North Africa Campaign Book

[John 3rd]

OK. I took everyone's advice on the U-Boats book request. Now I would like to ask for a good history of the entire North Africa Campaign. I've got the whole 'An Army at Dawn' set but would like something more on the earlier phases of the Campaign.

THANKS!

[Peever]

I've got "The Phantom Army of Alamein: How the Camouflage Unit and Operation Bertram Hoodwinked Rommel" by Rick Stroud on my to read/listen list. It looks like an interesting read and has decent reviews on Audible.

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

OK. I took everyone's advice on the U-Boats book request. Now I would like to ask for a good history of the entire North Africa Campaign. I've got the whole 'An Army at Dawn' set but would like something more on the earlier phases of the Campaign.

THANKS!

warspite1

I have never read - or heard - of a one volume account of the North African Campaign. I believe Alan Moorehead did a 3-volume series of North Africa 1940-43 but I could not personally vouch for it.

My knowledge of the campaign came initially through Purnell's Encyclopedia of the Second World War - you could do worse than try and can track down a second hand set of those beauties. Other than that it has been a case of buying individual books to drill down further such as:

- The Osprey Campaign Series - various titles such as Operation Compass Gazala, Crusader, Tobruk, El-Alamein etc
- Siege Malta 1940-43
- England's Last War Against France (inc Catapult and Exporter (Syria))
- The Lost Battle: Crete 1941
- Massacre at Tobruk (special ops raid)
- The War In the Mediterranean (naval war)
- Somerville's Force H (naval war)
- The Struggle for the Middle Sea (naval war)

And of course the Blair volumes you have bought will also provide some detail on U-boar operations in the Mediterranean too.

[JeffroK]

Online
The Aussie, Enzed Official histories plus the first 2 volumes of the British History.
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/ETO/Africa/index.html

Alan Moorehead's books/trilogy are good, not hard core.

The Desert Generals by Corelli Barnett.

Lots of books on campaigns, "Compass", Crusader, Tobruk, Gazala & Alamein. It was a campaign of stops & starts.

[Encircled]

Alan Moreheads "The Desert War" is good

Good trilogy by Barrie Pitt "The Crucible of War"

[cohimbra]

From italian point of view, and I think only in italian language, you can find it in military library edited by FF.AA.:

Montanari M., Le operazioni in A.S. - I - Sidi el Barrani;
Montanari M., Le operazioni in A.S. - II - Tobruk;
Montanari M., Le operazioni in A.S. - III - El Alamein;
Montanari M., Le operazioni in A.S. - IV - Enfidaville.


A.S. = Africa Settentrionale = Northern Africa

[John 3rd]

Thanks guys./

OK. Lets look at specific campaigns like Crusader, any of Rommels, and something on the Invasion of Greece--North Africa Campaign.

[Big B]

In a single volume:

The Battle for North Africa 1940 - 1943, Jackson (1975) - Amazon

[John 3rd]

COOL!

My interest in the U-Boats and North Africa stems from reading Military Errors of World War Two. I would describe it as high quality 'potty' reading.

[John 3rd]

ORIGINAL: Big B

In a single volume:

The Battle for North Africa 1940 - 1943, Jackson (1975) - Amazon

Thanks Brian. Will look into that one.

[Dili]

Without sources from the other side or even better sources that have input from both sides is more or less just knowing one side. I don't find that satisfactory.


For Crusader you will probably get more at this website The Crusader Project link is https://rommelsriposte.com/

[JeffroK]

Dili, please suggest some options.

The only decent book I found in English was about the Guastatori(Engineer?) Bn of Folgore.

Bayerlein also covers his involvement in his book.

[rustysi]

I do vaguely recall reading something years ago on North Africa. Didn't The Rommel Papers have it in there? Been so long I can't remember, not even sure of the name of the book. If I'm right you'd have something from the Axis side.

[Dili]

JeffK unfortunatley there isn't much that presents both sides for land combat or an overall look, but that is true for many combats in WW2, for example without that japanese person Taki we would know much less about Japanese army... There are air combat books with both sides - Some Shores and Malizia and the Desert Prelude 1 and Desert Prelude 2 from June 1940 to operation Compass for air war. There is O'Hara about Naval combat, but on land just some recent very limited Osprey's. Most i know about the theatre is because i can read English and Italian. For a generic look you might get better just following wikipedia.
For example the Italian air force history of WW2 by Santoro is available free online is the ideal source for statistical proposes but it is in Italian.

PS:Guastatori are assault engineers.

Edit: Santoro book( 2 volumes) it is probably not too difficult to read the charts.

http://www.avia-it.com/act/biblioteca/libri/libri.asp

>By Avia> A> Aeronautica Italiana nella Seconda Guerra Mondiale

2 volumes in PDF be warned that each is around 160mb.

[Andreas1968]

Hi, I run the Crusader Project.

I wouldn't trust Bayerlein further than I can throw The Rommel Papers. Kriebel is a very good source on the battle from the German side, and available in English. He was the Ia in 15th Panzer during the battle.

http://www.amazon.com/Inside-The-Afrika ... 1853673226

I obviously have a ton of stuff related to the battle on the site, but no overarching narrative, yet.

All the best

Andreas

[Andreas1968]

This should also be helpful:

http://tothosewhoserved.org/

All the best

Andreas

[JeffroK]

Thanks for the links, I've downloaded a couple of the books in Italian, I forsee 12 mths of my standard of translation.

Why the lack of Italian history converted to English?
If there is a belief the Italian Army got bad publicity why not try to correct it.??

[Alfred]

British/American publishers are not interested in incurring the extra costs of translating foreign language non-fiction works.  They only translate foreign work which they believe will appeal to the mass market.  So foreign fiction, especially of a well known writer, might be translated but academic foreign work is not seen to be profitable.
 
Alfred

[rustysi]

I wouldn't trust Bayerlein further than I can throw The Rommel Papers

Would someone care to expand on this statement. Was The Rommel Papers that bad of a book? I mean I read it some 40 years ago, but don't recall any glaring errors.

[JeffroK]

ORIGINAL: Alfred

British/American publishers are not interested in incurring the extra costs of translating foreign language non-fiction works.  They only translate foreign work which they believe will appeal to the mass market.  So foreign fiction, especially of a well known writer, might be translated but academic foreign work is not seen to be profitable.

Alfred

What about an Italian Publisher?

Therefore there should be no complaint of an "Allied perspective"