Kesserine!
On 8 November, 1942, the Americans landed in Morocco and Algeria along with their British Allies. By the 17th, they were in Tunisia on a front stretching from Beja through Pichon, Sidi bon Zid, and to Gafsa, but it was a very thinly manned line. The Axis responded, first with Stukas at Beja and leveled the town. When the French General Barre in Medjez-el-Bab finally threw in with the Allies, the opposing armies were on his doorstep. The ensuing battle was brutal and forced an Allied retreat toward Beja. The battle for northern Tunisia would stalemate at Medjez-el-Bab. December and January would pass as the stalemate continued but on Valentines Day, 1943, Rommel attacked the Americans not in the north, but in central Tunisia. It is at this desperate juncture on February 20th that we pick up the battle with a ragtag force of Americans holding Kesserine Pass west of the town of the same name.
