During World War II, the North African Campaign, also known as the Desert War, took place in the North African desert from June 10, 1940 to May 16, 1943. It included campaigns in Libya and Egypt (Western Desert), Morocco & Algeria (known to the Allies as Operation Torch) and in Tunisia.
The campaign was fought between the Allies and Axis powers. The Allied war effort was dominated by the British Commonwealth and exiles from Occupied Europe.
The British Commonwealth had built a rail line from El Alamein to Tobruk during the course of the war. This rail line is significant both for purposes of supply but also as a sense of pride to the British troops, as the rail line was built through a little-populated, inhospitable desert.
Italian forces (and their native Libyan allies - about two divisions of the latter) invaded Egypt in November of 1940 and sat just across the border in neatly organized camps along the Mediterranean. The British Commonwealth, based around the 7th Armored Division, a British and an Indian Infantry Division, launched a counterstrike codenamed Operation Compass in early December. The Italians had previously invaded Greece and France, both Commonwealth allies, and had now made a military incursion into a British protectorate. The counterstrike involved the British pocketing two of the Italian camps against the Mediterranean, forcing their surrender. This led to a general Italian withdrawal and a British Commonwealth advance. Tobruk was captured by British, Australian and Polish forces on January 22, 1941.
Italy called on her ally Germany which sent its 15th and 21 Panzer Divisions and 90th Light Division. Italy also supplemented its forces in Italy with the Ariete and Trieste Armored Divisions. These forces, under Generalleutnant (later Field Marshal) Erwin Rommel drove the British back across Cyrenecia to Tobruk, laying siege to it until June 21, 1942 when Allied forces surrendered there after a failed attempt to relieve the fortress. After the Germans overextended themselves at the First Battle of El Alamein and then were defeated at the Second Battle of El Alamein by the British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, Tobruk was recaptured on November 11, and remained in Allied hands thereafter.
