at peace with Italy, it could not be sent to the front. On 12 January 1941, the reorganization of the brigade in keeping with British regulations was completed and the unit was renamed the Polish Independent Brigade Group. It was modelled on a British motorized infantry brigade and was then moved to the port of Haifa, from where it was to be transported to Greece. However, before the first of the detachments had been embarked on the ships, the Battle of Greece ended as the Germans overran that country. On 30 April 1941, during the offensive of Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps, the brigade was moved near to the front at the fort of Mersa Matruh, where it spent the next 10 weeks strengthening defensive positions. It was then withdrawn to the El Amiriya camp near Alexandria, and on 18 August 1941 the first convoy of the brigade's units left for besieged Tobruk. Transported in seven convoys, between 21 August and 28 August, the brigade took over the westernmost perimeter, relieving Australian troops in the process. Fighting alongside the British 70th Infantry Division, the brigade took part in the Siege of Tobruk. Overnight on 9 December, during the British Eighth Army's offensive, Operation Crusader, which was to raise the siege, the Polish brigade seized the strategically important Madauar Hill, the town of Acroma and broke through to the Eighth Army. Due to their impact on the battle, the Polish soldiers were awarded the prestigious title of the Rats of Tobruk by their Australian comrades in arms. On 13 December the Carpathian Uhlan Regiment was detached while the remainder of the brigade was attached to XIII Corps of the Eighth Army and took part in the attack on the Axis Gazala defensive line on 15 December. Rommel made a fighting withdrawal to defensive positions around El Agheila but his counterattack on 21 January 1942 led to the armies once more facing each other at the Gazala position by early February. On 17 March 1942, the brigade was withdrawn from the front to the El Amiriya camp and then back to Palestine. There it was joined by the Polish forces of General Władysław Anders evacuated from the Soviet Union and was reformed into the 3rd Carpathian Rifle Division. The brigade officially ceased to exist on 3 May 1942. Throughout its existence the brigade lost 156 killed in action (including 127 in the Siege