ALL-OUT ASSAULT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25801, 23 March 1945, Page 5

ALL-OUT ASSAULT

AERIAL ARMADA NORTH GERMAN PLAIN BEYOND MONTGOMERY’S FRONT ißec. 11.10 p.m.) LONDON, Mar. 22. An all-out assault against targetsin the North German plain opposite Field-marshal Montgomery’s army group is being maintained by the tactical air forces. All yesterday, last night, and again early this morning Allied aircraft have been swarming over the Reich from Holland to the Saar, hammering one military objective after another. Front-line “ hedgehog ' towns guarding the approaches from the Rhine to Bremen and Hanover, marshalling yards of the entire North German plain, and a great group of Luftwaffe airfields north and north-east of the Ruhr are in flames and covered with pails of smoke rising, in some cases, 10,000 feet, stated Reuter’s correspondent with the Tactical Air Force. The unrelenting allout assault by the British and American tactical air forces against German front-line targets -from the Ruhr to Holland yesterday has been stepped up with powerful assistance from R.A.F. Bomber Command and and Ninth American Army Air Forces. Ceaseless Raids Ceaseless raids, which started at the first light, were concentrated at first against German river front defences facing the American Ninth Army. Medium bombers .from the Ninth American Air Force, escorted by British fighters, fought through a cordon of flak to pound the key communications centres of Koesfeld and Dulmen, both about 30 miles northeast of Wesel. Tactical Air Force medium bombers started numerous fires, many of which were oil blazes in the marshalling yards' at Bocholt, 12 miles north of Wesel, while fighterbombers went inflow to demolish one train and many railway trucks in the strategic centre of Winterswijk at the approaches to areas from which Vbombs are launched. Simultaneously medium bombers and rocket-firing planes were over Dorstein, Isselburg, Anholt. Bocholt. and Haltern, pounding railway yards to rubble and reducing roads to stretches of closely knit craters. German Airfields Attacked

The American Air Force struck at nine German airfields, including jet plane bases with 1100 heavy bombers of a total of 1300 engaged yesterday morning. Almost simultaneously other heavy bombers attacked Plauen, south of Leipzig, which is turning out tanks and other armament. Seven hundred Mustangs accompanied the total force of heavies. They shot down at least nine jet planes in combat and destroyed at least 40 planes mostly of other types, in ground strafing attacks. Airfields attacked were in an area in north-west Germany between Wilhelmshaven, Bremen, Munster and the Dutch border. Some airfields received a “ one-two-three punch.” After Fortresses dropped bombs from a normal height, escorting fighters armed with fragmentation bombs dived to a low altitude to cover the dispersal an a and then lower still to attack planes on the ground which had been missed in the first two attacks. A colonel who is a veteran combat pilot and now director of bombers on General Doolittle’s staff, said the attacks were designed to check the recently accelerated activities of jet planes against both air and ground forces. Another officer said: “The Jerries had some very fine dummies at one end of the field, but they did not fool us. We searched for planes parked in woods and made a mess of them.”