244: East Africa

Description

General Wavell was managing far more than just the Western Desert. Across East Africa, British, Indian, South African, and African colonial forces conducted a sprawling two-front campaign against Italian-held Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia, facing rugged terrain and supply challenges that rivaled anything in the desert.

The campaign’s strategic importance went beyond territory: capturing the Italian coastline along the Red Sea was necessary to convince the United States to re-open the area to American merchant shipping, giving Britain a badly needed supply lifeline. Churchill’s ambitions for a Balkan front added still more demands on Wavell’s stretched resources at every turn.

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Transcript

Hello everyone and welcome to History of the Second World War Episode 244 - North Africa 1940 - East Africa. This week a big thank you goes out to Robert, Arya, Peter, Greg, and Christopher for supporting the podcast by becoming members. Members get access to ad-free versions of all of the podcast’s episode plus special member only episodes roughly once a month. Head on over to historyofthesecondworldwar.com/members to find out more. While the fighting was occurring in the Western Desert, Wavell, as the head of the entire Mediterranean theater, had much more to worry about than a few divisions of troops pursuing the retreating Italians. Back in London the conversations about Greece and the Balkans were ramping up by the end of 1940, with Churchill in particular very anxious to find a way to form a Balkan front that would distract the Germans from whatever they were planning next. At the time the main hopes seemed to lie in a collection of countries: Greece, Yugoslavia, and Turkey. Wavell was lukewarm at best about this idea, as he was already being asked to do so many things with the forces available to him and it seemed likely that if those nations entered into the war they would require significant support from the British. This would include major shipments of equipment that Wavell felt that he desperately needed in order to accomplish the goals that had already been given to him. The supply situation was made much worse by the fact that the Italians were in control of the southern coasts of the Red Sea, or at least the western coastline at its southern extent. This made it challenging for British merchant ships to move through the area, requiring major Royal Navy support, but more importantly late in 1940 was the fact that due to the Italian control of the coast the entire area in the western Indian Ocean and the Red Sea had been declared a combatant zone by the Americans. During this period of the war, with neutrality still firmly ensconced in the minds of many American leaders, they were attempting to reduce the likelihood of American ships being damaged by the Italians or the Germans. This would involve the possibility of the loss of American lives, which might pull the Americans into the war. To get around this various areas of the world were considered combatant zones, where American shipping was not allowed to move through. This made it difficult to get supplies from America into Egypt because it required that they be loaded on British, or Allied, shipping. If the Italian positions along the coast, in Eritrea and Ethiopia, could be captured then it was likely that the area would be re-classified as a non-combatant zone which would open it up to American merchant ships. This fact put major pressure on Wavell and the British leaders in East Africa to work on a plan to recapture what the Italians had captured before and during the opening months of the war. But this just became yet another area where British forces had to be committed to try and accomplish yet another goal. Or to quote from the official history Wavell and his commanders “had to achieve a workable and appropriate balance of forces while doing their best to comply with a rapid succession of instructions and suggestions, such as to part with forces from Kenya, to capture Kismayu quickly, to capture Eritrea quickly, to deter the Japanese by ’liquidating Italian East Africa’, to treat as a ‘first duty’ the air defence of Malta, to be prepared to send ten squadrons to Turkey, to regard the capture of Rhodes as ‘of first importance’, and to ’let their first thoughts be for Greece.”. I want to give a note up front about terminology for this episode. All of the military forces involved in the fighting in East Africa involved soldiers from a variety of different nationalities and ethnicities. While there were Italians from Italy, and British from Britain, these were often the minority of the men involved. And instead on the British side troops from India would play a major role, along with men recruited from the various African colonies controlled by the British. On the Italian side the majority of the soldiers were also usually Africans from various areas under Italian control. The general term given to Africans who served in European armies in the African colonies was askari, which is a term you might hear me reference and might be present in quotes used in the episode. However, for the ease of this podcast episode I will frequently be referring to the two groups as simply the British and the Italians. It is not a perfect system, but I think it makes for the best listening and prevents listeners from having to try and keep track of which side which unit or group was on at any given moment. Just keep in mind that any military unit involved in the fighting discussed today or in other episodes relating to East Africa was a multi-ethnic collection of soldiers all fighting for the same cause.

While there were issues for the British as they tried to do too many things with not enough resources, everything was not perfect for the Italians. The Italian troops in East Africa were largely on their own after the war started, with the Royal Navy able to prevent any sea based resupply, and land routes into the territories basically non-existent due to the fact that British and French colonial holdings surrounded the Italian areas. To make matters worse, by the early months of 1941 the Ethiopians, which the Italians had defeated 5 years earlier during the Abyssinian War, were beginning to organize and to fight back. Within Ethiopia there were still powerful tribal chieftains which had previously been rivals with one another, which made it difficult for them to pool their resources together against the Italians, however as the Italian occupation continued it served as at least a temporary uniting force within Ethiopian society. This resulted in them working together, and this cooperation was bolstered when Emperor Haile Selassie, who had went into exile years earlier returned to Ethiopia with the help of the RAF in late January 1941. A major uprising was not far behind, which would make it difficult for the Duke of Aosta and his Italian occupation forces right at the time when the British were beginning to launch their attacks . This came from two different directions as they attempted to execute a pincer attack on the Italian controlled territories. From the south would come Lieutenant General Alan Cunningham, who would lead the 1st South African division and several independent brigades in an attack from the south. Their goal was to enter into Italian Somaliland in modern day Somalia and move on Mogadishu. From the north the 5th and 4th Indian divisions under the command of General Platt would move into Eritrea from the west, with the goal of moving from Kassala to the coast at Massawa, a distance of several hundred kilometers. Critically they would be able to utilize the road that ran along the route through a series of towns, with Agrodat and Keren being the most important as those were the ones the Italians planned to defend with the most determination.

As would so often be the case in the African theater, the first problem that the Indian troops had to overcome was not the Italians but instead the terrain. The Asmara Plateau was a rolling plane which was scarred by water courses, rocky outcroppings, and areas so full of dust that it at times made it difficult to breath. It was also very remote which made supplies always a major challenge. As they moved across the area the British were not free from Italian resistance. In many cases this took the form of artillery and rifle fire from positions at the top of hills which the British would have to take time to work either around or through. In some cases, just as the Indian units were making their way into a position to launch a final attack the Italians would do the smart thing and abandon their positions, only to then repeat the process further to the east . There was one somewhat unique moment when a squadron of Eritrean cavalry, which were led by Italian officers, executed a real cavalry charge. They would move quickly against a British unit, throwing grenades in front of them, but they would experience about the level of success that you might expect and they would be forced surrender after just minutes of fighting.

Eventually, after many frustrating days the Indian units would begin to arrive near their first major test and objective, Agordat. Agordat was held by the Italian 4th Colonial division and also had good numbers of artillery guns and even 10 tanks which were quite rare in East Africa. Much like at Bardia, the Italian defenders at Agordat actually outnumbered the Indian attackers, somewhere around two to 1, but also just like at Bardia the Indian forces had a secret weapon, 4 Matilda tanks were slowly making their way into a position to support the attack. Before the primary assault began though, a series of probing and exploratory efforts would begin on January 28th 1941. These were generally just designed to determine exactly where the Italian defenses were and their relative strength. The ground around Agordat had several different hills and elevation changes that the Indian forces attempted to take advantage of, by moving units along ridges and hills. Of course the Italians expected this, and when some of those units moved forward at night on the 28th they would be attacked, resulting in some close quarters fighting, and even some instances of hand to hand combat . When the Indian attacks failed, and the morning came, all they could do was try to find a place with some cover and then wait for further developments. The good news was that there were often many clefts and dips in the landscape that offered good protection, as long as they were content to stay in one place and had the supplies to stay in cover during the day.

With the first flanking attack having been a failure, the only real option was to try from a different direction. During the night units of the Cameron Highlanders infiltrated along the other side of the Italian defenses so that they could gain positions above them on a higher hill. At the same time more troops were brought up to launch a frontal attack once daylight broke, including a few tanks that were moved as close as possible to the Italian positions without putting them at risk. Early the next morning the troops that had circled around the Italian positions charged on them, with the Italians taken completely by surprise as they were still focused on the areas where the previous attack had taken place. The entire area was quickly cleared and the Italian forces were sent running, just in time for the British artillery to begin crashing down on the main defenses. Within the Italian positions it very quickly became clear that the British forces were coming from unexpected directions, and even from above them on the hill . The combination of the artillery and this realization was combined with the sudden appearance of the Matildas to throw the entire Italian defense into chaos. The tanks came up to the line, then ran along it destroying Italian defense as they went, there was nothing that the Italians could do. It was over in a matter of hours, with the entirety of Agordat occupied and all of the Italian forces having surrendered. The main issue over the rest of the morning was to try and prevent the British forces from looting the town, with some of the local inhabitants also needing to be brought under control.

While the capture of Agordat was important, it was just one of the steps on the way to Massawa and so almost immediately reconnaissance units were sent further east. They very quickly ran into an issue when they reached a bridge that spanned the Baraka waterway. The Italians had mined the areas around the bridge and had prepared the bridge for demolition. This would obviously cause problems for the advance and so engineers were brought up to deactivate all of the explosives and to repair some of the damage that had already been done. This allowed motorized reconnaissance units to cross the bridge and continue to the east. Unfortunately they did not get far because the Italians had prepared positions along the Dongolaas Gorge, which the British units would have to move through on their way to their next objective, Keren. The only way to deal with those defenses was to climb up on top of the gorge and launch frontal attacks on the Italians. It would be a long, slow, grind which would begin on February 4th and last for three days . While this first effort captured some territory, it did not completely dislodge the Italians and so another attack would begin on February 10th, it would not be the last.

While the road to Massawa had turned into a slow grind for the Indian forces involved, in the south the attack into Italian Somaliland by General Cunningham and the forces under his control was going quite well. In early February Cunningham’s plan of advance had been approved and so the attack began, with the first objective being the port city of Kismayu before the next jump was made to Mogadishu. The key in this region of Italian Somaliland was control of the bridges over the various river crossings that the British would have to cross if they wanted to advance towards Kismayu and then Mogadishu. To capture these intact Cunningham launched a series of flanking attacks which moved around the Italian defenses instead of through them. The rapid movement of the largely African force under Cunningham’s command caught the Italians off guard, and while the British were moving they rapidly tried to destroy the port facilities at Kismayu to deny them to the British before retreating. They were unsuccessful in these efforts, and on the 14th the port would be captured and before the end of February supplies were already being moved in via convoys along the African coast. This was perfect for the British as they began to look further afield, and really took advantage of the Royal Navy and its almost complete control of the sea lanes. Getting supplies around Africa was always a challenge, but being able to move them via seaborne shipping made everything so much easier. This was particularly important for Cunningham because his nearest base of supply before Kismayu was Nairobi, 500 miles away. While Cunningham started pushing troops towards Mogadishu, he also asked Wavell if it would be possible to have another force landed in British Somaliland to the north. He wanted them to take the port of Berbera so that if he was able to push that far, a distance of around 500 miles, that it would be ready for him to use as a supply base. This attack would be launched from Aden, across the Gulf of Aden from Berbera. Over the month that followed the operation to seize Berbera would be successful, and then Cunningham would arrive after having captured Mogadishu, with the greatest challenge not being the Italians but instead the weather and the terrain.

Meanwhile, back at Keren, the rest of February would primarily be spent preparing the British forces for the next attack. This required a tremendous amount of back breaking work as roads had to be improved, supplies had to be brought up, wells had to be dug to ease access to water. Importantly the railway line in the region was repaired and improved which made it easier to bring supplies forward. RAF support also arrived, basing out of Agordat and Barentu and allowing the troops at the front some air cover and soon the British would have full air superiority. There were even Wellesley bombers that attacked the workshops that had been setup by the Italian aircraft manufacturer Caproni. These were used to repair Italian aircraft in the area and over the course of a few raids the RAF Bombers and fighters were able to set all the main buildings alight and put them out of action. The RAF bombers also were able to attack the Italian positions at Massawa . In early March the British were finally ready for their attack on Keren, and while the fighting would be heavy they would slowly grind forward. This cleared the way to Massawa. In the port the Italians would somewhat frantically prepare the 6 Italian destroyers in the port for a final raid out to sea, which they would set off for but would accomplish very little. The British forces would surround Massawa and it really became only a matter of time before the Italians surrendered, and the only question was how long they would keep fighting. The surrender would finally take place on the afternoon of April 8th, 1941. The capture of Massawa, along with all of the other gains that the British had made in the region by the middle of April resulted in the area no longer being declared a combatant zone by Roosevelt, and American ships could once again be used for transport of men and supplies to Egypt. It was a critical step to allowing the British at a time when the overall course of the war in the Western Desert had shifted, because the Germans had arrived along with a certain General and his Afrika Korps, but that is a story for another day