surviving two Hurricanes broke to right and left and dived, then swooped up, turning in the opposite direction. Presently they were out of sight.

  Pennati wondered how long it would be before R.A.F. bombers came over in response to the Hurricanes' report on the Italian dispositions.

  He saw three lorries, each with a 47 mm anti-tank gun mounted on it, emerge from their camouflaged positions and move forward. Sometimes the British tank crews mistook such vehicles for victims of a breakdown and were taken by surprise when a shell hit them; if they were still alive to be astonished.