EASTWARD ROAD

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 21, 20 October 1941, Page 7

EASTWARD ROAD

Menace Of German Offensive TEST FOR BRITISH Fine Record Of Imperial Armies (British Official Wireless.) (Received October 19, 7 p.m.) RUGBY, October 18. Britain’s need for a large army to face the German menace in the East and at home was emphasized by the joint Parliamentary Undersecretary for War, Brigadier-Gen-eral Lord Croft, in a speech at Hornsey. “Our real test of strength and endurance is only now about to commence,” he said. “The German armies, fighting in Russia against an enemy numerically superior and excellently equipped, have advanced over 1400 miles, and the Germans will almost certainly come to Batum and Baku across the Caucasus by spring. If this is so, the Iran frontier becomes vital to us—first, in supporting the Russian defence of Baku, if they will let us; and, secondly, to deny the road to Egypt, India and the East. “I believe that with, the great army raised in India, together with our own forces based on Egypt, we can hold the line to the East. I believe that if the brave Russian people stick it like their forbears we may yet see the Germans held on the East, but even so our army is still faced with a mobile army of tar greater strength in the command of German generals.” General Croft then recalled the achievements of the Imperial armies in the East. When France fell General Wavell had 90,000 men against 500,000, but nevertheless utterly destroyed the Italian army in Cyrenaica and took 200,000 prisoners with astonishingly few casualties. “Having guaranteed Greece, compelling considerations of national honour demanded that we send every available man from Libya to her aid,” he continued. “Had the Serbs concentrated their divisions in the south and had the Greeks been able to detach some of their fine forces from the Albanian battlefield to hold the vital passes into their country till we arrived, we might have built on those very strong positions and held the Germans. By fighting in Greece and Crete we delayed the German attack on Russia by at least six weeks.” Total Casualties.

Lord Croft said he thought that Britons felt immense pride in the achievements of their army in all its 10 campaigns. “Never have risks been so freely taken; never have setbacks been so brilliantly retrieved; and rarely have victories been so complete, so cheap in cost of lives or more farreaching in their strategy as in the conquest of the vast Italian East African empire,” he said. “The whole of the Middle Eastern position • has now changed to our advantage. “The total casualties have been approximately 100,000, including 20,000 among the Dominion troops—l3,ooo Australians, 6000 New Zealanders, and 600 South Africans. The casualties o£ the Indians were 7000, and there were fewer than 500 among African native troops. These totals do not Include the Royal Navy and Air Force or Merchant Marine, the large majority of whom were of the Homeland or the civil casualties, the whole of which were incurred in Britain. “There is hardly a single regiment of fame in the British Army which has not seen hard fighting either in France, Belgium, or Norway, as well as Africa, Greece or Crete. The Royal Armoured Corps, Royal Artillery, Royal Engineers, and R.A.S.C. have been engaged in every one of these campaigns. In proportion to its size the Royal Armoured Corps has suffered more casualties than any other force of tlie Empire.”