Not only did the Sicily operation represent a watershed in tactical development of combined arms tactics it was also an important test for future Allied joint operations. Senior British commanders left the North African theater with a jaundiced & dismissive view of the combat capabilities of the inexperienced US Army after the debacle at Kasserine Pass in Tunisia in February 1943. Sicily was a demonstration that the US Army had rapidly learned its lessons & was now capable of fighting as a co-equal of the British Army. The Sicily campaign contained a measure of high drama as Patton took the reins of the Seventh US Army & bent the rules of the theater commander in a bold race to take Palermo on the northern Sicilian coast. When stiff German resistance halted Montgomerys main assault to Messina through the mountains Patton was posed to be the first to reach the key Sicilian port & end the campaign. The Sicily campaign contains a fair amount of controversy as well including the disastrous problems with early airborne assaults & the Allied failure to seal the straits of Messina allowing the Germans to withdraw many of their best forces.