Get Rommel

"By the summer of 1941 Erwin Rommel was Hitler's favourite general. Sent to North Africa to halt the British advance into Libya, he not only stopped the British offensive but drove them back to their Egyptian base. He seemed to be unbeatable on the battlefield, so the British planned to kill him. On the eve of the next British offensive, Operation Crusader, a specially trained commando team landed by submarine behind enemy lines. Marching deep into the desert, they attacked Rommel's headquarters. At the same time, in its first ever combat mission, the newly created SAS parachuted sabotage teams close to the German airfields to knock out the enemy air forces on the ground." "Michael Asher reveals how these daring raids were practically impossible from the start - but the volunteer commandos and SAS men had no idea this was effectively a suicide mission. Poor planning and incompetence in high places was matched by fantastic bravery and brilliant improvisation that enabled a handful of the survivors to escape back to British lines and tell their story. From Bob 'Lucky' Laycock, the model for Evelyn Waugh's Lt. Col. Tommy Blackhouse, to the tragic Geoffrey Keyes, awarded a posthumous VC for leading the operation, Michael Asher investigates the true story of Operation Flipper: the plot to kill Rommel."--BOOK JACKET.