HITLER FOILED

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 51, 28 August 1940, Page 10

HITLER FOILED

EXTENDED INFLUENCE

FRENCH COLONY'S DECISION

TACTICAL GAIN

LONDON, August 27. s

A French spokesman pointed out tonight that if Hitler had got control of the French colony of Chad, which has decided to resume the struggle against Germany, he would have been able to create a direct link between Italian Libya and the former German colony of the Cameroons. He would thus have been given a chance of extending German influence right down to the Equator. As it is, the Allied forces now j command the African Continent from the Atlantic coast of Nigeria right across to the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, and it is only a part of the northern coast of Africa that the defection of France has yielded to the dictators. Chad is of considerable tactical importance, as it lies south of Italian Libya and between British Nigeria and the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. (Received August 28, 2 p.m.) LONDON, August 27. The Lyons radio stated that the British blockade of Atlantic ports has stopped French traffic between Marseilles and Dakar and between Dakar and Algeria. The French authorities will consequently try to divert traffic from sea to land connections. A main route across the Sahara will be opened.