ALLIES LOSE NO SHIPS

Southland Times, Issue 25703, 12 July 1943, Page 5

ALLIES LOSE NO SHIPS

Landing Operations (Rec. 8.45 p.m.) LONDON, July 11. All the Allied landings are successful and the troops are advancing, says the Algiers correspondent of the Associated Press. Reuter’s correspondent at Allied North Africa headquarters says the Allied assault forces completed their initial landings in Sicily withput the loss of a single ship. The vessels completed their hazardous mission without meeting submarine or other attacks. ■ It is announced officially that the German troops in Sicily have been reinforced. Numerically they are only a fraction of the total forces, but they form a valuable stiffening for the Italians.

The British United Press Madrid correspondent, quoting French reports, says the Allied troops, overrunning Sicily’s coastal defences, are in close contact with Axis troops beyond the plain between Syracuse and Catania. Reuter’s Algiers correspondent says the huge Allied force landed on the beaches of Sicily without serious loss. Swarms of fighters from the NorthWest African Air Force patrolled the beaches while ground troops disembarked and met negligible fighter opposition. Hundreds of planes kept up a mammoth assault all day on Saturday against Sicily’s airfields and communications, particularly the vital, strategic airfield network of Gerbini. According to the Stockholm newspaper Tidningen's Berlin correspondent

Italian circles say the Allies landed at seven points in Sicily. German military quarters declare that the invasion of Sicily is the “greatest and most daring undertaking in the history of war. FLEET IN ACTION The awe-inspiring sight of the battle fleet in action is described by a bomber pilot who returned from plastering aerodromes in Sicily. The whole battle fleet was lined up in battle order in the Mediterranean, ’ he said. “They stood out like a big group of islands. The battleships all opened fire just after he had passed them. It sounded like a volcano eruption. There must have been 40 miles of boats of all sizes. Sicily’s coast and the sea were black with them. It looked like 1,000,000 flies as our boys poured ashore.”

An air of caution prevails in Washington until the fighting develops further, because 300,000 Axis troops are massed in Sicily. However, military experts stated that these forces will be heavily outnumbered when all the Allied forces go ashore. The New York Times says the American sth Army, commanded by Lieuten-ant-General Mark Clark, is participating in the attack, while British and Canadian troops probably outnumber the Americans. News of the landing was received with enthusiasm in all parts of the United Nations. Thousands thronged the streets of Valetta listening to loud-speakers for the latest news flashes. The Maltese regard the Italians’ predicament as recompense for what Malta suffered from Axis bombs. ITALIAN FLEET DAMAGED - (Rec. 8.40 p.m.) LONDON, July 11. Latest estimates of the Italian Fleet show that there are three new Littorio class battleships, which are reported to be off north-west Italy, also four refitted Cavour class vessels, which are reported to be east of the Straits of Messina. One of these was severely damaged at Taranto and was probably put out of action. There are also two. eight-inch gun cruisers, which have been damaged and probably put out of action, about six light cruisers, less than 50 destroyers and 40 or 50 submarines and a large number of E-boats. The Sunday Times, in a leading article on Sicily, says: “It is well to recognize that the operations which have now started are most difficult and most hazardous. The necessary preparations by prolonged air attacks gave the enemy ample notice of our intention. The powerful Axis forces, German as well as Italian, may ' be expected to make a resolute resistance and, well placed and led, they have obvious advantages against forces landing from the sea. We, on the other hand, have superiority in the air and the Allied fleets are now supreme in the Mediterranean., There is full confidence in all areas of the Allied services engaged in this great enterprise. If, as is not unlikely, they encounter mischances and setbacks, we shall not count it against them. They are on the road to victory.” The expected news has come at last. “It is a remarkable achievement,” said Lieutenant-General Sir Douglas Brownrigg, in The Evening News. “There is nothing surprising in the place chosen for the first landing. Its proximity to Malta and the North African mainland has always made Sicily the most likely landing-place to feel the first tread of Allied feet. Sicily offered the best facilities because, first, our North Afri-can-based bombers could bomb every inch of the island and destroy aerodromes and planes on the ground and thus neutralize any counter-action which might be taken by the Axis shore-based fighter planes against our ships as they crossed the narrow waters and our troops as they went ashore and, second, because even if the action of the bombers was insufficient entirely to neutralize the hostile air defence our own North African single-seater fighters were still close enough to provide umbrellas over the landing places. The scale of resistance will prove whether the time spent in preparation has been worthwhile.”