Abstract

Battle Lines in Tunisia

The showdown campaign for North Africa has not yet been fought, but all signs indicate that it does not lie far ahead. Progress in the African war has not always been correctly assessed. The loss of all Libya to the Eighth Army was not in itself a serious matter for German dictator Adolf Hitler. It relieved the British of a threat to their position in the Middle East, but it did not spell defeat for the Germans. The American occupation of Algeria and Morrocco aroused hopes of an instant annihilation of German Field Marshal Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel, but the failure to reach Tunisia ahead of Axis troops, together with weather difficulties and not too brilliant generalship, afforded time to dig in and develop strong natural defenses. Today, as four months ago, the total strategic situation favors the United Nations. Surrounded by the British Eighth Army on the south and by French, British, and American forces on the west, the Germans in eastern Tunisia are in a dangerous position.