occupied 44.occ.002 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Rommel advances from El Agheila again

Following the successful Operation Crusader, in late 1941, the Eighth Army had driven the Axis forces out of Cyrenaica and forced Rommel to withdraw to strong defensive positions he had prepared at El Agheila. However, their 500+ mile advance had over-stretched their lines of supply and during January 1942 they had thinned out their front line troops to work on building lines of communications and supply dumps to enable a further thrust west to be made against Tripolitania. Meanwhile, Rommel had received reinforcements in men and tanks, and on 21 January sent out three strong armoured columns to make a tactical reconnaissance. Finding only the thinnest of screens in front of him he rapidly changed his reconnaissance into an offensive. He recaptured Benghazi on 28 January, and Timimi on 3 February and pressed on towards the fortified port of Tobruk on the Mediterranean coast.
[edit] Eighth Army digs in on the Gazala line

Between Gazala and Timimi (just west of Tobruk) the Eighth Army was able to concentrate its forces sufficiently to turn and fight. By 4 February Rommel's advance had been halted and the front line had been stabilised running from Gazala on the coast (30 miles west of Tobruk) to the town of Bir Hakeim, 50 miles to the south.

The "Gazala Line" was a series of occupied "boxes" each of brigade strength set out across the desert with minefields and wire watched by regular patrols between the boxes. The Free French were to the south at the Bir Hakeim box. The line was not equally staffed with a greater number of troops covering the coast leaving the south less protected.
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