Auchinleck viewed the defence of Tobruk as a lesser matter and told Ritchie that he did not intend to hold it at all costs. An immense store of supplies of every description had been accumulated around the port for an Allied offensive and Auchinleck expected it to be able to hold out for two months with the supplies in the fortress. The British prime minister Winston Churchill had placed great store on the symbolic value of Tobruk and there was an exchange of ambiguous signals, leading to the port becoming surrounded and besieged, rather than evacuated as originally planned. Operation Venice () began on 26 May 1942 and drove the Eighth Army east of Tobruk, leaving it vulnerable to attack from the east. Gott garrisoned Tobruk with the two brigades of 2nd South African Division (Major-General Hendrik Klopper) along with the 201st Guards (Motorised) Brigade, 11th Indian Infantry Brigade, 32nd Army Tank Brigade and the 4th Anti-Aircraft Brigade. penetrated a weak spot on the eastern defensive perimeter and took the port within twenty-four hours. The garrison of 33,000 men was captured, many of those on the western perimeter not having been engaged. Over 1,000 vehicles in working order, of food and of petrol were captured. The surrender was the largest capitulation of British Empire forces in the war after the Battle of Singapore in February 1942. Later in the year, a Court of Inquiry () found Klopper to be largely blameless for the surrender and ascribed the defeat to failures among the British high command. The findings were kept secret until after the war, doing little to restore the reputation of Klopper and his troops. Aftermath Analysis With the capture of Tobruk, the Axis gained a port nearer the Aegean–Crete route and a large amount of Allied supplies. If the Allies could not stop the Germans in Egypt, they would take the Suez Canal (forcing Britain to use supply lines twice as long, threatened by U-boats) and potentially drive for the oilfields in the Middle East. Hitler rewarded Rommel with a promotion to the rank of field-marshal, the youngest German officer ever to achieve this rank. Rommel remarked he would have preferred another panzer division. Churchill wrote, Auchinleck dismissed Ritchie on 25 June and assumed command of the Eighth Army for the First Battle of El Alamein, where he stopped Rommel's advance. In August, Auchinleck was replaced as Eighth Army