SECOND FRONT

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 13227, 18 August 1943, Page 3

SECOND FRONT

INVASION OF FRANCE “EUROPE NOW RIPE” London, August 16. The latest Allied moves suggest strongly that the invasion of Europe •will he launched across the English Channel and not in the Mediterranean area, London observers state. A statement made in Quebec yesterday by the Prime Minister, Mr Mackenzie King, is interpreted to mean that the Allies plan to land on the coast of France. Referring to the forthcoming conference between Mr Churchill and President Roosevelt in Quebec, Mr Mackenzie King said: “It is fitting that the liberation of France should be decided and planned in this French city.” The London correspondent of the Stockholm newspaper Tidningen says: “All is ready for the real second front, in which Britain and America will stake all they have. There are no longer any excuses. Europe is ripe for a second front as never before, and the Allies are , ready to create it. The British are in the mood to win or lose all, but it is not certain whether Allied experts in Quebec are of the same opinion.” M. Yaroslavsky, one of the chief editors of the -Soviet newspaper Pravda, also a member of the Central Committee of the Communist party, speaking on Moscow radio, declared: “The routing of the German divisions at Orel, Bielgorod and Karachev, and in the battles of Kharkov, has created a situation in which a serious blow from the west would greatly speed up the end of Plitlerire Germany. The Red Army is entitled to expect the Allies to develop an active offensive on the European Continent just as a fighting unit expects some long-promised reinforcements.”