INITIATIVE HELD.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 62, Issue 227, 8 July 1942, Page 3

INITIATIVE HELD.

FIERCE ARTILLERY DUEL. AXIS POSITIONS UNDER FIRE. LONDON, July 7. The Bth Army retained the initiative after another day of continuous fighting west of Alamein. All enemy attempts to break through were beaten back. General Auchinleck is not allowing Marshal Rommel a minute’s rest. Reuter’s Cairo correspondent says: “The battle is now swinging over a wide area fronting the Alamein positions, with the highly mobile British, New Zealand. South African, and Jn- * dian battle groups continuously shelling the enemy’s flank. “Reinforcements for the Bth Army are still steadily moving up.” “The news from the Western Desert is the most encouraging for many days,” says the military correspondent of the “Daily Mail.” “Marshal Rommel is now placed inside a box, the northern side of which is about seven, miles long. His line then swings 10 miles southwards and 10 miles westwards, and then comes north again to leave a gap no more than four or five miles wide at the north-western corner. Our massed artillery is laying across this gap one of the heaviest barrage curtains of fire the British have laid down in this war. Rommel’s panzers lie in the centre of the box. Our guns are attacking them, massed batteries raking the desert with streams of cross-fire. The Royal Air Force is putting the lid on the box with a non-stop bombing assault. “One fact emerges clearly. Rommel must get in or get out. No army in the world can remain inactive in such a position. We must recognise that this v knowledge will render Rommel more dangerous than ever.” The Cairo correspondent of the British United Press says: “Almost ceaselessly for the last 48 hours a huge ar- -£ tiJlery duel has proceeded along the Alamein line. The enemy has brought up heavy guns, including some 210 mm. pieces, which are the heaviest yet used in North Africa. A British officer said the British lines were ‘stiff with guns.’ A 'gunner who fought in Greece and France said he had never fired so many shells. “The enemy is using a new type of combined wheeled - tractored, longrange anti-infantry machine-gun, resembling the Vickers gun. but much mere mobile.” ROMMEL REPORTED WOUNDED. LONDON. July fi. Tt is reported from Cairo, without confirmation, that Marshal Romme lias boon wounded find lias hnndocl ~ over the command of the Afrika Korps *to an unnamed Italian general.