BLACK SEA PROJECT

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20639, 20 August 1941, Page 9

BLACK SEA PROJECT

TURKEY IN THE WAY NAZIS WITHOUT SHIPS LONDON, Aug. 15. Under the heading, “Hitler’s Black Sea Bid," the Daily Telegraph reviews the German drive toward Odessa and Nikolayev, and suggests that the German General Staff may believe that should these ports fall — a possibility which must be faced—“they can command several ways to victory.” Both harbours, the paper points out, might be used to outflank the Russian front, capture the Crimea and reach the oilfield of the Caucasus, or, alternatively, strike across Turkey at Irak and Iran. “The British-Soviet declaration,” the Daily Telegraph continues, “has created difficulties for these grandiose German projects. Attempts to make Turkey subserve the Fuehrer’s megalomania are now countered. She is not to be bullied into making her country a corridor for the next German conquest.

“However many legions Hitler’s marshals can deploy on the Black Sea shore, there are no ships to move them until some run the gauntlet to and through the Dardanelles and there is no naval protection for them except what Mussolini has to lend. “Stories are told of the great number of barges prepared at Constanza, and of the motor torpedo boats brought down the Danube. Russia has a fleet in the Black Sea far more than capable of obliterating any naval force which Hitler could scrape together there.” ________