Prof. Greg Jackson

Even though the M4s are new, Tunisian dust and sand have already worked their way into every crevice, and all five men inside James' tank stink.

Yes, terribly uncomfortable.

Nonetheless, the focused battalion commander keeps a vigilant eye out for anything suspicious.

So far, he sees little more than local Arabs plowing.

All of a sudden, James spies a flare cutting through the sky above Sidi Bouzid.

More follow.

He radios into command a sighting of dust plumes, indicating enemy tanks approaching on both sides of the column.

Almost immediately, brown geysers of soil and smoke rise, the result of enemy artillery slamming into the hard, sun-cooked earth.

Then the German panzers draw close.

They begin firing their tank-piercing rounds.

As this destruction and death plays out, the locals, perhaps long used to living amid European encroachments, including war, go on plowing, seemingly unbothered by the explosive tank and artillery battle happening all around them.

Most of James' battalion of tanks is bombed into oblivion in an onion field.

Men are trapped inside the burning vehicles, unable to escape.

Cooking and suffocating, they die within minutes.

A colonel watching the plumes of smoke from miles away radios in.

What does the battalion need?

James replies,

A moment later, his own tank is hit.

Along with two other surviving crewmen, James scrambles out of the hatch and runs for his life across the desert.

The trio become POWs within the next half hour, and to number among the very few survivors of this otherwise almost entirely obliterated battalion.