STRENGTH OF BRITAIN

Press, Volume LXXIX, Issue 23949, 17 May 1943, Page 3

STRENGTH OF BRITAIN

ADVANCED FIGHTING BASE

PREPARING FOR SECOND FRONT (B ;0- W -) RUGBY, May 14. Britain is an advanced fighting base for the United Nations, and it is still under constant siege and assault by air and sea.” said Mr Churchill in a broadcast address from Washington. “It is in a very large measure the power-house and directing centre of the whole of the British Commonwealth and Empire. It is the source of a vast output of war equipment, and it is the home and cradle of the Navy. From its ports sail the convoys which carry forth expeditionary armies and to them come the food and supplies by which our tense, organised, vibrant life is sustained. In this home there burns the light of freedom.” The Prime Minister, who was referring to the third anniversary of the Home Guard, added; “Guard it well, Home Guard.” Mr Churchill traced the development of the Home Guard in the dark days when Britain stood alone. They had been short of arms until their American friends were able to send supplies. The Home Guard had received rifles and ammunition as fast as they had arrived, but they had hardly dared to fire a practice round, so precious was every cartridge. In those anxious days there had always arisen that last consoling thought of unenslavable men. The position to-day was very different. The Home Guard was well armed and was acting on anti-aircraft and coastal defences. Some who pointed to Britain’s great air strength asked if the danger of invasion had not passed. "Let me assure you,” said Mr Churchill, “that until Hitlerism is beaten into unconditional surrender the danger of invasion will never pass away. The degree of invasion danger depends entirely upon the strength or weakness of the forces, the preparations gathered to meet it, the larger army that must be brought across the sea to attack and subjugate us, the greater difficulties of operation, and the better targets open to the Navy and the British and United States Air Forces. Home Guardsmen are a vital part of those forces, as they are specially adapted to meet the most modern form of overseas attack—the descent of parachute troops. The Home Guard might well share the motto of the Royal Artillery. ‘Ubique,’ for they are everywhere. “If the Nazis dropped down from the skies,” the Prime Minister continued, “they would find that they were in the lions’ den. “These are gr£at days,” he said. “They are like the days in Lord Chatham’s time, of which it is said you had to get up very early in the moming not to miss some news of victory, but victory is no conclusion. Even final victory will only open new and happier fields of valiant endeavour. Victories gained by the way must be a spur. ... ... “We are gathered here with the highest professional authorities in all the fighting services of the two great Eng-lish-speaking nations to plan well ahead of the armies which are moving swiftly forward. It is no good having only one march ahead laid out. March after march must be planned,, as far as the human eye can see. Design and forethought must be our guides and heralds. We owe it to the fighting troops. We owe it to_ the vast communities we are leading out of the dark places. We owe it to > heroic Russia and long-tormented China. We owe it to the captive and enslaved nations who beckon to us through the prison bars. “At present we have strong armies in Britain, and it is an assembly base for the United States armies coming across the broad Atlantic. But this is iot the end. We must prepare for the time which approaches, and it win surely come, when the bulk of these armies will advance across the seas into deadly grapple on the Continent. Just as the Home Guard render the regular forces mobile against the invader, so the Home Guard must now become capable of taking a great deal of the burden of home defence on to themselves and thus set free the bulk of our trained troops for an assault on the strongholds of the enemy’s power.