Montgcmery had to retrain the Eighth Amy from scratch, focusing upon the problems of centralized command and control for set-piece battles.

The British gained time by halting the Germans at Alam Halfa (31 August - 5 September 1942). Having predicted the key terrain that the Germans would have to seize, British and Commonwealth defenders dug in to deny the enemy that terrain. The Royal Air Force attacked German armor while it was immobilized in British minefields. The main British defenses included Grant tank fire at long range, towed antitank guns at closer range, and finally massed artillery protective fires at short range These successive defenses exhausted the German attacks.

After Alam Halfa, Montgomery used an abbreviated form of his training program from Britain to prepare the Eighth Army for the deliberate attack known as the second battle of Alamein (October - November 1942). To ensure that the entire army attacked in a coordinated manner, Montgomery resorted to the elaborate planning and centralized direction characteristic of British attacks in World War I. Each corps directed its artillery, for example. Such procedures were more familiar to British staff officers than the fluid, improvisational tactics that they had at tempted to copy from the Germans. Engineers, infantry, and artillery conducted a night penetration of the German-Italian defensive positions, seizing high ground on which to establish infantry-antitank defenses. Next, Montgomery planned to move armor forward under the protection of these antitank defenses, tempting the Germans to counterattack. In actual practice, the second battle of Alamein was an attrition contest in which Montgomery's plans changed frequently, largely because the armored units still had difficulty cooperating with the artillery and infantry. The ultimate British success clearly owed as much to Montgomery's methods of forcing combined arms cooperation upon his subordinates as to the British material superiority at the time. Historians have frequently criticized Montgomery for the cautious manner in which he conducted both deliberate attacks and more fluid exploitation and pursuits. Yet this caution enabled him to minimize or avoid the errors of his predecessors, errors caused in large part by an inability to coordinate the different arms. (Literally brought the Army and RAF HQ's closer together)

Gorge shall see upon the Eastern surface a treasure,

One of which coitus of idea is not sustained,

And this shall henceforth be removed from visible sight,