Land mine invention by the Polish officer Józef Kosacki. His invention, known as the Polish mine detector, was used by the Allies alongside mechanical methods, to clear the German mine fields during the Second Battle of El Alamein when 500 units were shipped to Field Marshal Montgomery's Eighth Army. The Nazis used captured civilians who were chased across minefields to detonate the explosives. According to Laurence Rees "Curt von Gottberg, the SS-Obergruppenführer who, during 1943, conducted another huge anti-partisan action called Operation Kottbus on the eastern border of Belarus, reported that 'approximately two to three thousand local people were blown up in
Second Battle of El Alamein based on his usual manoeuvre tactics but no clear picture emerged of how he would fight the battle and British plans seriously underestimated the Axis defences and the fighting power of the . The Battle of El Alamein is usually divided into five phases, consisting of the break-in (23–24 October), the crumbling (24–25 October), the counter (26–28 October), Operation Supercharge (1–2 November) and the break-out (3–7 November). No name is given to the period from 29–31 October, when the battle was at a standstill. Prior to the main barrage, there was a diversion by the 24th Australian Brigade, which involved