R.A.F. and American Bombers

Press, Volume LXXIX, Issue 23985, 28 June 1943, Page 5

R.A.F. and American Bombers

heavy attack ON SARDINIA (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Sec II p.m.) LONDON. June 27. Messina, the Sicilian port and ferry terminal, • was attacked by heavy hombeßT'O f the Royal Air Force on Saturday night. Fires were started near oil tanks and the main railway station. Saturday was a quiet day over the Mediterranean. Allied aircraft carried i u t patrols, shooting down two Axis aircraft without loss, Reuter's Algiers correspondent says that 200 tons of high explosives and incendiaries were dropped by Flying fortresses on Messina on Friday. A Rome communique admits that extensive damage was caused by the fortresses raid on Messina. It says

the casualties were 81 killed and 85 wounded. Reggio, one of the two mainland terminals of the Messina ferry, was also raided. "Flying Fortresses had to shoot their way through swarms of enemy fighters to reach Messina in Friday’s raid,” says the Columbia Broadcasting System’s Algiers correspondent. "It is officially reported that anti-aircraft fire over the target was intense. Italian and German fighters pressed the attack from all directions, sometimes ignoring their own anti-aircraft fire and forcing the Fortresses to fight during bombing runs. One of our bomber flights was tailed to within sight of the African coast. 'The fighters were thick as gnats,’ said one American gunner." About 300 North-west African aircraft successfully pounded targets in Sardinia on Thursday. Twenty enemy aeroplanes were destroyed. Nine Allied aeroplanes are missing. “It was an allAmerican show,” says the Algiers correspondent pf the Columbia Broadcasting System. “While Marauders plastered railways, Lightnings had a spectacular running fight with large formations of Messerschmitts, 13 of which were shot down." Leaflets calling on the population to surrender were dropped by Allied bombers during the latest raids on Naples, according to the Rome radio. “NO TARGETS FOR SUBMARINES ” AXIS SHIPS CAUTIOUS IN MEDITERRANEAN (Rec. 9 p.m.l LONDON, June 26. Allied submarines in the central Mediterranean are at present finding no targets, says Reuter’s Algiers correspondent. The British victory in North Africa seems to have cleared ,e Axis from the sea. One submarine commander said: “Submarine work is dull these days. Axis vessels are afraid to venture out. The few ships appearing hug the shore as close as 100 yards.”

PREPARING FOR INVASION GERMAN AND ALLIED REPORTS MEDITERRANEAN AND FRANCE LONDON, June 25. Yesterday the United States Secretary of War (Mr H. L. Stimson) said there were indications that Germany was moving big forces into France and Italy to meet an Allied invasion. It is believed in London to be safe to assume that the Germans have about 40 divisions in France and the Low Countries, totalling perhaps 600,000 men, made up of ordinary field service divisions, panzer divisions, and training divisions. This total would exclude ndn-divislonal troops, the Luftwaffe, anti-aircraft troops, and S.S. units.

Mr Stimson’s view, to which expression was given a few days ago in London, that German troops had been moved into Italian territory recently, would seem to find some measure of confirmation from the Berlin radio, which to-night said that Sardinia was defended by “the pick of the Axis forces,” and was now equipped with means to resist invasion. The Berlin radio also said that the deploying movements of the attackers and defenders on the Mediterranean front appeared to have reached their peak. “The Italian and German defences, from Spain to Crete and Rhodes, are, a bastion against which even a strong and well-equipped enemy will break his head,” said the radio. The Berlin radio added that the British battleships King George V and Howe had left Gibraltar for the Mediterranean. Troops for Syria German military authorities informed Swedish correspondents in Berlin that the British Bth Army had been withdrawn from North Africa and sent to Syria, where the British 9th and 10th Armies were also concentrated. The Germans added that American troops have also been sent to Syria and that new American troops had replaced the British forces withdrawn from North Africa.

"The belligerents are shrouding Coming events in an artificial fog," said Goebbels in an article in "Das Reich,” according to the Berlin radio. "The British, particularly, are carrying out a war of nerves in a fruitless attempt to confuse Germany and divert her from her plans, Britain and America have enough shipping tonnage and fighting forces to land at some given point in Europe, but they could not take Germany by surprise. The British thesis that Germany can be overpowered by air power alone is entirely groundless. “Germany would welcome an attempt at invasion, which may well be the prelude to a decisive stage of the war. The British are overrating the success of their air war and underrating Germany’s effort and success under total war.”

When the Allied invasion of Europe begins French railwaymen must destroy engines and disorganise the whole railway system. This instruction was given to French railwaymen in a broadcast by a 8.8.C. announcer, who added: "Prepare yourselves now for this mission of liberation.”

King to Join Family.—On arrival by air from North Africa, the King spent a short time at Buckingham Palace and then left by car for the country to join the Queen and Princesses.—London, June 25.