NEVER A FAILURE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 January 1944, Page 3

NEVER A FAILURE

EIGHTH ARMY’S FINE RECORD

MONTGOMERY'S FAREWELL’ ♦ TO HIS SOLDIERS.

HISTORIC EVENTS RECALLED

(By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, January 3,

General Montgomery made his farewell address to members of the Eighth Army in the opera house of a little Italian town. Standing alone on the stage, he talked to his men for half an hour. There was a break in his voice when he said good-bye, and tears in his eyes when 2000 officers and men cheered in response to a call from Lieutenant-General Freyberg.

"I have probably been long enough with this army, and it is high time I moved on and somebody else came to give you new ideas and inspirations. I remember August last year, when I eanie to join the Eighth Army. Things weren’t good. Plans were actually being worked out to move army headquarters back to Cairo. It was clear that the army required a firm lead. The Eighth Army required somebody to say, ‘lf we are attacked we shall fight where we stand.’ Once that had been said there was no further trouble. You know what happened: the Eighth Army from that time never looked back. “I have heard the Press in England and elsewhere is commenting on the slowness of the campaign in Italy. There has been no slowness. This army landed' in Italy on. September 3, and by December 3 it had fought its way over 700 miles of country. I don’t call that slow.

“I am going to England. It is natural that I shall want some of our very experienced men. The Eighth Army is really the only experienced army we possess in the Empire. 1 feel now that we have to get battle experience spread over all the armies that are going to deal the knock-out blow.

‘■The first essential in war is the human factor, on which everything depends. I have never, since taking command of this army, issued a written order to my generals about operations. The command must be personal and must be verbal. How can the soldier know what is wanted of him unless he is told clearly and personally.” General Montgomery said that during the whole time he had commanded the Eighth Army he had had only two anxious moments. The first was on January 15, 1943, when he attacked Tripoli. “I knew that we must get there in; 10 days, otherwise it would be an awkward position from- the administrative viewpoint,” he said. “I knew that if the Germans could hold us we might have to go a long way back. I was slightly anxious for about one day in that battle, but we got to Tripoli in eight days.

“The second anxious occasion was when we left Tripoli and were advancing on the Mareth Line. Rommel about the same time was attacking the Americans at Gafsa. We had to do something. We were very weak and stretched when we reached the Mareth Line in March, and it was clear that Rommel was pulling out from the American front to attack us. We rushed up the New Zealand Divisionu, and I think the only thing that saved us was our air superiority. Rommel attacked us, and you know the result. “It was the only time we had to fight a defensive action after leaving El Alamein. It is interesting that everyone had forgotten how to fight a defensive battle. J even found generals looking up their textbooks.” General Montgomery concluded by reading a message to all the troops of the Eighth Army, in which he said he had been ordered to take command of the British armies in England that are to operate under General Eisenhower. “In all the battles we have fought together we have not had one single failure," he said. He asked the army to give his successor the same loyal and devoted service.