7th Armoured Brigade (United Kingdom) Bournemouth Barracks in Soltau. The 7th Armoured Brigade returned to the desert when it arrived in Saudi Arabia in October 1990 as part of Operation "Granby", intended to protect Saudi Arabia from invasion by Saddam Hussein's Iraq. The brigade, commanded by Brigadier Patrick Cordingley, later took part in the Coalition of the Gulf War ground campaign to liberate Iraqi-occupied Kuwait on 24 February 1991 that began after a sustained air campaign. The Desert Rats, along with the rest of 1st Armoured Division, carried out a left-hook manoeuvre that swung round the Iraqi Republican Guard. The brigade advanced deep into Iraqi
7th Panzer Division (Wehrmacht) sea, leaving what was left of its heavy equipment behind each time. After fighting defensively across Prussia and northern Germany, the surviving men escaped into the forest and surrendered to the British army northwest of Berlin in May 1945. Following the completion of the invasion of Poland, the limited effectiveness of the light divisions caused the German High Command to order the reorganization of the four light divisions into full panzer divisions. In October 1939, the 2nd Light Division became the 7th Panzer Division, one of Germany's ten armoured divisions. It consisted of 218 tanks in three battalions, with two