SOMAULAND CAMPAIGN

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23739, 20 August 1940, Page 6

SOMAULAND CAMPAIGN

With characteristic caution (or cowardice), Italy delayed launching her campaign against British Somaliland until she felt assured that the French in the neighbouring colony would observe the terms of Marshal Petain's capitulation. The attitude of the Djibouti authorities remained in doubt for some time, but toward the end of last month they admitted the Italian Armistice Commission. That meant the demilitarisation of the French Somaliland forces and the gravest dislocation of the joint Allied plans for*defence and offence. The balance was at a stroke heavily tipped against the British. From leading the Italian posts on the Abyssinian frontier a lively dance, the British were suddenly placed on the defensive, facing overwhelming odds. Normally the British garrison in Somaliland comprises the Camel Corps (largely mechanised), of 405 officers and men. No doubt it would be reinforced as the threat of hostilities grew, but the French defection was hardly a contingency thatv could be anticipated and provided for. In the circumstances the best policy has been followed. It would be impossible with the available forces to defend the whole of a country one and a-half times the area of the North Island. The British forces were therefore concentrated in an attempt to cover Berbera, the capital and only good port. In falling back on the capital, they are making the enemy pay for his ' advance by inflicting heavy losses. The Italians admit they are on a gigantic cattle thieving expedition and they also flatter themselves that they will gain prestige from a patently ingloiious forav. Their further claim that occupation of the whole Somali coast would enable them to close the Red Sea cannot be sustained while British sea power remains supreme in the Gulf of Aden and at Suez.