Nazis Plan Move in the West

Manawatu Times, Volume 66, Issue 196, 19 August 1941, Page 5

Nazis Plan Move in the West

SPANISH FORCES ON THE BORDER ROLE OF VICHY LONDON, Aug. 37. A massing of troops on and near the Spanish territory nearest to Gibraltar is reported by the Dally Telegraph’s special correspondent In the Western Mediterranean. Spanish troops in Morocco, he says, number not fewer than 250,000, and aro steadily increasing, with small reinforcements from Spain, possibly averaging 100, arriving each day. The Spanishborn troops are concentrated chiefly In the plains in the west of Spanish Morocco, and the native Moors are more numerous in the eastern mountains. The German advisers in Morocco are very discreet, little being seen of them. The two Panzer and three motorised divisions believed to be on the Pyrenees border of Spain have apparently not been increased recently, but they total not fewer than 100,000. The Germans boast that they could cross Spain to Gibraltar in 60 hours. Realisation of the German plans for eventual action on the Iberian Peninsula depends very much on the Spanish attitude, and also on events in French Morocco. The Germans are apparently not demanding immediate participation from Vichy, but slow infiltration cZ German units to important bases. It is significant that the German Armistice Commission has locked up French army material in Senegal with the evident intention of using it themselves A large-scale movement will probablv occur when the important bases are well soaked with Germans. The only active collaboration immediately required from the French will be naval. The French Navy is certainly the only body of Frenchmen ready to accept, if not welcome, war with Britain. Efficient units of the French Fleet are concentrated at Cstnblanca and Dakar.