WEST AFRICA IN THE WAR.

Evening Star, Issue 24327, 16 October 1942, Page 2

WEST AFRICA IN THE WAR.

For many months a strong atmosphere of expectancy has hovered over AA’cst Africa. Military developments were thought to •be in the air, and British garrisons, in all arms of the services, were strengthened. The military picture is largely governed by the situation in A 7 ichy Africa, which, from Dakar in the north, lies like a huge hand with the fingers of the Ivory Coast and Dahomey stretched out between Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, and Nigeria. It is Dakar, the strategic French port, that is the centre of most of the rumours and speculations. The Ger- , man radio last month accused the United States of plotting an attack on the French colony, at the same time denying reports that Germany had asked France for tho use of bases in Dakar and Casablanca. Such reports bring into bolder relief the fact that since Brazil entered the war on the Allied side the importance of the African AVest Coast has greatly increased. And now signs of the increasing tension can be recognised in a cablegram which stated that Spanish diplomatic circles expect a change in the status quo of French AVest Africa within forty-eight hours. The German-controlled Swedish Telegraph Agency reported that British and American troops were concentrated on the frontiers of Gambia and Senegal, and that a large Allied convoy was seen off Dakar. In recent months the United Nations have perhaps been less eager to occupy Dakar than to prevent the Axis forces from establishing themselves there and developing a strategic base. It is realised that, while seizure of this port would strengthen the Allied position in the South Atlantic and help to protect the sea lanes to the Middle East and India, it would be a costly enterprise, which most likely would not achieve the more immediate object of diverting the enemy’s attention from Russia and bolstering Allied defence of the Middle East. It might also have the effect of throwing Viphy entirely into the Nazi orbit. It is therefore probable that the present position of Dakar will not be fundamentally changed in the future unless Nazi infiltration reaches the point at which the base becopies dangerously aggressive and the interests of Brazil are seriously threatened. The Allied land garrisons and sea and air patrols may as long as possible remain content with keeping watch over the Atlantic sea lanes.