Battle of Tug Argan

The Battle of Tug Argan was a land battle between forces of the British Empire and Italy which took place on 11–15 August 1940 in what was British Somaliland (later independent and renamed Somalia). The battle was part of the Italian conquest of British Somaliland, in which Italy successfully attempted to conquer the latter British colony, and thus is included in the larger East African Campaign of the Second World War.

Italian invasion forces were advancing northwards on a north-south road towards the colonial capital of Berbera through the Tug Argan (named after the dry riverbed, or "tug," running across it) gap in the Assa range of hills, when they encountered British units lying in fortified positions on a number of widely distributed hills across the gap. Italian forces, after an intense four day encounter, overcame the relatively weak British positions and were able to force the gap, with the British being forced to retreat to Berbera.

With the Italian victory at Tug Argan, the position of British forces in Somaliland was compromised, and colonial authorities were forced to initiate a naval evacuation of the garrison form Berbera. As a result, Italy was able to quickly secure British Somaliland, which proved a propaganda coup for Italy despite the lack of strategic value to the territory.

Background
As Italy entered the war at the conclusion of the Battle of France, their Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini looked to Africa as a possible location for easy propaganda victories to justify his joining the conflict and to glorify Italy's hitherto speculative role it. The British Somaliland colony, a weakly defended area located in modern Somalia, looked to the dictator easy prey. Despite Italy being logistically unready for a conflict in that region, an attack on Somaliland was authorized, set for late 1940. Italian forces in East Africa were relatively strong in numbers, if not in quality, with 29 colonial brigades, each consisting of several infantry battalions and some light artillery, concentrated around the recently conquered Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. The Italians also possessed at least 60 medium and light tanks and 183 aircraft, both fighters and medium/light bombers.

Italian armies easily outnumbered those of the British, who were defending multiple areas in North Africa with skeleton forces. With Cyrenaica and the Sudan under threat as well as Somaliland, only token units were available to control what was considered a relatively unimportant possession. In fact, until December 1939 British policy had been to abandon Somaliland altogether in the face of invasion. However, General Archibald Wavell, the newly appointed commander of British armies in Africa, successfully recommended to the British Chiefs of Staff that Somaliland be defended. A multiracial congregation of five battalions, the minimum force that was adjudged capable of defending the region, was assembled by the beginning of August.

Berbera, the capital of British Somaliland and its only major city and port, was the obvious destination of any invasion. As plans took shape for the blocking of Italian passage to the city, it became apparent that the border with Ethiopia was too long and open to be defended effectively. However, the rugged Somali countryside was impassable by vehicles, meaning that the British could stage a defense on the choke points of the two roads to Berbera, from Hargeisa and Burao. The Hargeisa road, the most direct route and the main route through the country, headed through a gap in the hills at a place called Tug Argan for the "tug," or dry riverbed, that ran before the line of hills. Unfortunately for the British, the gap was flat and open, meaning that a small force could not hold out for long. Despite these difficulties, three battalions of the five and a light artillery battery were stationed in the pass, with one battalion in reserve.

On 3 August, General Guglielmo Nasi led 35,000 Italian troops, the vast majority of them native fighters, across the border into British Somaliland. The invaders were organized into three columns: one on the left advancing north to the coast before swinging east to Berbera, one on the right making the opposite motion on the Burao road, and a main central column, led by Carlo de Simone, containing the bulk of his forces. The central column would force the British positions at Tug Argan and make straight for Berbera, effectively ending the campaign in one fell swoop. Nasi advanced quickly upon Hargeisa, forcing harrying British camel soldiers to withdraw by 5 August. After a few days of rest and rearmament, the march was resumed on 8 August. After two days of probing, de Simone reached the Tug Argan gap and prepared for the major assault, scheduled for 11 August. In the meantime, General A. R. Godwin-Austen arrived to take command of the enlarged British army.

Battle
The British had determined the Tug Argan gap the best possible place to make a stand out of the three roadways, and also the most likely invasion route, and thus positioned the bulk of the army around it. On the British right, to the north of Tug Argan, were three companies of the 3/15 Punjab Regiment, set upon a group of west-facing strongpoints overlooking the rough wilderness that lay beside the road. South of them lay the gap itself, manned by a contingent of Rhodesian troops. They sat upon a line of small hills, named from north to south Black, Knobbly, Mill, Observation, and Castle Hills. These hills, positioned in a row with 2,000–2,500 yard gaps in between, housed machine-gun nests surrounded with light rings of barbed wire and served as the Rhodesians' defensive strongholds and the main defense for the British of the pass. On the British left were another group of Indian troops, located upon the aptly named 'Punjab Ridge' facing directly to the south. Unfortunately for the British, the front was too wide for the troops available, and the gaps between hills too large, leaving the defenses prone to infiltration. Also, due to the hills being in a single line, the position lacked depth. Meanwhile, De Simone, arriving at the site of the impending battle on 10 August, set his forces directly opposite the British positions. On the left, II Brigade prepared to advance through the wilderness towards the Punjab troops in the north. In the Italian center, XIV Brigade faced the Rhodesian hilltop positions within the pass, and XV Brigade looked north towards Punjab Ridge on the Italian right. Behind them were XIII Brigade and the armored vehicles.

The attack on the gap began at 7:30 am on 11 August, as a flight of Savioa-Marchetti SM.81 medium bombers attacked British defenders on Punjab Ridge. This half-hour assault was followed by a long artillery bombardment lasting until noon. At 12:30, the infantry attack began. II Brigade began moving slowly towards the Indians through the trackless wilderness north of the road, XIV Brigade attacked Mill, Knobbly, and Observation Hills, and XV Brigade clambered atop Punjab Ridge, engaging its defenders. The attacks of XIV Brigade against the Rhodesians failed, but XV Brigade managed to drive off the Indian defenders of Punjab Ridge. Counterattacks were mounted against the Italians, but these were unsuccessful. The Italian attack on the hills was renewed the next day, 12 August. Black, Knobbly, and Mill Hills were on the receiving end of repeated assaults by XIV Brigade, and the weakest of them, Mill Hill, began to reel under the sustained pressure. By 4:00 pm, the British defenses were being overrun, and after nightfall the British retreated from the Hill, spiking their guns as they left.

13 August saw little change in the overall situation of the battle. XIV Brigade's attacks on the Rhodesian hilltop positions failed yet again after some intense fighting, while II Brigade continued their trek through the wilderness towards the northern hills. XV Brigade began to infiltrate behind British lines, finding a supply convoy which was attacked and dispersed. On 14 August, the embattled XIV Brigade was relieved of their role in the battle after suffering heavy casualties in their continuous offensives, and was replaced by XIII Brigade. The fresh troops did little more than their predecessors, as an attack on Observation Hill failed once again after continuous artillery bombardment throughout the day. II Brigade, meanwhile, had still failed to engage the Indians, and XV Brigade made little progress before fending off a counterattack from two companies of the 2nd King's African Rifles.

By 14 August, Godwin-Austen realized the peril of his situation, with XV Brigade nearly able to cut him off from behind, his troops exhausted, and his artillery completely deficient and running low on ammunition, and informed General Henry Maitland Wilson, who was in command at Cairo while Wavell was absent in England, that retreat from Tug Argan and evacuation from British Somaliland was now a necessity. If his forces could be evacuated, perhaps 70 percent of them might be removed. Otherwise, he would be forced to fight to the death, with his entire command destroyed. Wilson agreed to Godwin-Austen's request the next day, and preparations were made to flee after dark on 15 August. During that day, Observation Hill was attacked for the final time by De Simone's forces. De Simone had decided to doggedly press his attack in the gap, in lieu of completing the flanking maneuver, and finally this proved successful. By 7:00 pm XIII Brigade had seized Observation Hill, and the British retreated from it in disarray. After sundown, the defenders of the remaining hills were withdrawn, along with the Punjab troops, who departed just as II Brigade was able to make inroads through their abandoned positions. British resistance had collapsed, and as Godwin-Austen and his forces fled towards Berbera, the Italians were in control of Tug Argan.

Aftermath
After the British had departed Tug Argan, the Italians swiftly began to bring a close to their operations in Somaliland. Units of the Black Watch, 2nd Battalion King's African Rifles, and the 1/2 Punjab Regiment formed a small rearguard at Barakasan, which fought gamely into the night of 17 August to buy the main force time to evacuate. The Royal Navy had already begun to evacuate military personnel from Berbera on 16 August, operations that were not interfered with, possibly due to uncertainty about whether a peace treaty might be signed in the near future. By 19 August, all military forces, including the rearguard, the remainder of which had embarked late the previous day, had been evacuated by sea. An estimated 5,300–5,700 troops in total were evacuated to Aden. Italian forces, who had been held up by naval bombardment by HMS Ceres on 17 August, arrived in an empty Berbera on the 19th, effectively completing their conquest of British Somaliland. In total, Britain had suffered extremely light casualties, with 38 dead, 102 wounded, and 120 missing; however 10 artillery pieces had to be left behind and were captured by the Italians. In comparison, Italy paid dearly for the province, suffering 465 deaths and 1530 wounded.

The retreat from Somaliland, however well conducted by the British, infuriated incumbent Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Irritated severely by the boasts of Mussolini over his victory, Churchill excoriated Wavell via cable, labeling the low casualty numbers on the British side a sign of blatant cowardice and demanding that Godwin-Austen be subjected to a board of inquiry. Wavell, however, did not crumple before Churchill's wrath, coolly responding that "a big butcher's bill is not necessarily evidence of good tactics" in defense the performance of British troops and commanders during the battle. This drove the Prime Minister into an apoplectic rage, and helped to put Wavell into Churchill's disfavor in which he stood for the remainder of his career.

Despite the boasting of Mussolini and the fury of Churchill, the loss of Tug Argan and consequently Somaliland was not of the greatest strategic importance. Certainly it was a blow to British prestige and pride, but Somaliland was one of Britain's lesser regions of value and could be affordably lost. In fact, Britain incurred monetary gains after being relieved of the necessity to station an expensive garrison there. But the impact could have been far greater if the Italians had managed to move faster after the battle. Heavy rains and difficulties supplying the troops damaged these efforts, as well as removed any chance of a sizable strategic victory.