At the end of November 1941, the months-long siege of Tobruk, a city in eastern Libya, came to an end. For more than seven months the Germans and Italians had been unable to capture this fortress. From the end of August 1941, Polish soldiers from the Independent Carpathian Rifle Brigade were the defenders of Tobruk.

The occupation of Poland in September 1939 by the Germans and the Soviet Union did not mean the total collapse of Poland. An émigré government was active in France and then in Great Britain. The Polish army was also being reconstituted. One unit was formed in April 1940 in French-controlled Syria. It was the Independent Carpathian Rifle Brigade (SBSK) under the command of General Stanisław Kopański. After the surrender of France, at the end of June 1940, the brigade was redeployed to British-controlled Palestine. Here, in the Latrun camp, the brigade was completely rearmed with English weapons and equipment. In the autumn of 1940, its subdivisions were sent to Egypt, where they took part in the expansion of fortifications and the guarding of camps for prisoners of war. By 1941, the division had almost reached its target strength of 5,000 soldiers.

In August 1941, a key decision in the unit’s history was taken. It was sent to the fortress of Tobruk, a city in western Libya besieged since April 1941 by German and Italian troops. Further subdivisions of the brigade were moved by sea from the port of Alexandria between 18 and 28 August 1941. The Poles were directed to the most difficult western section of the defence facing the superior troops of the German Afrika Korps commanded by General Erwin Rommel.

For more than three months, the Polish soldiers heroically repulsed the attacks, earning the name ‘Desert Rats’, as the Germans called the Tobruk defenders. At the end of November 1941, units of the British 8th Army reached the city from the east. The final touch of the fighting was the successful assault by SBSK soldiers on Maduar Hill, a key German position near Tobruk. It took place on the night of 9/10 December 1941.

In March 1942, the brigade was sent to rest in Palestine, where it was reformed into the 3rd Carpathian Rifle Division.