AEROPLANES DISCOVER ADVANCING FORCE.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVI, Issue 71, 24 March 1915, Page 5

AEROPLANES DISCOVER ADVANCING FORCE.

EL KUBRI'S GUNS COMPEL RETREAT.

FORCE ROUTED NEXT DAT BY GENERAL YOUNGHUSBAND,

(Received 2.10 p.m.) LONDON, March 23."" The Press Bureau, -n giving further details of the second attack on Suez, state 3 that according to advices from Cairo the British air patrol discovered on Monday morning a force of a thousand Turks under General yon Traumer, near El Kubri, on the opposite side of the Canal so Suez. The guns of El Kubri compelled the enemy to retire, and next day a force under General Younghusband was sent out in pursuit of the flying Turks. They were overtaken the same day, were routed, and are now in full retreat. An attack by a thousand men on the Suez Canal can only have, been intended as a reconnaissance prior to greater operations, but it is difficult to imagine why so weak a. force should have been led to the slaughter, seeing that in the first attack on the Canal, on February 3, an army of at least 12.000 was repulsed practically without loss to the British, but with a loss to the enemy estimated at 2,400. Possibly the attack was an ill-timed feint designed to cover major operations against some other portion of the Canal.