Salaam

Here we go again.  Whatever the rights and wrongs and realpolitik of it, and I struggle to make my mind up, I wonder if any bookies are taking punts on whether we will get any thanks for stepping into the Libyan imbroglio.   Long odds I suspect. 

By pure coincidence I’ve been rereading John Latimer’s Alamein and, while the technology has moved on a bit from Panzer IVs and 25-pdrs, the North African geography remains as much of a constraint as it ever was.  For either side to carry out a ‘home run’ into Tripoli or Benghazi means extending themselves out over 650 miles of coastal road and still having the wherewithal to be able to sustain themselves for long enough to finish the job when they get there.  Think of it as two boxers attached to bungee ropes.    It’s as true now for Gadhafi and the mysterious ‘Opposition’ as it was for the Afrika Korps and the Eighth Army.  And that inescapable logistical limitation is the main reason why the desert war see-sawed back and forth across Cyrenaica and the Western Desert for over two years.  Incidentally, I haven’t seen any news reports at all that have actually referred to eastern Libya as Cyrenaica, a name which became all too familiar through 1940-42.

Latimer excels as an author of popular military history, balancing the grand strategy with the human.

 

While Axis forces usually relied on centralised cooking, the British often devolved the responsibility down to vehicle crews, allowing more scope for inventiveness.  Crews soon perfected the technique of ‘brewing up’ and moving on in 20 minutes, and 20 ways of cooking bully.  Whenever the British were close to Alexandria an enterprising unit would arrange for delicacies to be brought up by anyone with an excuse to make a visit there, however brief.  ‘Up the blue’ – in the open desert – very occasionally there would be gazelles to hunt for fresh meat, and sometimes a Bedouin would appear seemingly from nowhere, enabling a trade – the British swapped tea or cigarettes for eggs.  According to Harold Fitzjohn, these exchanges were not always straightforward, as the nomad would always ask for a written chit or pass to prove his loyalty to the Allied cause.  ‘He’d ask the Germans for the same.  I suppose he had a pocket full of them.  We used to make one out and it used to say “Whatever happens, do not trust the bastard.”  After much thanking and “salaaming” he would go on his way clutching his pass.’ (p.21)