A 600 feet (180 m) high, narrow escarpment extends south then southeastwards for a total of 55 kilometres (34 mi) from a short distance east of the border.
[citation needed] In World War II, the engineered route up the escarpment had been destroyed and the pass had great strategic importance.
Rommel counter-attacked; the British withdrew and by 27 May the Germans had recaptured Halfaya Pass, a passage of time in which Major Edward Thomas earned his Military Cross.
Supply shortages obliged the Germans to curtail their advance, so they dug in and fortified their positions at Halfaya with 88 mm guns.
Isolated after the fall of Bardia on 2 January 1942, besieged by Commonwealth forces, cut off from supplies, and bombarded from the air and the sea, Bach and de Giorgis finally surrendered the Halfaya garrison of 4,200 Italians of the 55th Savona and 2,100 Germans,[4] to the South African 2nd Infantry Division on 17 January 1942.
[5] The pass was scene of the accidental death of Major-General 'Jock' Campbell (VC), then commander of the British 7th Armoured Division.
On 26 February 1942, a month after assuming command, his staff car overturned on the newly laid clay surface, killing him outright.