ALL-OUT OFFENSIVE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 86, Issue 306, 29 December 1942, Page 5

ALL-OUT OFFENSIVE

U.S. AIR FORCE IN BRITAIN PREPARATIONS BEING MADE (By Telegraph—Press i.tlon—Copyright) London, Dec. 27. “A powerful United States air force based on Britain is preparing for an all-out offensive against the Axis,” said .Major-General J. F. Miller, commanding the United States Air Force Service Command. “We will be ready to accomplish our offensive within a very brief period. “Aircraft and supplies of all kinds are pouring into Britain, and completely equipped American air units are now concentrated at. strategic points throughout the country. Our ccynbat units are already doing a magnificent job over Europe, as they eventually will over Germany.” Aviation correspondents believw that unless the Germans check the present rate of losses the Luftwaffe will soon be crippled. It is engaged on a major scale on two fronts—in Russia and the Mediterranean— on which 60 per cent, of its first-line strength is concentrated. Many nightfighters have to be kept, in Germany, and many more day and night-fighters have to remain in France, Belgium and Holland. The journal Aproplan? assesses tht German losses at 2500 planes a month, which production is not replacing. It says: “The more the Luftwaffe is made to fight the more rapidly will the point be reached when further stretching means breaking. Appearances suggest that the greater proportion of the German fighter strength is engaged against the R.A.F. and the United States ‘ air force, and the greater proportion of the bombers against Russia, but let us not rejoice too soon, despite these encouraging signs, for our own resources are extended to the utmost, and more planej are the most pressing demand.”