Sixes and Snake eyes Rommel's luck in an alternate 1942 desert war

[cardcarrier]

author's note and perspective for 6.1

Kesselring assuming command of Northern forces is historical

Kesselring authorizing airlift of reinforcements is historical (ish)... this occurred in the original timeline as the battle of Gazala progressed, Rommel ultimately received something like 4000 infantry replacements from the Crete Garrison and later on after first Alamein, Kesselring begrudgingly granted the PAA the forces that had been left in reserve for Herkules. In this time line Kesselring is more impressed by the DAK/PAA success at Gazala and authorizes the reinforcements earlier, and with possession of in tact fields and captured booty at Gambut, the German replacements can be made use of in good order.

The timeline will use air transported German reinforcements to address Rommel's unsustainable attrition rate, which even if improved by a bigger victory at Gazala is still a constant emergency

22nd armored dice roll contemplation and evaluation:

Historically 22nd engaged in tremendous duels with bogged down DAK elements at this time (who had no fuel due to Bir Hakeim hold out), and gave as good as they got... 4 for the British historically since 22nd had lost many crews and had been significantly reorganized in the spring. They then where ordered to attack Rommel's defensive position at the cauldron which went disasterously, and the formation had to retreat and be completely rebuilt. 2 on the dice, they had a number of unlucky breaks in the cauldron attacks

The timeline displaces 21st panzer and Ariete to attack 22nd front and back because Bir Hakeim falls Position reflects intended march routes and positioning for PAA mobile formations in that area based on my original roll of 3/4 for the Trieste Division. 22nd is more disrupted and isolated because of this positioning and lacks close air support due to more successful advance by 90th light division. 90th lights roll considered 1 after collapse at Bir Hakeim. 22nd is decapitiated like other formations in the south due to 21st panzer's superior position vs the original timeline (roll of 2). They are attacked front and back, without orders or much air support by 2+ times their number, and collapse inflicting moderate losses on their attackers (roll of 2/3)

Investment and future destruction of 150th box not considered dice roll due to historical positioning of the box making it a death sentence (ie the PAA destroyed the box with the battle not going as well for them historically). 8th army refusing to release the Gazala or Toburk garrisons by this stage not considered a dice roll as they had historical emphatic orders from London that forbade them from doing so, and London was not convinced historically to allow the formations to withdraw, until after the battle had been lost

 

[Aber]

Kesselring authorizing airlift of reinforcements is historical (ish)... with possession of in tact fields and captured booty at Gambut, the German replacements can be made use of in good order.

There is a world of difference between drawing on the Crete Garrison for reinforcements and what you seem to be proposing:
Flying them into what is effectively the frontline - RAF will still be operating and Ju-52s will be easy meat.
Dropping them into the Libyan desert and expecting them to be immediately effective
Giving them British trucks and expecting them to be immediately mobile - how many Germans knew how to drive?
Giving them British artillery etc

Historically 22nd engaged in tremendous duels with bogged down DAK elements at this time (who had no fuel due to Bir Hakeim hold out), and gave as good as they got.... They then where ordered to attack Rommel's defensive position at the cauldron which went disasterously, and the formation had to retreat and be completely rebuilt.

The timeline displaces 21st panzer and Ariete to attack 22nd front and back

There is a world of difference in the desert between an armoured unit attacking an enemy in a fixed defensive position and a clash of mobile armoured units. In the Cauldron battle the Germans had the advantage of their own anti-tank guns (and 88s) being able to choose the terms of engagement.

In a mobile battle anti-tank guns and AA will be less effective (and heavy artillery not at all), and particularly now the British have Grant tanks so that they can engage the German armour at longer range, and not have to charge to close the range for their guns to be effective as in Crusader. The Grants also mean the Italian tanks are seriously outmatched.

It will be very difficult for the Germans and Italians to co-ordinate a combined attack. In the desert it is hard enough to know where your own units are let alone the enemy units (especially when they are free to move in any direction). While the British may lose tanks and have to pull brigades back from the front line, remember attrition is also having an impact on the German units.

Investment and future destruction of 150th box not considered dice roll due to historical positioning of the box making it a death sentence (ie the PAA destroyed the box with the battle not going as well for them historically).

Who exactly is investing the box given most of the Afrika Corps is otherwise engaged?

 

[Protagoras]

I don't know about anyone else, but I like to read timelines, and do not like to read endless repetition of the same complaints. Yes, perhaps this timeline is excessively generous to the Germans, and this pushes some people's buttons; we all have buttons (I, for example, get annoyed when people treat battlecruisers as if they were made of aluminum foil, when the notorious examples of them being spectacularly destroyed involved poor ammo handling rather than their armor schemes), but there's a limit to how many times it is productive to keep repeating the same objections, a limit that was surely passed a long time ago in this thread. Perhaps the people who don't want to read a timeline like this should just stop reading it?

 

[oldironside]

Or perhaps it would be better to address the deficiencies in the story?

The forum is a place of debate. Timelines in post-1900 have a reasonably high bar of plausibility and realism to get over. The debate is educational. There are other fora (ASB or the Writers' Forum) for timeliness which don't meet the standard required here.

 

[cardcarrier]

There is a world of difference between drawing on the Crete Garrison for reinforcements and what you seem to be proposing:
Flying them into what is effectively the frontline - RAF will still be operating and Ju-52s will be easy meat.
Dropping them into the Libyan desert and expecting them to be immediately effective
Giving them British trucks and expecting them to be immediately mobile - how many Germans knew how to drive?
Giving them British artillery etc



There is a world of difference in the desert between an armoured unit attacking an enemy in a fixed defensive position and a clash of mobile armoured units. In the Cauldron battle the Germans had the advantage of their own anti-tank guns (and 88s) being able to choose the terms of engagement.

In a mobile battle anti-tank guns and AA will be less effective (and heavy artillery not at all), and particularly now the British have Grant tanks so that they can engage the German armour at longer range, and not have to charge to close the range for their guns to be effective as in Crusader. The Grants also mean the Italian tanks are seriously outmatched.

It will be very difficult for the Germans and Italians to co-ordinate a combined attack. In the desert it is hard enough to know where your own units are let alone the enemy units (especially when they are free to move in any direction). While the British may lose tanks and have to pull brigades back from the front line, remember attrition is also having an impact on the German units.


Who exactly is investing the box given most of the Afrika Corps is otherwise engaged?

The crete garrison so far are infantry replacements for Kleeman, this isn't too much of a deviation from historical yet, but will become more so later, so please allow that to develop a bit. The DAK/PAA as a whole had a policy of using confiscated British equipment, and Crete garrison used their share of stuff left behind by the British in 1941, so familiarity might be a bit more than normal. These troops eventually formed the 164th light africa division and gave ok performance in the desert

The cauldron was sort of a culmination of all the bad practices the British armored corps had gotten into in the desert until Montgomery would come along and smother them with better tactics and organization. Attacking into the sun, attacking without adequate artillery preparation, junior officers being overzealous and leading the tanks into wild cavalry charges where they would get impaled on anti tank guns, poor radio/operational security, and the most unfortunate part of the battle Neil Ritchie committing the brigades one at a time as they arrived, letting Rommel engage them on numerically workable terms; giving rise to his often quoted interaction with a captured British officer from that battle ~what difference does it make that you have 2 tanks to my 1, when you spread them out and let me smash them in detail~

The Grants where good enough, they could knock out a panzer 3 or 4 from 500 meters, which was a big improvement from most of the British tank park, the problem was the grants where evenly distributed to all of the armored Brigades so 22nd had a bit less than 1/3 of it's runners as Grants, the rest where the usual domestic suspects. Panzer 3 series J and Grant have about the same gun effectiveness minus the limited traverse of the Grant cannon

The Italian XX corps and the Trieste division from XXI corps are investing the 150th brigade box for now, that story will develop further in the timeline

 

[TimTurner]

I thank you for your work @cardcarrier here and I look forward to more updates.

 

[Belisarius II]

There is a world of difference between drawing on the Crete Garrison for reinforcements and what you seem to be proposing:
Flying them into what is effectively the frontline - RAF will still be operating and Ju-52s will be easy meat.
Dropping them into the Libyan desert and expecting them to be immediately effective
Giving them British trucks and expecting them to be immediately mobile - how many Germans knew how to drive?
Giving them British artillery etc



There is a world of difference in the desert between an armoured unit attacking an enemy in a fixed defensive position and a clash of mobile armoured units. In the Cauldron battle the Germans had the advantage of their own anti-tank guns (and 88s) being able to choose the terms of engagement.

In a mobile battle anti-tank guns and AA will be less effective (and heavy artillery not at all), and particularly now the British have Grant tanks so that they can engage the German armour at longer range, and not have to charge to close the range for their guns to be effective as in Crusader. The Grants also mean the Italian tanks are seriously outmatched.

It will be very difficult for the Germans and Italians to co-ordinate a combined attack. In the desert it is hard enough to know where your own units are let alone the enemy units (especially when they are free to move in any direction). While the British may lose tanks and have to pull brigades back from the front line, remember attrition is also having an impact on the German units.


Who exactly is investing the box given most of the Afrika Corps is otherwise engaged?

It would be tough to shootdown the JU-52's when the main forward RAF airbase is overrun.

 

[cardcarrier]

It would be tough to shootdown the JU-52's when the main forward RAF airbase is overrun.

I perhaps haven't explained this very well for the timeline Kleeman has destroyed dozens of aircraft on the ground and captured/killed significant desert air force command staff with his surprise appearance at Gambut

The desert airforce would recover and reorganize themselves, but the loss of El Adem and Gambut at the start of the battle would cost them a significant number of their historical sorties in defense of the troops at Gazala; so we are transposing the historical heavily contested, heavy bombing of the Bir Hakeim garrison, onto the exposed 22nd armored brigade, with the Desert Airforce reforming itself after losing Gambut. Without stores at Gambut, it would be very di for the desert airforce to launch their sorties from inside Libya, they would instead have to rely on their fields in Egypt temporarily which would limit their loiter time over the battlefield, at least for a few days until new runways could be built in a safe area closer to the front

Using their air bases around mersah matruh is 250 miles further away than their historically available airbases; I am talking in terms of a main command and control base with good concrete runways; they did have some other strips along the coast but many of these would have to be evacuated once Kleeman got behind Tobruk, as well fuel/bomb/ammunition distribution would be temporarily disrupted and confused with the loss of the rail head

Kittyhawks (their main air superiority fighter) at that distance would have a maximum of 10 minutes of combat at full throttle, even then they would have terrifying minutes with the fuel warning light on, when setting up to land, their hurricaine fighter bombers couldn't even be used at that range at all; plus with the distance involved it limits their sorties per day due to the long slow cruises too and from the battlefield

 

[cardcarrier]

Chapter 6.2 A leaky ship

05-29-1942 23:59 El Adem British supply dump and airbase Mobile HQ 15th Panzerdivision Commander (acting) Oberst Eduard Craseman

Craseman was one of GeneralOberst Rommel's favorites, and one of the more experienced line commanders in the Heer. Having commanded a forward battalion with the 1st Panzer division in it's drive through Poland, and helping to capture Warsaw, and then participated as a leading unit commander in Rommel's 7th Panzer Division's lightening drive across Northern France in 1940. It was no surprise to any one who had served in the ghost division that Rommel requested Craseman come to serve under him in Africa in 1941

Craseman had commanded a regiment in the 15th since landing in Libya with distinction, winning the coveted knights cross medal. The normal divisional commander GeneralMajor Von Vaerest had been wounded on the second day of the offensive and was brought back to Tripoli for recovery. Crasemen enjoyed Rommel and the men's trust and respect and had kept the division on Rommel's timetable

After their scraps with British armor in the south the division was at about 75 percent strength. Rommel had informed him that he would be counter attacked by the British late last night but those forces seemed to be still en route to him. All the better in his opinion, two infantry battalions of the 90th light had been driven back to El Adem to stiffen his hold on the area, and their forces where intended to be gradually relieved of the immense security responsibility at Belhamed. Most of Hauptmann Seebohme's people had relocated to his headquarters and where beginning to locate British forces via their radio triangualation equipment as they neared Craseman's troops

Craseman was an artilleryman by trade, from his earliest days in the army commanding batteries on the eastern and western front in the first world war, so the fresh British cannons from the factory laying before him at El Adem where like a small Christmas in May. Craseman eschewed the 6 pounder anti guns, he was not impressed with what he considered their primative shells, but he delightfully put several captured trucks and prime movers to work locating nearly 2 dozen captured 25 pounder cannons and 11 3.7Inch aa guns to supplement his own artillery park. The troops had been well fed and hydrated the past 24 hours on captured British stocks, all the tanks where full of fuel; the division was ready

Will edit in additional authors notes and commentary soon

 

[Aber]

It would be tough to shootdown the JU-52's when the main forward RAF airbase is overrun.

A RAF desert fighter base is a bit sparse - see later in the campaign when they were operating them behind the German front lines.

I was thinking more in the lines of a Beaufighter anti-shipping patrol.

 

[Aber]

The Italian XX corps and the Trieste division from XXI corps are investing the 150th brigade box for now, that story will develop further in the timeline

Can you check the order of Battle as OTL the XX corps was Ariete and Trieste?

The cauldron was sort of a culmination of all the bad practices the British armored corps had gotten into in the desert

Agreed

 

[Belisarius II]

A RAF desert fighter base is a bit sparse - see later in the campaign when they were operating them behind the German front lines.

I was thinking more in the lines of a Beaufighter anti-shipping patrol.

At this time they didn't have fighter strips behind Axis lines. Tactics, and mobile equipment for that weren't developed yet. The RAF had built good conventional airfields during the Winter months, before the battle. JU-52's flying in from Crete would have a flight of Bf-109F's escorting them. Beaufighters would get killed taking on Fredrick's. At this time only the Spitfire V could take on the Bf-109F on equal terms, and they didn't have any in theater. You wouldn't have many anti shipping patrols between Crete, and Tobruk to stumble onto incoming JU-52's anyway, because their wasn't much of any Axis shipping in the area. Other then a occasional S Boat operating at night, or a U-Boat, those waters were controlled by the RN.

 

[cardcarrier]

Can you check the order of Battle as OTL the XX corps was Ariete and Trieste?


Agreed

many histories of the desert war shift the corps designation among the 2 Italian formations (the 2x mobile divisions Ariete and Trieste; and the 5 infantry divisions) between XX, XXI and XXX; I believe this is due to multiple command shuffles that occurred in this time period

For simplification of my story to the reader

Ariete and Trieste and elements of Trento are XXI
The remaining infantry is XX

That particular issue is one where I will take a permanently lazy route

 

[oldironside]

At this time they didn't have fighter strips behind Axis lines. Tactics, and mobile equipment for that weren't developed yet. The RAF had built good conventional airfields during the Winter months, before the battle. JU-52's flying in from Crete would have a flight of Bf-109F's escorting them. Beaufighters would get killed taking on Fredrick's. At this time only the Spitfire V could take on the Bf-109F on equal terms, and they didn't have any in theater. You wouldn't have many anti shipping patrols between Crete, and Tobruk to stumble onto incoming JU-52's anyway, because their wasn't much of any Axis shipping in the area. Other then a occasional S Boat operating at night, or a U-Boat, those waters were controlled by the RN.

Simply because the Bf109F was superior to the Hawker Hurricane II and the Curtiss Tomahawk, doesn't give the Luftwaffe a free pass to fly unmolested from Crete to North Africa. During the invasion of France and the Low Countries in 1940, the Bf109E was definitely top of the food chain. It was simply better than the Hurricane I, Dewotine 520, MS406, Curtiss P-36, Fokker D.XXI, and any other fighter the Allies employed until the arrival of the first Spitfires over Dunkirk. Nonetheless, the Lufwaffe managed to lose 1,129 aircraft to enemy action (source Frieser, Karl-Heinz (1995). Blitzkrieg-Legende: Der Westfeldzug 1940 ).

The notion that the Tante Jus flying in from Crete would have an effective close escort of 109s also needs closer examination. The lesson from the Battle of Britain clearly show the that Bf109 was not well suited as an escort fighter. Let us look at the details of the proposed operation.

The distance from Heraklion to Gambut is around 250 miles one way, as the crow flies. Sources differ, but in general the Bf109 F had a cruising speed of around 310 mph and a cruising range of around 520 miles with a 300 litre drop tank. Superficially, this looks like a simple assignment.

However, the Ju 52s were considerable slower. They had a cruising speed of 153 mph and an economical cruising speed of 130mph. Given that they would be carrying as much as possible, it would be fair to go with the lower figure. So, it's a minimum two hour flight, with perfect navigation, no headwind and no enemy interference. The 109s would either have to throttle back and fly at a very uneconomical speed to stay close to their charges, or to weave pretty patterns above and around them, all the way to Gambut and then all the way back with the empties. Not only would they burn more fuel in either scenario, but they would also be exposing the Ju52s to attack. They would either be too close and too slow to be able to react, or they would have to react to an attack that was already underway. Given the extremely poor combat effectiveness of the Junkers 52, even a single coordinated gunnery pass against them will undoubtedly cause heavy losses. This was proven every time they were used in contested air space in daylight – including the OTL resupply runs across the Med.

In addition, any weakening of Luftwaffe units in Sicily to provide escorts for supply runs from Crete would undoubtedly ease the passage of the Operation Harpoon convoy to Malta between 12th and 15th June. This would further hamper any Axis resupply missions across the Strait of Sicily.

Given the need for the Luftwaffe to continue to dispute air supremacy over several battlefields at once (in just this theatre), it is far more likely that the Luftwaffe would assign Bf 110s as escorts. They had a far longer range and were much less in demand over the battlefront than the hard worked Bf109Fs. Of course having seen the 110s performance during the Battle of Britain, these aircraft would find it much more of a challenge to try to dogfight with Hurricanes and P-40s.

Probably more crucial than anything mentioned above, there is also the question of the availability of Ju 52s. From 20th February 1942 Ju 52s were withdrawn from all other theatres (including training machines from Germany itself) to fly in supplies for troops encricled in the Demjanks and Cholm pockets. Although they had to fly 160km over Soviet control territory, around 600 Junkers 52s succeeded in flying in around 305 tons of supplies per day. A fairly impressive achievement. However, they only face limited resistance from the Soviet air force, which was still weakened from the initial attacks of June 1941. Even with this limited air defence, the Luftwaffe still lost almost 300 Ju 52s in an operation which lasted until 18th May. (source Pimlott, John, 1998, Die Luftwaffe, Neuer Kaiser Verlag).

To then immediately reassign the surviving aircraft to the Mediterranean theatre for a similar resupply operation, over greater distances and with more effective opposition is an unlikely recipe for success. The aircraft needed maintenance, the crews needed rest, and the multi engined flying schools in Germany needed their surviving instructor pilots and planes back.

So, to summarise, resupply flights from Crete would not be an easy undertaking.

 

[Marco Rivignani]

Just subscribed. Really liked this timeline so far! Just one question: will you keep writing until the end of the North Africa Campaign or just to the conquest of Egypt?

 

[cardcarrier]

historically, although admittedly a few weeks later, the Luftwaffe was able to fly in reinforcements from the Crete garrison to Gambut without prohibitive or even notable losses

the reasons then, rapidly advancing German ground troops had forced the desert air force to evacuate many of their forward fields, and displace to bases back in Egypt; are essentially repeated in this time line, although on a heavier handed (in the short term) scale because the 90th light captures command and control elements and the rail head

the axis airforce had moderate air superiority, during the battle of Gazala due to larger number of machines committed, higher sortie tempo, and moderate qualitative advantage in German/Italian fighters, they did however have strong air control at this time over their shipping lanes to Tripoli, the British also had a number of fighter squadrons on permanent station in the canal zone to contest German bombers from Crete bombing Alexandria and Port Said

This level of reinforcement could be maintained with 60 aircraft, operating at 50 percent serviceability, on 2 sorties a day (assumed as dawn and dusk) without any herculean effort required.

Demyansk and Cholm had been relieved by ground troops at this time, and case blue is still several weeks from starting, so the Luftwaffe and OKW mindset can still be a bit more flexible than they where in the historical later stages of Gazala. The resistence to reinforcing Rommel stemmed from those item's and Kesselring/Cavalerro insistence that Herkules would still be launched. In the timeline Kesselring has become a believer in operation Venice

 

[sonofpegasus]

Although I find this story intriguing I do get the impression that as my reading of the OTL histories indicate Rommel was already being incredibly lucky and relied very heavily on his Intelligence trump card, so that in order to have an even greater success here in north Africa there could be a corresponding negative effect elsewhere for the Axis. How bad for the Axis that negative is then become important to the overall outcome it could cause this success in Egypt to be no more than a Pyric Victory.

 

[cardcarrier]

Although I find this story intriguing I do get the impression that as my reading of the OTL histories indicate Rommel was already being incredibly lucky and relied very heavily on his Intelligence trump card, so that in order to have an even greater success here in north Africa there could be a corresponding negative effect elsewhere for the Axis. How bad for the Axis that negative is then become important to the overall outcome it could cause this success in Egypt to be no more than a Pyric Victory.

This is a thoughtful idea; especially in the sense that outside of the forces held for Herkules, the axis strategic reserve was empty in every meaningful way; as the kitchen sink and then some was being assembled for case blue

So for Kesselring to meaningfully reinforce Rommel, something would have to give on the mainland, and it will in the timeline

 

[cardcarrier]

Just subscribed. Really liked this timeline so far! Just one question: will you keep writing until the end of the North Africa Campaign or just to the conquest of Egypt?

If the forum would permit me to only cover events on the Russian front in passing 5000ft view, I could pursue the timeline to the end of events in North Africa, not due to lack of interest; just my having another version of big axis push in Africa 1942 in my head that involves cancelling case blue that I would prefer to keep as a separate project

 

[oldironside]

historically, although admittedly a few weeks later, the Luftwaffe was able to fly in reinforcements from the Crete garrison to Gambut without prohibitive or even notable losses

the reasons then, rapidly advancing German ground troops had forced the desert air force to evacuate many of their forward fields, and displace to bases back in Egypt; are essentially repeated in this time line, although on a heavier handed (in the short term) scale because the 90th light captures command and control elements and the rail head

the axis airforce had moderate air superiority, during the battle of Gazala due to larger number of machines committed, higher sortie tempo, and moderate qualitative advantage in German/Italian fighters, they did however have strong air control at this time over their shipping lanes to Tripoli, the British also had a number of fighter squadrons on permanent station in the canal zone to contest German bombers from Crete bombing Alexandria and Port Said

This level of reinforcement could be maintained with 60 aircraft, operating at 50 percent serviceability, on 2 sorties a day (assumed as dawn and dusk) without any herculean effort required.

Demyansk and Cholm had been relieved by ground troops at this time, and case blue is still several weeks from starting, so the Luftwaffe and OKW mindset can still be a bit more flexible than they where in the historical later stages of Gazala. The resistence to reinforcing Rommel stemmed from those item's and Kesselring/Cavalerro insistence that Herkules would still be launched. In the timeline Kesselring has become a believer in operation Venice

"historically, although admittedly a few weeks later, the Luftwaffe was able to fly in reinforcements from the Crete garrison to Gambut without prohibitive or even notable losses."

Are you aware of the concept of handwavium? It takes many forms, but this is one of them. You can't just say “Well, it happened this way in OTL, so even with the changes TTL, it will go exactly the same way again.”

Firstly, a matter of a few weeks is important here. Although the Demjansk pocket was officially relieved on 20th April 1942, it was actually May 2nd before supplies could reach the garrison by road. Up till that point they still had to fly everything in.

According to one source at least, this involved ten to fifteen flights per hour into the pocket. The aircraft, aircrew and ground crew must all have been absolutely worn out. They would then have a grand total of 24 days to get things back in order, rest, service the aircraft, make good any losses or deficiencies and then relocate, lock, stock and barrel to Heraklion to start all over again. That is a journey of over almost 2,000 miles. The “a few weeks later” you cite is probably the bare minimum they would have needed to be even close to 40% servicable (You quote sixty Junkers 52s, with a servicability rate of 50%, although 40% was more normal for the Luftwaffe in that theatre).

Even with that, these supplies and reinforcements from Crete are a drop in the ocean. The Axis forces in Africa needed 100,000 tons of supplies every month. I make that around 3,300 tons per day. Kesslering promised Rommel that he would be able to fly in 400 or 500 tons of fuel a day (sources vary on the actual figure he promised). In reality, these later supply flights only provided 25 tons per day. These flights were intercepted and, more importantly, not massively escorted. As far back as December 1941 a resupply flight of eleven Junkers 52s were intercepted by sixteen Martin Maryland bombers. The Junkers' escort consisted of no more than two Bf110s.

Rommel captured 1000 tons of fuel at Tobruk. Again, that is a drop in the ocean. It's two days of Kesselring's promise that he couldn't keep.

Men, equipment and supplies were not going to just appear out of nowhere and they were doing their best OTL. As Peter Lieb put it in Krieg in Nordafrika 1940-1943 (published by the Zentrum für Militärgeschichte und Sozialwissenschaften der Bundeswehr, 2018)

“On the German side from the late summer of 1942 there was militarily no more good news. With the beginning of the German summer offensive in Russia, the Panzerarmee Afrika again slipped down Hitler's and the OKH's list of priorities.To put it plainly, it received little in the way of supply and limited personnel reinforcement. However, that did not mean under any circumstances that Hitler had reduced his expectations of Rommel.” (my translation)

The planning for Fall Blau had already begun as early as 28th March 1942, so Hitler's priorities were clear, and they would have started gathering material for the big push in Russia, at the expense of any resupply to Africa. This shouldn't be a surprise to anybody. As far back as Mein Kampf he had identified Russia as his real focus, and the North African theatre was only a side show. One that he had never really wanted to get involved with in the first place.

"the axis airforce had moderate air superiority, during the battle of Gazala due to larger number of machines committed, higher sortie tempo, and moderate qualitative advantage in German/Italian fighters,"

Indeed, they wore themselves into the ground so that by September 1942 there were very few operational Axis aircraft left in theatre, while Allied air strength just kept increasing. It seems likely that, just as in the invasion of France, the Luftwaffe was going flat out and there was very little extra that they could give, and there was certainly a limited time they could keep it up. Ever extending supply lines, hostile environment and a furious pace are all going to lead to a collapsee at some point.

"they did however have strong air control at this time over their shipping lanes to Tripoli,"

Whatever the veracity of this statement, at the opening of Unternehmen Theseus only 32,000 tons of supplies reached Tripoli in May 1942. These supplies still had 780 miles to travel before they even reached Tobruk.