BOMBERS AND TROOPS

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 3, Issue 205, 28 August 1940, Page 3

BOMBERS AND TROOPS

EXPERIENCE IN FRANCE One point in the Prime Minister's speech appears to require elucidation, wrote Brigadier-General John Charteris in the Manchester Guardian on June 20. He mentioned the figure 25 as the number of Allied divisions, which, owing to the disaster in Flanders, were lost to the Allies in the culminating phases of the great battle for France. He did not explain how he arrived at this figure, and in some quarters he was considered to be referring only to British divisions. The figure included both the nine divisions of the Expeditionary Force and the 16 French divisions which were cut off with them in Flanders and could not be re-formed in time to take part in the final battle. With the possibility of operations taking place.in our own country all information that can be derived from. those who have been through the fighting in France becomes important. Officers who have experience both of this and of previous campaigns point out that bombing from aeroplanes is far less effective against troops in the open held than the former bombardment by field guns and heavy artillery. The amount of metal ,that can be carried by aeroplanes is much less than that discharged in the barrages of the previons war. Although the noise of the bombs is : terrific and has sometimes a numbering effect, atcual casualties are small. Machine gunning from low-lying aeroplanes can by all accounts be -successfully countered by machinegun fire from the ground. Both officers and men urge that adequate overhead protection for the gunners on the ground shall be provided by means of an armoured shield. Similarly, artillery officers point out that the existing shield provided ( with field guns could be readily improved by altering'the angle at which it is fixed so as to give better protection against low-flying aeroplanes. It is heartening to hear assurances that the German tank is vulnerable both to anti-tank gunfire and to field-guns.