AIR DRIVE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 12 August 1942, Page 3

AIR DRIVE

CONTINUED IN EGYPT AGAINST AXIS TRANSPORT & BASES. ANOTHER BARGE SUNK OFF COAST. LONDON, August 11. Patrol activity are the only land operations reported on the Egyptian battlefront. Aircraft are keeping up a • strong drive against enemy supplies, encampments and land transport. A barge was sunk off the coast and another was damaged. CLASH IN PROSPECT AMERICAN TANKS READY TO GO IN. WHEN THE GONG SOUNDS. LONDON, August 10. The lull in land fighting in Egypt continues, but increased artillery activity points to a renewal of large-scale action. The air war has livened up. Rommel has thrown in fresh reinforcements and the R.A.F. countered with a non-stop day and night offensive against advanced Axis aerodromes, American armoured units assigned to the various British reserve regiments are ready to go in when the gong sounds for the next round. The Cairo correspondent of the “Daily Express” says Rommel has been using the period of watchful waiting to strengthen his defences and acclimatise his reinforcements. The Afrika Korps is particularly short of infantry, the Italians being reinforced with convicts reprieved on condition' that they fight in Africa. General de Gaulle reviewed the Fighting French force at their headquarters in the desert and decorated officers and men who held up Rommel’s push at Bir Hacheim. The march-past was most impressive. It included tanks and armoured cars. Pills which the Nazis claim to give pep to panzer troops and which were taken from captured Germans in the Middle East have been analysed in London. They were found to consist of low-grade sugar, unequal to the boiled sweets which form part of the daily ration of the British troops. KILLED IN ACTION NOTED BRITISH GENERAL. LONDON, August 10. The “Daily Telegraph” says that Lieutenant-General W. H. Gott has been killed in action in Libya. General Gott, who was known as “Strafer,” was 45 years of age, and one of the youngest generals in the British Army. He commanded the 7th Armoured Division, and probably knew’ more about the Western Desert than any other senior British officer, BACK IN HARNESS GENERAL FREYBERG RESUMES DUTY. LONDON, August 10, General Freyberg, who was wounded in the neck at Mersa Matruh, is reported to be back with his men. Fie refused to remain convalescent any longer.