As the tanks led the charge onto the more open ground, the infantry of the 5th and 8th Machinegun Battalions quickly called for supporting artillery fire, as Streich had planned. Streich was dead, but his orders were still alive. The gritty Sergeants on the line radioed back for artillery fire, and the rounds came in soon after. Yet they were immediately answered by lethal counter battery fire. Radars were watching and recording the arc and fall of the incoming shells, and computers were calculating the position of the guns for the AS-90s. Six guns went into burst mode and quickly put 6 rounds each on the German gun positions-36 heavy 155mm rounds that wreaked havoc. The hasty defense had not given the Germans time to dig their guns in. Realizing what had happened, the only defense was to move the artillery or be destroyed, and by the time they reached a new location the attack would be over.
The Challengers led the way, followed closely by the Warriors with their new 40mm Bofors guns putting deadly accurate fire on the German infantry positions. They were ideal for taking out small AT and infantry guns, and behind them the company self-propelled mortars were laying down good fire with their 81mm tubes. Then they got the first surprise of the morning with the sudden appearance of enemy tanks.
“Thermals right!” A gunner in the leading three Challengers on that flank called the warning. “Tanks! Tanks!”
“Gunner track right. Engage!” The Challengers saw the Panzers coming in at just over 2000 meters, and their big turrets rotated, guns firing as the tanks moved. That was a feat the Germans could not duplicate, as they needed to stop to get a stable firing solution on a target, though that really didn’t matter.
Hans Kummel had been waiting with his company of Panzer IIIGs near an old cairn site, and when the action began he led his tanks out through a low depression, intending to move south and then turn west to take the advancing British on the flank. He thought he might get at the enemy artillery, but had no idea it was almost twenty kilometers to the south. Now his tanks emerged from the purple shadows of the higher ground behind him, charging in to engage, but what he saw was not British 25 pounders, but tanks!
Kummel would need to charge forward another full kilometer to get into optimal firing range, and before his eighteen tanks had covered half that distance, the three Challengers had put needle nosed armor piercing sabot rounds through six Panzer IIIs. He was lucky his own tank had not been hit.
“Kruschinski! Find cover! Look at those monsters out there! Albers!” He shouted to his gunner now. “Can you hit them?”
Albers loaded furiously, sweat dotting his forehead even though the morning chill was still on the air, and the temperature inside the tanks had not reached that awful scalding boil that they often suffered. But he knew his Company commander well, and he could hear the desperate edge in his voice. Kruschinski had backed up to maneuver behind a sandy hummock covered with low desert scrub, and now Albers saw what Kummel was shouting about. A massive hulk loomed in his sights, well lit by the rising sun, a tank unlike anything he had ever seen. He knew the enemy armor silhouettes well, and what to expect at this range. He could distinguish the tall, squarish shape of a Matilda easily from the lower, flatter profile of the cruiser tanks, but this was something else.
He looked at his range finder, thinking they were much closer than he thought. How could it be so huge? The tank was easily twice the size of a Matilda. Then he saw another Panzer III on his left stopping to fire, recognizing the number as Schuber’s tank. The thin barrel of his 50mm gun spit yellow flame at the enemy, but he watched in shock as the round simply glanced harmlessly off the enemy turret, which now rotated ominously in their direction. The gun barrel was the size of a tree trunk, or so it seemed. It had to be an artillery piece! No tank gun in the world could be that size. And then it fired, blasting Schuber’s tank to pieces with a single round.
“Back! Back! Back!” Kummel’s strident order could barely be heard over the noise of the explosion. He had seen all he needed to know. Now their only hope now was to get back behind the knobby protrusion of a wind scored rock formation. The engine strained and the Panzer III jolted, backing furiously way a just as the massive enemy turret and gun began to rotate his way.
