| While 1 soldier reads, another naps while they rest in their foxholes. In 2010, United States Army Africa toured the El Guettar battlefield and found many of these foxholes still intact. In Robet Capa’s autobiography of questionable veracity, he recounts how Time magazine’s William J. “Bill” Lang Jr. (October 7, 1914 – January 21, 1968) and the Scripps-Howard newspapers war correspondent Ernie Pyle (August 3, 1900 – April 18, 1945), both old-timers of the North African campaign, drove him in their jeep to El Guettar, Tunisia. Capa later wrote, “They promised to find me as much war as I needed for my health and my pictures. This time the road was better and much shorter. We headed for…where the [United States Army] First Infantry Division was holding back the main German counterattack.” “We found plenty of war before we reached the front. German fighter planes were strafing the road and every few minutes we had to stop the jeep and jump into a ditch for cover. There was a lot of excitement, but I got no pictures at all. “Bill and Ernie stopped at division headquarters. I was in a hurry to get my first pictures and they told me to go on ahead and cross two little jebels (what the Arabs call their hills) and hide between the jebels in the wadi (the Arab word for valley). ‘Just ask anybody where the war is,’ they said. ‘You can’t miss it.’” “I found jebels and wadis. The Sixteenth Infantry Regiment was dug in and the GIs were writing letters and reading pocket books in deep foxholes. I asked them where the war was. They pointed to the next jebel. In every wadi, they pointed up to a jebel, and on every jebel, they pointed down a wadi.” “Finally, on the last and highest hilltop, I found about fifty soldiers relaxing and heating up cans of C-rations. Their faces were devoid of all enthusiasm. I walked up to their lieutenant and asked where all the shooting was. ‘It’s hard to say,’ he answered. ‘My platoon has only the most advanced position on the front.’” “He consoled me with a can of C-rations. Just as I was about to dig into the awful-looking stew, a shell whistled and I threw myself flat on the ground, spilling the meat and beans all over me. [Capa was wearing a new war correspondent’s uniform.] It was a German shell all right, but it landed a few hundred yards away.” “When I raised my head, the lieutenant – who hadn’t budged – was looking down at me. He was very smug. Sheepishly I got up, dusted off the beans, and told him that from my angle this war was like an aging actress: more and more dangerous, and less and less photogenic.” The Battle of El Guettar took place during the Tunisia Campaign of World War II, fought between elements of the Army Group Africa under Generaloberst Hans-Jürgen von Arnim (April 4, 1889 – September 1, 1962), along with Italian 1st Army under General Giovanni Messe (December 10, 1883 – December 18, 1968), and United States Army II Corps under Lieutenant General George S. Patton (November 11, 1885 – December 21, 1945) in south-central Tunisia. It was the 1st battle in which U.S. forces were able to defeat the experienced German tank units. The battle, which featured in the 1970 film Patton, began the final phase of the African Campaign. The newly named Afrika Korps retreated towards Tunis, which fell to the Allies in May 1943, ending Axis presence in North Africa. | |
| Image Filename | wwii2072.jpg |
| Image Size | 647.35 KB |
| Image Dimensions | 2423 x 2266 |
| Photographer | Robert Capa |
| Photographer Title | |
| Caption Author | Written or Adapted by Jason McDonald |
| Date Photographed | March 1, 1943 |
| Location | |
| City | El Guettar |
| State or Province | Gafsa Governorate |
| Country | Tunisia |
| Archive | International Center of Photography |
| Record Number | |
| Status | Caption ©2026 MFA Productions LLC Please Do Not Duplicate or Distribute Without Permission; Image in the Public Domain |
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