BRITISH FORCES
TRAGICALLY INADEQUATE SYDNEY, October 17. The tragic inadequacy of Britain's armoured forces in the French campaign last year is disclosed in the dispatches from Lord Gort released to-day. He declares that the armoured strength amounted only to seven divisional cavalry regiments equipped with light tanks, one regiment of obsolete pattern armoured cars and two battalions of infantry tanks.
The Germans had a tremendous ascendancy in mechanised equipment. They had in the field 10 armoured divisions, of which at least five were used to cut the British rearguard.
The dispatches also refer to the tremendous nuisance value of parachute troops, and to the fact that no French civil organisation existed to isolate and search areas where they landed.
Lord Gort also refers to the vital part played by dive-bombing attacks, which placed tremendous strain on the morale even of those old soldiers who had grown accustomed to heavy shellfire.
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Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 247, 18 October 1941, Page 6
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150BRITISH FORCES Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 247, 18 October 1941, Page 6
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