Rommel << RAW muhl >>, Erwin (1891-1944), was an officer in the German army during World War II (1939-1945). A field marshal, he gained fame as leader of the Afrikakorps, a German force that fought in North Africa. Rommel’s clever tactics earned him the nickname “the Desert Fox.”
Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel was born in Heidenheim, Germany, on Nov. 15, 1891. He joined the German army in 1910. Rommel served with distinction as an infantry officer during World War I (1914-1918). He remained in the army after Germany’s defeat in the war.
After the outbreak of World War II in 1939, Rommel served in Poland before leading a panzer (tank) division in the 1940 invasion of France. Early in 1941, Rommel took command of the Afrikakorps, a mechanized force created to stop Allied advances in North Africa. He won a series of battles in Libya, Egypt, and Tunisia. Increasing Allied strength, however, eventually defeated the Afrikakorps, and Rommel returned to Europe in 1943. See World War II (The Western Desert Campaign) and World War II (The Tunisia Campaign).
In 1944, Rommel led some of the troops that opposed the Allied invasion of Normandy. After he recognized the significance of the superiority of the Allied air forces, he reported to German dictator Adolf Hitler that it was futile to continue the war. Rommel was then implicated in a plot to kill Hitler in July 1944. Rommel was given his choice of trial or poison. He chose death by poison. He took the poison and died on Oct. 14, 1944.
