Malta, 1942: Hold or Break Under the Bombs

Lieutenant-General Sir William Dobbie governs an island that the Luftwaffe, freshly redeployed from Sicily, is working to erase from the map. Since January 1942, raids have hammered the airfields of Luqa, Hal Far and Ta' Qali day and night; surviving Hurricane fighters are destroyed on the ground before they can take off. Stocks of flour, fuel and ammunition are shrinking at a rate that will make the situation untenable within weeks. The civilian population has taken shelter in caves and catacombs carved from the limestone, while dockhands at Grand Harbour attempt to repair the handful of freighters still able to force the blockade between two bombing raids.

The question bearing down on Dobbie is one of acceptable cost. Malta, lying 90 kilometres from the Sicilian coast and midway between Gibraltar and Alexandria, remains the only British base capable of striking the convoys feeding Rommel's Afrika Korps with fuel and armour. As long as its submarines and Wellingtons keep flying, roughly one third of Axis shipping sinks before reaching Tripoli. But every week of determined resistance burns through reserves that no one yet knows how to replenish.

Dobbie can hold the island at all costs as an offensive base against enemy convoys, whatever the price in hunger and bombs; scale Malta back to a purely defensive posture, suspending all offensive sorties to conserve men and materiel; or concentrate the remaining resources on an evacuation plan and prepare a surrender if no relief convoy arrives in time.