Eisenhower tours the front

15th April 1943: The Allied Commander in North Africa gets up close to the front line to see the terrain and recently destroyed German Mk VI panzers

US soldiers in a Jeep while on patrol in Tunisia, North Africa, in 1943. Note the mud camo on the jeep, and the mounted Browning .30 Cal. machine gun. The same vehicles were used for General Eisenhower’s personal escort.

In Tunisia the U.S Army was rapidly developing battle experience. One man was coming to terms with a huge range of new experiences, not solely connected with combat. As the Allied Commander in North Africa Dwight D. Eisenhower had to accommodate some tricky diplomatic and political issues and forge a working team of British and American senior commanders that contained no shortage of strong characters.

Eisenhower's right hand man was his Naval Aide, former journalist and broadcaster Harry C. Butcher, who had a unique insight into the top command team through to the end of the war¹. On the 15th April they got a rare opportunity to see the war close up:

On Thursday morning left Ike’s tented Advance CR Generals Ike and Tooey in one car, General Porter and I in another, with jeeps and their .50's fore and aft, on roads dusty with the rapid movement of elements of II Corps from its old sector to its new battleground in the north.