The Desert War: The classic trilogy on the North Africa campaign 1940-43

The North African campaign was a legend in it's own time and is still romanticized. People picture it as somehow "different" from the Eastern Front or New Guinea or Burma. It had dashing maneuver, worthy opponents and colorful characters and a colorful locale. There were few war crimes and little collateral damage. And the hardship somehow seems "cleaner". Dust storms and sun rather then mud or malaria, or trench foot. Manly hardships such as Imperialistic adventurers had been facing for generations and above all the feel that if one was assigned here one could feel like a man and not like a machine. And for British the feel that one could collectively prove that one was a part of the war, rather then endlessly training while others suffered. Obviously there was more to it then that. It may have been a less unpleasant war to fight because of the environment, and the comparative decency of the leaders. It was still a war.Alan Moorehead was a journalist of the heroic age of journalism. His name sits with stars like Pyle, Lowell Thomas, and Claire Booth Luce. In this book he writes what the war feels like from someone there. It is not just a book on the North African war but a Grand Tour, of the Mediterranean Theater of Operations. We see the war from the sea as well as the land and visit such far away places as Greece, Crete, and India. We take part in forgotten campaigns like Ethiopia, and the conquest of Syria. And we meet leaders such as Cunningham and Wavell, and warriors such as Bagnold as well as spending time at the fabled sharp end. We see slices of life such as cooling a bus in India by letting a block of ice evaporate, or enjoying being billeted on an Italian general's villa, or the junk heap left after the massive fighting of Operation Crusader. This book is a great travelogue and an epic of war reporting written in the spirit of a new Herodatus. In it we can go back in time to when the a few thousand men in the desert could affect the world.

I’m doing research for my next novel, which may be partially set in North Africa in 1941/42. Alan Moorehead’s ‘classic trilogy’ gives a great balance of overall historical summary and gripping first person detail for this comparatively obscure but important World War 2 campaign.Alan Moorehead was a correspondent in North Africa for most of the North African campaign, from its humble beginnings in 1940 to its explosive climax in 1943. He also traveled, during these years, to India, the United States and the United Kingdom. He has a keen eye for the big picture of a campaign, won or lost, and a genius for details that give the reader a gut feel for the moment of battle, the moment of victory or the moments of relaxation that come before and after.To give just one example, Moorehead was caught in a crossfire near the front during the first British campaign against the Italians. He writes: then from the hill ahead a long whining scream of bullets came at us down the roadway. We were ambushed. . . . Clifford and I made for the wooded bank on the left, but it was hopeless—the enemy were firing almost at point-blank range, two or three hundred yards away. . . . One Breda-gun burst set the armoured car next to ours ablaze, killing the men inside. . . . The enemy's tracer-bullets made long crisscross sheaths of light down the road.Our driver had been cruelly hit on the arm by an explosive bullet as he had leapt from the truck. . . . He was huddled crookedly in the shallow drainage gutter, quickly drenching in his blood. Clifford joined me, and together we tore off his greatcoat and cut away his sweater and shirt. But then the Italians creeping closer saw us—the last of the British left around the cars. They blew our truck to bits while we lay four yards away trying to stem the wounded man's flow of blood. . . . The fire was very close and very heavy and our cover not more than eighteen inches, so we had to stop and be still from time to time. Then a piece of shrapnel struck Keating in the forearm, while a bullet tore a ragged hole in his leg. He fell forward softly upon the driver in the shallow trench. Clifford was nicked neatly in the behind. Another bullet passed through the folds of the sleeve of my greatcoat, and, certain I was hit, I remember waiting frigidly for the pain to come.If I have a criticism of the book at all, it’s that Moorehead rarely mentions the date. When I attempt to correlate the real events of the book to the fictional events of my story, I’m going to have to find other sources.

Many maintain that this trilogy is unique in its portrayal of the Desert War in North Africa. Having read several histories on the subject, I would agree. Published only a few years after WWII, it is a war correspondent's personal memoirs of his coverage of the entire struggle of Great Britain in Africa. Moorehead takes us to little known conflicts in the former African colonies (Sudan, Abyssinia, etc) as well as the complete era of the North African campaigns from 1940 to 1943. This is not so much a history but a journalist's story. The detail is exceptional. From Spartan life in the desert or rugged terrain of Ethiopia to the starkly oblivious social life in Cairo and Nairobi, his observations tell us what it was like. Be forewarned, the text has not been scrubbed by modern editing to be politically correct nor adjusted to correct inaccurate historical details (battle casualties, etc) that many revised histories would have. It is what was observed then, often with the biases of the men and leaders he lived with and reported on.

The book intertwined the events of the conflict with the history that was being lived by the people being affected by the war. Although mainly focused on the African conflict, it was an all encompassing stroll through the events the British Army was struggling with throughout Africa and South Asia during the early days of the war.If you are looking for a detailed blow by blow of the campaign, this is not the book for you. It is the story of a correspondent who covered the war and his travels through the battles and his experiences doing that. It is a delightful read. If you are a student of the Desert War, this is a must read as part of your understanding of that campaign and what was going on in that theatre of the war and its effects.

OK

Alan Moorehead was incapable of writing a boring sentence. Part memoir, part history, this book moves like a freight train . Vivid battle scenes, brilliant analysis -- this is one of the best books to come out of World War Two. Very highly recommended. I close with a question: Why is Moorehead's work so poorly represented on Kindle? The man was a brilliant writer, and in his time he was one of the most commercially successful authors on the planet.Moorehead is well overdue for a revival, which can't come soon enough to suit me.

L'interesse del libro è dovuto a:1)il racconto delle operazioni belliche in Egitto, Libia e Tunisia tra il novembre 1940 e la primavera 1943 è molto avvincente quasi una telecronaca da parte dell'autore,corrispondente di guerra in quelle zone2)la vita dell'autore in quegli anni in cui ha seguito da vicino i combattimenti tra tanks, fanteria, artiglieria, attacchi aerei etc, è stata in tutto simile ai soldati di prima linea e ne ha condiviso pericoli mortali e disagi di ogni genere come il clima, la fame, la sete.

This is not a speculative account but a narration of the authors experience which to be frank was both amazing and at times a little dry. I was rapt reading his personal accounts and perspective, and have often gone back to it to refresh my memory. I did not find it biased but informative, enjoyable and well worth reading. It beats reading WW2 discourses from journalists who rely on second/third hand accounts.

Great read