BOMBING OF AKYAB

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25142, 5 February 1943, Page 5

BOMBING OF AKYAB

HEAVY ATTACKS ON JAPANESE

LONDON, Feb. 3,

“We have just given the Japanese troops defending Akyab a night they will always remember,” cabled the Daily Mail’s special correspondent, who’was aboard one of the planes on Monday night’s blitz on Akyab. From dusk to dawn heavy bombers plastered the island with tons of high explosives and incendiaries. >

One pilot remarked after the raid: “If we drop much more that island will sink. Fires were started on the island until it seemed that the whole of Akyab was alight. The Japanese must have gone to ground, because there was almost no flak. The weight of bombs dropped on Burma has been more than doubled in the last few months.”

An Indian joint communique states: “Yesterday four formations of R.A.F. Blenheims attacked the Japanese positions at Rathedaung and three other villages further south. Fighters followed the bombing ’with low-level machine-gun fire. Last night our aircraft attacked objectives on Akyab Island, including the anti-aircraft batteries at Fakir Point. None of our aircraft is missing.”