Rommel Warned Them About Patton — They Ignored Him

MidFebruary 1943, Field Marshal Irwin Raml sat in his command post near the Tunisian border, writing a letter to his wife Lucy. His forces had just smashed through American positions at Casarine Pass. Outside, the Africa Corps was celebrating victory. Inside, Raml was analyzing what he had learned about the Americans. The letter was blunt.

 Raml wrote that the Americans were soft, lacked proper training, and their officers made amateur mistakes that would have gotten them court marshaled in any European army. Raml had just watched American forces break and run at Casarine Pass. Over 6,000 American casualties in 6 days. Entire battalions surrendered.

 Equipment abandoned on the battlefield. It was the kind of collapse Raml had seen from the French in 1940. The Americans didn’t just lose at Cassarine. They were humiliated. Soldiers who had grown up on stories of World War I heroism were suddenly questioning if they were cut out for this. Raml didn’t just see a tactical opening.

 He thought he was witnessing the American spirit breaking in real time. He wrote to Lucy that if Germany could launch another offensive within weeks, they could push the Americans into the sea before they learned how to fight properly. The assessment was shared with Berlin. Exploit American weakness immediately. Don’t give them time to adapt.

Raml’s assessment wasn’t based on prejudice. It was based on observed performance. At Casarine Pass, American forces had demonstrated multiple critical failures. Their commanders positioned units poorly. Radio discipline collapsed under pressure. Coordination between infantry and armor was non-existent.

 When German forces attacked, American units retreated without orders, creating cascading panic. The American second core commander, Major General Lloyd Fredendall, had built his headquarters in a canyon 70 mi behind the front lines. He communicated by radio and telephone without seeing the battlefield.

 His orders were confused and contradictory. German intelligence officers compiled detailed reports. American equipment was adequate. American soldiers fought bravely when cornered, but American command structure was amateur. These were not soldiers who had faced the Vermacht before. They were learning warfare in real time against Germany’s best.

 Raml calculated it would take the Americans at least 6 months to fix their leadership problems, probably 12 months to develop effective doctrine. If Germany struck again in March, the results would be similar to Casarine. German armored doctrine had proven itself against every opponent since 1939. Concentrate superior force at a weak point.

 Break through with armored spearheads. Exploit the breakthrough with mobile formations. Force the enemy to retreat or be encircled. This doctrine had shattered French armies in six weeks. It had destroyed Soviet armies in 1941. It had pushed British forces across North Africa twice. The formula worked because most armies fought defensively, trying to hold lines that German mobility could bypass.

Casarine Pass had proven the Americans fought the same way. They established defensive positions and waited to be attacked. When German armor concentrated against weak sectors, American forces retreated rather than counterattack. Raml studied the terrain around Elgatar in central Tunisia.

 It was perfect for another demonstration. If German forces attacked there in late March, they would catch American units still recovering from Casarine. The psychological advantage alone would be decisive. Berlin approved Raml’s assessment. One more offensive would break American morale completely. Then Germany could shift forces to face the British while Americans shipped their defeated army home.

 German intelligence reported a command change in early March. Lieutenant General George Simus Patton Jr. had assumed command of Second Corps on March 6th, 1943, the same core that had collapsed at Cassarine. When Patton arrived at second core headquarters, the atmosphere changed before he even spoke. He rolled in with a siren blaring motorcade, wearing his famous ivory-handled revolvers.

 He didn’t just issue orders, he issued an ultimatum. The days of the soft American were over. Patton forced men to wear ties and regulation helmets in the desert heat, not out of vanity, but to remind them they were professionals, not defeated refugees. Officers who arrived without proper uniform were fined on the spot. Soldiers who didn’t salute were reprimanded publicly.

 One general couldn’t fix systemic problems in 3 weeks. That was the German assessment. Patton might improve morale slightly. He might enforce better discipline, but he couldn’t teach an entire core new doctrine in less than a month. Raml’s health was failing. His stomach ailments and exhaustion were worsening, but his tactical mind was sharp.

 He reviewed the Elgatar attack plan one final time before turning operational command over to General Hans Jurgen Van Arnum. Theplan assumed American defensive tactics. The plan assumed American hesitation under pressure. The plan assumed that 3 weeks wasn’t enough time to transform an army.

 Every assumption was logical based on German experience against every other opponent. March 22nd, 1943. German forces prepared to attack American positions near Elgatar. The German order of battle included the 10th Panzer Division with Mark 5 tanks and the experienced Italian Sento Division. German commanders briefed their units on expected American responses.

 Americans would defend from fixed positions. When German armor concentrated, Americans would call for air support that might not arrive. If pressure increased, Americans would retreat like at Cassarine. The German tanks had superior firepower and armor protection. German 75mm guns could penetrate Sherman armor at 2,000 yd.

 Sherman guns needed to close to 500 yd for effective penetration. The technical advantage in firepower was decisive in open desert terrain. German artillery prepared fire plans to suppress American positions. The entire operation was designed to exploit what worked at Casarine. March 23rd, 1943. Dawn broke over Elgatar.

 German forces advanced, expecting another victory. They were about to discover that 3 weeks was enough time to change everything that mattered. The German attack began at 6:00 a.m. Lead elements of the 10th Panzer Division rolled toward American positions held by the first infantry division, the Big Red One. Visibility was good. Terrain was favorable.

Everything matched the operational plan. Then American artillery opened fire. Not ranging shots, not scattered fire. coordinated time on target salvos that dropped multiple batteries on German positions simultaneously. Every gun in second core could concentrate its fire on a single point at the exact same second.

 This level of artillery coordination was something German forces still relying heavily on horsedrawn artillery could not replicate. The accuracy was shocking. The volume was devastating. German tanks took direct hits. Radio operators heard urgent calls from infantry units requesting medical evacuation. The Americans weren’t suppressed.

 They were firing back with precision, suggested professional forward observers and experienced artillery crews. The 10th Panzer Division kept advancing. This was expected resistance. Americans would break under sustained pressure. German commanders ordered units to push through the artillery and close with American positions.

 American tank destroyers opened fire from concealed positions. German Mark Fives started taking flank shots. The Americans weren’t defending from obvious positions. They had positioned anti-tank weapons to create crossfire that made German armor vulnerable regardless of facing. By 9:00 a.m., German forces had penetrated 2,000 yards into American positions.

 This was normal for an offensive, but the Americans weren’t retreating. They were conducting fighting withdrawals to prepared secondary positions. For the man of the first infantry division, Elgatar wasn’t just a battle. It was an exorcism. They were the same soldiers who had been humiliated at Casarine Pass.

 As the tenth panzer rolled toward them, the big red one didn’t look for an exit. They looked at their sights. They had traded their fear for cold, professional rage. German radio intercepts picked up American communications. The tone was professional and calm. Officers were giving clear tactical orders. Units were reporting positions and coordinating fields of fire.

 This wasn’t the panicked radio chatter from Casterine Pass. American infantry held positions under German fire until ordered to withdraw. When they withdrew, they moved to new positions and resumed fighting. They weren’t running. They were executing tactical retreats that preserved unit cohesion while making German advances costly.

 The Italian Centauro Division on the German right flank reported heavy resistance. American counterfire was pinning their infantry. When Italian units advanced, American machine gun positions opened fire from overlapping fields. The Americans had prepared the battlefield properly. By noon, the German advance had stalled at 3,000 yards.

 This wasn’t the breakthrough Casarine Pass had led German commanders to expect. General Hans Jurgen Farnim commanded German forces in Tunisia after Raml’s departure. He received reports from Elgatar at his headquarters. The attack wasn’t achieving objectives. American resistance was organized and effective. Casualties were mounting without corresponding American collapse.

This didn’t match the intelligence assessment. Farnum studied the tactical reports with growing concern. Something fundamental had changed. The Shermans were still outgunned by German armor. The terrain wasn’t dramatically different from Casarine, but the Americans were fighting with coordination and aggression that German commanders hadn’t anticipated.

Radio intercepts revealed Americanofficers giving confident tactical orders. Artillery was concentrating fire with devastating precision. Infantry was counterattacking instead of retreating. This wasn’t the demoralized force from three weeks earlier. March 24th, Farnum recommended calling off the offensive.

German casualties were significant without achieving breakthrough. The Americans were too strong in their current positions. The attack was suspended and German forces withdrew. German intelligence worked to understand what had happened at Elgatar. They interviewed captured American soldiers. They studied documents recovered from the battlefield.

 They needed to know what created the transformation. The Americans hadn’t received new equipment. They hadn’t received significant reinforcements. They hadn’t trained for months in new tactics. The change happened in 21 days under Patton’s command. Patton’s method was simple but radical. First, leadership purge. He fired officers who hesitated.

He promoted men who attacked. Command positions went to officers who understood that speed and aggression won battles. Second, doctrine revolution. Every unit learned to counterattack immediately when attacked. Artillery concentrated fire to achieve overwhelming effects at decisive points. Defense meant aggressive patrolling and spoiling attacks, never passive waiting.

Third, psychological transformation. Patton convinced soldiers they were superior to their enemy, not through speeches, but through training that rewarded aggression and punished caution. Units that performed well received public recognition. Officers who failed were relieved immediately. The entire core learned one lesson.

Attack succeeds. Hesitation fails. German commanders analyzed what Delgatar revealed about American capabilities. The Americans had adopted a doctrine that neutralized German tactical advantages. German doctrine relied on concentrated armor breaking through weak points. American doctrine responded with mobile anti-tank weapons positioned to create crossfire.

 German advances became costly regardless of armor superiority. German doctrine assumed defenders would retreat under sustained pressure. American doctrine taught immediate counterattacks that disrupted German momentum. What looked like victory suddenly became a fight for survival. German doctrine emphasized technical superiority and tactical excellence.

American doctrine emphasized coordination and overwhelming firepower. The Germans prided themselves on the individual skill of the Panzer commander. The Americans countered with the industrial might of time on target artillery strikes. It was a mechanical symphony of violence. For German infantry, it felt like the sky was falling.

 They weren’t fighting individual soldiers. They were fighting a coordinated machine that had finally found its rhythm. The Americans weren’t trying to match German technical advantages. They were making technical advantages irrelevant through superior coordination. Raml had written revised assessments before leaving Tunisia.

 The Americans had learned faster than any opponent Germany had faced. They had identified their weaknesses at Casarine and fixed them in 3 weeks. Any future offensive against American forces would require significantly more resources and different tactics. March 6th, 1943, two critical events happened simultaneously in Tunisia.

 Rama launched his final offensive in North Africa at Medanine against British 8th Army. The attack was a one-day disaster. British forces stopped German armor cold with coordinated anti-tank fire. German casualties were heavy. The offensive collapsed within hours. That same day, George Patton assumed command of American second corps.

 Raml’s exit and Patton’s entrance occurred at the same moment. The changing of the guard was symbolic. 3 days later, March 9th, Raml flew to Germany on sick leave. His health was failing. His jaundice and exhaustion were worsening. He would never return to Africa. Before he left, Raml wrote updated assessments for German commanders remaining in Tunisia.

The tone had shifted from his February letters. He warned that American forces under new leadership were showing rapid improvement. Any future operations against Americans should not assume they would break like at Casarine. Raml’s warning came too late. The attack at Elgatar on March 23rd confirmed everything he had predicted.

 German commanders who ignored his assessment discovered the Americans had transformed completely. But Raml was in Germany when his warnings were vindicated. May 13th, 1943, German forces in Tunisia surrendered. Over 250,000 access prisoners. The North African campaign was over. The Americans had gone from humiliation at Casarine Pass to victory in Tunisia in less than 3 months.

 German commanders studied American performance and issued new tactical guidance. They warned defenders to expect aggressive American tactics with rapid armored advances and concentrated artillery fire. The Germanswere adapting their doctrine. When Allied forces landed in Sicily on July 10th, 1943, those warnings proved accurate.

 American forces under Patton’s 7th Army advanced rapidly up the western coast. Patton’s forces reached Msina on August 17th, beating British forces in a race that made American arms look superior. German defenders reported that American tactical aggression combined with superior logistics made defensive operations nearly impossible.

 June 1944, Raml commanded German forces defending France against Allied invasion. He deployed defensive doctrine specifically designed to counter American aggressive tactics. Raml positioned mobile reserves close to likely invasion beaches. He knew Americans would push inland rapidly after landing.

 German forces needed to counterattack immediately before Americans could establish momentum. Raml’s assessment of American forces had changed completely from his February 1943 letters mocking their softness. He now wrote that Americans had shown themselves to be very much more advanced in their tactical thinking than the British.

 Their forces combined material superiority with aggressive tactics that made static defense ineffective. When D-Day came on June 6th, 1944, Raml’s defensive preparations were undermined by Hitler’s refusal to release Panzer reserves. But Raml’s tactical assessment proved accurate. American forces at Utah and Omaha beaches pushed inland aggressively despite heavy casualties.

Raml understood what other German generals were still learning. The Americans weren’t the soft, poorly trained force he had defeated at Cassarine Pass. They were a professional army with doctrine designed to exploit material superiority through aggressive application of force. After Germany’s surrender, Allied interrogators interviewed German generals about American military performance.

 The testimony was consistent and revealing. It read like a confession. When men like Hosafan Montul and Albert Kesler sat in interrogation rooms in 1945, a recurring theme emerged in their notes, a begrudging, almost startled respect. They had expected Americans to be like the French or early Soviets, slow to learn, easy to demoralize.

 Instead, they found an opponent that evolved at a speed that felt unfair. General Hassafan Manul, who commanded Panzer forces against American armies in 1944 to 1945, stated that Americans learned faster than any army Germany faced. They identified weaknesses and corrected them within weeks, not months. Field Marshal Albert Kesler testified that American artillery coordination was the most effective he encountered in six years of war.

 The speed with which Americans could concentrate fire on tactical targets made German tactical doctrine obsolete. German generals emphasized that American transformation wasn’t about better equipment. Soviet armies had excellent tanks. British forces had experienced soldiers, but Americans combined material advantage with aggressive doctrine that made their advantages decisive.

 The consensus among German military professionals was that American forces in 1945 were dramatically different from American forces in 1943. The same army that lost at Casarine Pass had become one of the most effective fighting forces in history. They didn’t just lose the war, they lost their sense of superiority. Raml’s initial assessment after Casarine Pass was logical based on German experience.

 Armies needed years to develop effective doctrine. Officers needed extensive combat experience to lead effectively. Soldiers needed months of training to fight professionally. Patton proved that assessment wrong in 3 weeks. The transformation showed at Elgatar, but it took 90 days from Cassarine Pass in February to the surrender of Tunisia in May for German commanders to fully accept that American improvement was permanent, not temporary.

 The first three weeks changed the doctrine. The next two months proved the change was irreversible. By May 13th, 1943, when over 250,000 Axis prisoners surrendered, German generals understood the Americans who had broken at Casarene were gone forever. Leadership mattered more than experience. Doctrine mattered more than equipment.

 Aggressive mindset mattered more than technical superiority. The Germans built better tanks. The Americans built better doctrine. When the two met at Elgatar, doctrine won. It won again in Sicily. It won in Normandy. It won across France and into Germany. The 90 days between the shame of Casarene and the triumph in Tunisia changed the course of the century.

 It was the moment the arsenal of democracy found its sword. German generals stopped underestimating American soldiers because by May 1943 they realized the man across the foxhole wasn’t a tourist. He was the architect of their inevitable defeat.