THE JOYS OF BOMBING

Manawatu Times, Volume 63, Issue 48, 26 February 1938, Page 12

THE JOYS OF BOMBING

Most Perfect of Sports

following extracts taken from

Bruno Mussolini’s own account of his air-bombing exploits in Abyssinia may be of interest. They appear in his book “Voli Sulle Ambe,” which has been recommended t o all Italian schools: “I get only mediocre effects, perhaps because I was expecting enormous explosions like in American films, whereas the little Abyssinian homes, made of withies and rushes, give n 6 satisfaction to anyone bombing them.” (p. 28). “The little incendiary bombs give satisfaction; at any rate one sees fire and smoke. We conscientiously burned the whole of this zone. But there were r.o inhabitants left.” (p. 39). “I have never been able to see a fire, though I have often chased fireengines . . . Perhaps because some one had heard of this gap in my education a machine from the 17th squadron was ordered to bomb the Adi-Abo zone exclusively with incendiary bombs. . . .

We had to set fire to the wooded hills, to the fields, and to the little villages

. . . The bombs hardly touched the earth before they burst into white smoke and an enormous flame, and the dry grass began to burn. I thought t the animals; God, how they ran . . .

After the bomb-racks were emptied I began throwing bombs by hand ... It was most amusing; a big “zariba” surrounded by tall trees wns not easy to hit. I had to aim carefully at the straw roof and only succeeded at the third shot. The wretches who were inside, seeing their roof burning, jumped out and ran off like mad.** (p. 77). “We went to Dacuc, where there was a market and a big crowd; we dropped a few bombs.” (p. 45). “Surrounded by a circle of fire about five thousand Abyssinians came to a sticky end. It was like hell; the smoke rose to incredible heights and the flames reddened the setting sun.** (p. 92). “After all, war is the most beautiful and perfect of all sports.”