Gains Consolidated

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 40, 17 February 1941, Page 7

Gains Consolidated

CAPTURE OF ITALIAN PORT

LONDON, February 16,

Tonight's news from the African theatre of war mainly tells of the consolidation of our most recent successes. Chief among' these has been the capture of Kismayu, at the mouth of the Juba River, which is one of the chief lines of com-: munication with the interior of Italian Somaliland.

Kismayu is the third largest port in this part of Africa, and its capture means that a slice of approximately 10,000 square miles more of enemy territory has been added to our gains. This figure appears today in an official message from

Nairobi

The operations .leading up to the capture, of Kismayu afford one more instance of the close and effective co-operation between the Royal Navy, the British Imperial land forces, and the Royal Air Force, with its sifter service, the South African Air Force. Each played a clearly-defined and extremely valuable part in carrying out the plan which led to the capitulation of the port. The contribution of the South African Air Force to this result is specially emphasised in the communique.

About Libya for the moment official messages have little to say. The counting of prisoners and the checking of war material taken in the pitched battle for south Benghazi are, it is understood, still going on. It has already been disclosed that 103 field guns, two heavy anti-aircraft guns, and 20 light anti-aircraft guns fell into our hands there.

In Eritrea, Fascist Italy's model African colony, the British column which is pushing down from the north is making what is officially described as satisfactory progress. A Cairo message reporting this adds that the concentration of additional troops around Keren also continues. At Keren, the Italians are putting up a stiffer show of resistance than has so far distinguished their campaign in this sector. Keren is a modern fortified citadel containing administrative and military buildings which are the pride of Italian colonisation. Local conditions strongly favour the defenders. Further south, in Abyssinia, , the main activity appears to have consisted of numerous attacks by the South African Air Force operating with British troops on this front. There is news of a large motor park at Dessu having been successfully bombed. British forces have reoccupied a frontier post in the Blue Nile sector rather more than 100 miles south of Gallabat. A correspondent who has visited more, than one of these battle fronts draws attention to the monuments which decorate several of the new roads built by the Italians in their various African territories. They bear the inscription: "Rome advances with her roads."