South Africans versus Rommel
The Untold Story of the Desert War in World War II
By (author) David Brock Katz
Publication date:
15 January 2018Length of book:
384 pagesPublisher
Stackpole BooksISBN-13: 9780811717816
After bitter debate, South Africa, a dominion of the British Empire at the time, declared war on Germany five days after the invasion of Poland in September 1939. Thrust by the British into the campaign against Erwin Rommel’s German Afrika Korps in North Africa, the South Africans fought a see-saw war of defeats followed by successes, culminating in the Battle of El Alamein, where South African soldiers made a significant contribution to halting the Desert Fox’s advance into Egypt. This is the story of an army committed somewhat reluctantly to a war it didn’t fully support, ill-prepared for the battles it was tasked with fighting, and sent into action on the orders of its senior alliance partner. At its heart, however, this is the story of men at war.