MANILA ATTACKS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 75, 26 September 1944, Page 5

MANILA ATTACKS

SUMMARY OF EFFECTS

WASHINGTON, Sept. 24. A Pacific Fleet communique states that the following damage, part of which was previously reported, was inflicted at and near the Clark and ! Nichols airfields in the Manila harbour area and ,at the Cavite naval base during the two-day operations over southern Luzon:—Forty ships and six small craft sunk, 11 ships probably sunk, 35 ships, 11 small craft, and two dry-docks damaged; 169 planes shot! down in combat, 188 planes destroyed on the ground, 45 planes probably damaged on the ground, three planes damaged by ships' gunfire. Extensive and widespread damage was done to buildings, warehouses, railway equipment, oil storage tanks, harbour installations, hangars, shops, stored supplies, and equipment. The Americans lost 11 planes in combat and there was no damage to their surface ships. THIED FLEET'S TOTAL SCORE. The communique states that the total revised score for the Third Fleet under Admiral Halsey's command now stands at 122 ships and 16 small craft sunk, 137 ships and ■ 109 small craft damaged, 380 planes shot down in the air and 598 destroyed on the ground, and crippling damage to airfields and naval establishments. Third Fleet carrier*based aircraft supported the Palau assault. American combat losses were 51 planes. The operations of the Third Fleet have forced the enemy to withdraw his forces from their former anchorage in the Philippines and seek new refuges in the same general area. They also disrupted inter-island communications and have also broken his air force in the Philippines, just as the operations of the Fifth Fleet broke the enemy carrier-based air force in the battle of tho Philippine sea