AIR OFFENSIVE BY ALLIES

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23718, 17 August 1942, Page 5

AIR OFFENSIVE BY ALLIES

FORECAST BY PORTAL “ DESTRUCTION FASTER THAN REPAIRS” (N.Z.P.A.-8.0.W.) LONDON, Aug. 15. “The time is not very far distant when British and American bomber squadrons in England will be able to destroy the industry and power of Germany at a rate which outstrips repair. When that time comes, will the average German long resist the conclusions that war is no longer profitable and that the Fuehrer is no longer worth following?" asks Sir Charles Portal, chief of the British Air Staff, in an article in a special Royal Air Force issue of the Chicago magazine “Flying and Popular Aviation.” Sir Charles Portal, in a review of some, of the problems which faced him and his predecessors, emphasises that Britain began the war with a numerical inferiority of one to four against the Luftwaffe and only npvt had reached numerical parity with the Germans. Britain’s air resources had never approached her requirements, and in view of that she could not be strong everywhere. All she could do at first was to ensure she was strong at essential points, and this could only be achieved at the expense of weakness elsewhere. As a result, Britain had had many grave reverses which had given rise to severe criticisms of the Royal Air Force, “I am glad to say, however, that the situation is now quickly Improving," he said, adding that the time was rapidly approaching when the United Nations would have a decisive air superiority over the Axis in all parts of the world.

Referring to the Royal Air Force bomber offensive, Sir Charles Portal said: "What has been achieved in the past is as nothing compared with what is now beginning to be achieved and what will be achieved soon with the help of the American bomber force destined for this country." < All the larger towns of the RhmeRuhr district are to evacuate women and children, according to a Zurich message. .. . “Himmler in his capacity as chief of the A.R.P. services is intensively preparing Berlin for heavy raids,” says the correspondent of "The Times” on the German frontier. "Himmler’s S.S. guards are displacing the Berlin civil police from the A.R.P. work and also displacing wardens of blocks and even concierges of individual houses. Anti-air-raid towers are being erected and the’ whole system of anti-aircraft gun nests is being changed, thus making obsolete the Royal Air Force’s Information. Wooden barracks are being built on vacant land near Berlin so that those bombed out of their homes can auickly be accommodated. Royal Air Force raids are estimated to have rendered 1,000,000 Germans homeless. FASCIST PARTY PURGE SECRETARY EXPLAINS EXPULSIONS LONDON. August 14. The general secretary of the Fascist Party has given these reasons for the expulsion of 76,000 Italians from the party: Lack of interest in party affairs, refusal to join the voluntary militia for national safety, failure to wear the Fascist badge, and infringement of the rationing regulations. The secretary added that a systematic examination of the position of every Fascist Party member was being carried out to eliminate harmful elements.

Anti-Fascist Italians in Uruguay have opened a pan-American conference designed to unify the Free Italy movement, says a New York message. Under the chairmanship of Count Carlo Sforza, one of the last preMussolini Foreign Ministers, who has been directing the anti-Fascist movement from the United States, members of the conference declared that their ideals fitted perfectly with those of the United Nations, and they expressed the hope that all the Allies would recognise the movement and accept the help of the proposed anti-Axls Italian Lesion. /

NAZI PEACE OFFER FORECAST

(8.0. W.) RUGBY, August 14. Germany is banking on a compromise peace which she will probably propose this autumn, said the Polish Commander-in-Chief (General Sikorski). He expressed the hope that the negotiations going on in Moscow would harmonise the efforts of all the Allied Nations who so far had been deprived of the benefits of a supreme joint command.