Word: bengasi
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Dates: during 1941-1941
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Ritchie an almost perfect setup for a cleanup. With some forces chasing the Germans beyond Bengasi, Ritchie was maneuvering this week to wipe out the Axis units on the Barca Plateau...
...week: "The British armored forces and infantry units have broken the Axis line west of el-Gazála and have sent the Germans reeling backward in headlong retreat." Other reports also had General Erwin Rommel's Army "reeling backward." BBC claimed this week that Rommel was abandoning Bengasi and retreating towards Tripoli...
Units of Rommel's forces that had not retreated beyond Bengasi were caught on the Barca Plateau. This was the area the Axis had hoped to defend to block the advancing British. They apparently stumbled over it in retreat, for this week Rommel's armored units and the Italian infantry appeared to be sprawled from Cyrene toward Tripoli...
With British reports putting some British units far south of Bengasi, Rommel seemed to be facing disaster. His only outlet for the forces caught on the Barca Plateau is Bengasi. Under bombing and shelling from the sea, the port may become a jagged-edged bottleneck. This week the British began increasing their aerial activity against Axis Libyan ports. They hoped they were entering the last round of the Ritchie-Rommel fight-to-a-finish...
...still appeared that the Axis powers had great problems in logistics. They could not supply their forward forces by sea. The British Navy last week said it had stopped 60% of all enemy supplies destined for all ports in Africa. Between the extreme rear (Tripoli) and the immediate rear (Bengasi) a British raiding force presumably still straddled the Axis supply roads. The only steady flow of Axis supplies came by plane and night. In the sector of supply the British had the advantage, and time might increase that advantage...