Fighting in Africa's deserts is like playing chess with nothing but rooks and pawns. Whole areas of strategic gambit are impossible, and even admissible tactics are confounded and confused by nature. Water is as vital as ammunition; sand finer than talcum makes its way into eyes, carburetors and rifle breeches; heat averaging 120 degrees out of doors becomes incineration inside a tank or behind an airplane engine. Trails ideal for the soft pads of camel feet are too soft for the treads of caterpillars. Mirages, the blistering wind called ghibli, sand blizzards, lack...
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