Deleted member 1487
Army AAA guns, Rommel used a bunch of 88s for ground combat remember?You are making some odd assumptions, especially about the deployment of heavy AA guns.
They will be deployed to protect key logistics and production points e.g. Ports, railway choke points and marshalling yards, army depots, airfields, war factories - see 20th Flak division with named groups for Sfax and Sousse. There is no reason for many to be lost in the retreat from Egypt, as they will not be at the front but spread between Bardia, Torbruk, Benghazi, Tripoli. Again there is little reason to deploy a large number to Sicily (apart from Messina) when the Allied heavy bombers are concentrated on Naples, Rome, Turin etc
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/8.8_cm_Flak_18/36/37/41#Support_of_ground_troops
During the North African campaign, Rommel made the most effective use of the weapon, as he lured tanks of the British Eighth Army into traps by baiting them with apparently retreating German panzers. A mere two flak battalions destroyed 264 British tanks in 1941.[7] Repeated high tank loss from well-placed 8.8 cm Flak guns in the battles of Halfaya Pass earned it the nickname "Hellfire Pass". Later in that theater, in the Battle of Faid in Tunisia, Rommel camouflaged many 8.8 cm Flaks (with additional 7.5 cm Pak 40s and 5 cm Pak 38s) in cactus-filled areas. Inexperienced U.S. tankers and commanders rushed into a valley at Faid only to be obliterated. When the U.S. Army's M3 Stuart and M4 Sherman tanks pursued, concealed German guns picked them off at ranges far beyond those of their 37mm and 75 mm guns respectively.
AFAIK those were not counted toward Luftwaffe FLAK and FLAK division numbers. 88s and other heavy FLAK calibers were useful for airfield defense, which was important for Sicily as they were under a fair bit of attack from 1943 on. Likely most of the heavy FLAK in Italy/North Africa, all >280 batteries in 1943, was in Africa defending ports and other installations, plus perhaps more supporting Rommel. Given that at a minimum every battery had 4 guns each then with over 280 batteries that is over 1000 heavy AAA guns in the Central Mediterranean and having most in Africa would at least mean over 600 just German AAA, not counting Italian. Leaving 19th and 20th FLAK divisions in Sicily/Italy instead of rushing them to Africa (and in some cases absorbing FLAK brigades already there), instead evacuating FLAK from Africa at Libyan ports to Sicily in November-December 1942 would then mean the vast majority of those ~280 heavy FLAK batteries are in Italy by 1943 instead of North Africa.