The Desert
Peter Batty
This land was made for war.
As glass resists the bite of vitriol,
so this hard and calcined earth
Rejects the battle's hot, corrosive impact.
Here is no nubile, girlish land;
No green and virginal countryside for war to violate.
This land is hard.
Inviolable.
These are the poetic opening lines of Episode 8 of the great TV documentary series, The World at War. They describe the Western Desert of Egypt where the titanic battles of Alamein were fought in World War II.
Main Location:
El-Alamein, Markaz Al Alamein, Matrouh, Egypt
Other locations:
British Infantry attack at El-Alamein in 1942