"Mines at El Alamein" Topic

Apparently, some of the mines that were planted at El Alamein are still there:

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Sadly, not surprising. It would cost too much and take a very long time to find and lift them all.

Indeed probably unavoidable. But it shouldn't be beyond the British, Italian and German governments to contribute to a fund to compensate these people.

Mumar Qadhaffi has been after WWII reparations for several decades. The boxes around Tobruk and Gazala left tens of thousands of mines.

N African battlefield perils remain
At the El Alamein war cemetery honouring nearly 20,000 allied dead, the silence of the desert is broken sound of a lawnmower cutting the grass in front of the graves. It may exude the tranquillity of an English garden, but beyond the memorials, the western desert is as deadly as ever.

Abdul Diyem Gatwa – a handsome bearded Bedouin in his mid-forties – jabs his deformed left hand as he talks about the perils of living near the battlefield. Three of his fingers are mere stumps, yet he is fortunate. Twelve members of his family have been killed by some of the 17 million mines still remaining in the western desert straddling Egypt and Libya.

Mr Gatwa says it is really quite dangerous around here.

"Children are maimed or killed. They lose their hands, feet, or legs, or become blind. They go out and play. They don't know what these things are.

"Sometimes they are with their livestock and they step on mines. They go out to play or they don't come back," he says.

Victims of mines are easy to find. Another Bedouin, 60-year-old Mahmoud Bado, nearly died in the blast that rendered his right leg useless and blew away his left arm. His father was killed in a separate explosion.

"The Germans and British planted these mines," Mr Bado says.

"They have a responsibility to clear them up. De-mining would make this a safer place."

Guide books advise visitors to the battlefield to stick to the paths because of the mines, especially around a squat sandstone mausoleum containing the remains of nearly 5,000 Germans. They were caught by surprise when the allies punched a hole through minefields meant to protect them. The British say they have offered technical assistance and training to the Egyptians. But diplomats in Cairo declined to talk on the record about the issue. The projected bill for reclaiming the desert is put at $2bn. Doud Mesari Hassan, a short wizened old Bedouin, occasionally guides tourists around the battlefield. He has lived here since World War II and is in no doubt about what should be done:

"This was a European war between the allies and the axis. They brought the war over here. It had nothing to do with North Africa.

"Their war and these mines have held back our development for more than 50 years."

If it could be reclaimed, this part of the desert close to the Mediterranean could accommodate millions of Egyptians currently living in overcrowded cities. Egypt may complain about the desert's wartime legacy, but here's the ironic twist. President Mubarak's government has yet to ratify international conventions banning landmines. That gives Britain and Germany the perfect excuse to invoke European Union policy which bans mine clearing in non-compliant countries.

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Not just from WWII Either. Robert
Algeria Destroys Thousands of Landmines
26 September, 2008 01:59:00 The North Africa Journal
The month of August was a busy month for the Algerian army's demining teams. A total of 7,330 landmines have be found and destroyed just during the month of August.

The landmines were planted by the French military in the mid to late 1950s and included 2,835 antipersonnel mines. The demining operations occurred along various border regions under military control. In all, since the military began to clear up the regions, as many as 305,731 mines have been eliminated.

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With the dry desert conditions, the mines will probably remain effective for decades more.

And the shifting desert sands can really make mine-clearing problematic in certain areas.

sounds like they need to sign Ottawa or get the Egyptian army to work harder. With two recourses open to them, and the UK already contributing to a fund to this purpose, it seems senseless not to sign up for help. IMHO

"Mumar Qadhaffi has been after WWII reparations for several decades."

"Or maybe he would rather the Allies left the Italians in charge and he could still be a colony of Italy. The American and British soldiers who died freeing them from the Germans and Italians are their reparations."

I have no doubt of the rightness of the Allied cause, but let's be perfectly clear that what they were *not* fighting for was to free Libya from the Italian boot, or free colonies in general from their European colonial masters.

The well-being of the Bedouins or Libyans, was at the bottom of the Allied list. The implication that the Libyans have any reason to be grateful to the Americans or the Brits, is incorrect. The indigenous attitude that this was a foreign war was correct.

Which is not to say that I agree with the attitude of blaming it all on the contemporary Brits, Germans, Americans or Italians either.

Tensions between Egypt and Libya have almost escalated to war on a number of occasions – it suits Egypt to leave the mines where they are.

German Mines in the Egyptian Desert
The Legacy of the Battle of El Alamein

65 years ago, one of the biggest tank battles in the Second World War took place between Rommel's Africa corps and Allied troops near El Alamein on Egypt's northwest coast. The mines that were left behind still claim victims among the civilian population. Frederik Richter describes the background

| Bild: Battle of El Alamein (photo: AP)
Bild vergrössern The battle of El Alamein, fought in the deserts of North Africa, lasted from October 23 to November 5, 1942 | Every fall, veterans from all over the world gather in El Alamein in Egypt to commemorate their fallen comrades. But hardly any of them spares a thought for the victims that the battle is still claiming today.

The troops left behind in the desert some 21 million aircraft bombs, tank shells and landmines. There's no telling where the shifting sands may have carried these mines by now.

The Foreign Ministry in Berlin asserts that international law does not require Germany to clear away mines deposited in Egypt during World War II. But Germany has nonetheless repeatedly offered Egypt humanitarian assistance, by for example handing over old maps showing where the mines are located, or supplying metal detectors.

An area of 2,800 square kilometers is still contaminated, a thirty-kilometer wide swath between El Alamein, some 60 kilometers west of Alexandria, and the Libyan border. This is a region inhabited primarily by Bedouins, the ones who most frequently fall prey to the leftover ammunition today.

Other priorities

It was not until 1982 that the Egyptian government acknowledged the problem. "It was a question of costs and priorities," Fathy El Shazly, director of the national northwest coast development program, frankly admits.

He refers to the history of his country, which after the Second World War was first busy gaining independence and then tied up in four wars against Israel. A bit more haste would have been advisable, though.

According to the NGO "Landmine Monitor," there have been 8,313 mine-related casualties in this region since 1982, including 619 deaths. As can be observed again and again whenever natural disasters or accidents occur, however, the Egyptian government evidently does not place much importance on its own citizens. It has done little to help the victims to date.

The Egyptian army did clear some 3.5 million pieces of ammunition out of the desert between 1982 and 1999, but since then a lack of funds has slowed down their efforts – at least that's the official line.

Since things are moving much too slowly for the private sector, which has great plans for the region, some hotels and oil companies have begun to remove buried ammunition at their own expense in order to build access roads to their projects.

Fresh start

In the year 2000, a National Commission was founded to address the issue. It included representatives from so many ministries and authorities, however, that it has since had to be reformed several times and has not really been able to take action.

In November 2006, the UNDP concluded an agreement with the Egyptian government on the development of the northwest coast. The first phase of a new strategy should be drafted by summer 2007.

The mines will then be recovered over several years in a second phase. For the first time, the agenda includes informing the public and protecting potential victims.

But the main question is still: Who is going to pay? The program is already short 1.1 million dollars for the first phase. According to El Shazly, the army estimates that the cost of clearing the mines will come to around 250 million dollars.

That is only a fraction of the sum that will subsequently have to be invested in infrastructure and commercial development. "The real challenge," El Shazly points out, "is to develop the region."

Commercial development plans

Egypt is relying completely on its international donors to foot the bill. But at least El Shazly – by contrast with many other voices in Egypt – is no longer insisting that Germany and the other participants in the battle take responsibility. "The issue of international responsibility does not play a role for me anymore. I will speak with anyone who is interested in seeing Egypt thrive."

His argument is that the mines are preventing the development of a key part of the country. The Ministry for International Cooperation estimates that some 22 percent of Egypt's terrain has been rendered unusable due to ammunition still buried underground. This area also harbors around 4.8 billion barrels of crude oil and 3.8 billion cubic meters of natural gas, El Shazly maintains.

Furthermore, 1.85 million hectares of arable land, which is becoming increasingly scarce in Egypt, could be opened up for farming. Most importantly, however, the northwest coast is at the center of Egypt's tourist strategy, with coastal strips along the Red Sea and the Sinai long since displaying the kind of patchwork development that results from the lack of a coherent plan.

Some of the Mediterranean's most beautiful beaches can be found on Egypt's northwest coast, and many of them are as yet untouched. Emirates-based real estate giant Emaar purchased land near Sidi Abdel-Rahman last year for 1.74 billion dollars with plans to develop an entire city for tourists.

In this region, where between 70,000 and 100,000 people live today, 380,000 new jobs could be created. According to the national northwest coast development plan, the coast could be home to 1.5 million Egyptians by 2022. The government is supporting these endeavors because it would like to see people relocate from the narrow Nile Valley out to peripheral areas.

Private sector must get involved

When it comes to removing mines, international donors have so far shown little inclination to come to Egypt's aid, and the new arguments will probably not do much to change this. The Egyptian government has simply done too little itself up until now.

At the beginning of May, El Shazly did invite international manufacturers of mine removal equipment to Cairo to conduct tests there. One of those who came was Erik Tollefsen from the Geneva International Center for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD).

He was impressed by the motivation and professionalism of the Egyptian government, and he thinks it's a good idea to enlist the army in mine removal for the time being. "It is important to have a strong national partner, and the Egyptian army has an excellent standing in society and the administration," Tollefsen commented.

He nevertheless believes that the Egyptian government must in future open up its program to private-sector organizations and companies. After all, it is unusual that a country's national army implements a demining program entirely on its own. Moreover, the involvement of private businesses or NGOs offers international donors greater transparency.

On the other hand, however, Egypt is not exactly setting a good example with its mine removal efforts. It refused to sign the Ottawa Anti-Mine Convention in 1997.

The reason behind this can be found in the Egyptian army's security concerns. Little about this issue is allowed to become public, but the fact is that the vested interests of the military are still inviolable in this country. The army will hardly be willing to forfeit its authority here when the prospects for acquiring expensive equipment are so enticing.
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Couldn't they just drive a modern-day flail around there for a bit? Like this one – link

Discussion of what should be done today about mines in North Africa is not appropriate for a wargaming board.

If you want to discuss this, please adjourn to our sister site, The Blue Fez: thebluefez.com