NOTES ON THE WAR

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 52, Issue 3261, 10 May 1943, Page 8

NOTES ON THE WAR

AIR POWER TELLING NOW ASCENDANCY OF ALLIES NORTH AFRICA AND RUSSIA Nothing is more striking in the news day by day than the evidence of the telling force of air power on all fronts, with the Allies now in growing ascendancy. In North Africa air power has contributed greatly all along to the success of the Allies and the same phenomenon is now apparent in Russia.

In Russia the salient feature of the prelude to the great battle, which must soon be joined as the ground dries up after the spring thaw, is the powerful offensive of the Red Air Force, helped materially by a notable accession of aircraft from Britain and America. Flying Fortresses are now doing some very effective bombing of the enemy’s rear communications. In the fierce air battle over the Kuban bridgehead which the Russians are winning Allied fighters are playing a part.

, Routes To Russia Some of these machines; ho doubt, will have come via the Arctic route through Murmansk, but the southern route from the Persian Gulf to the Caspian Sea, initiated in 1941 on the German invasion of Russia, is now in full swing and serving the Allies very effectively. Communications between the whole Middle East area and Russia have been greatly improved in the last two years.

From the Egyptian base, with its ports on the Suez Canal and at Alexandria, there is now a standard gauge railway connecting with the Turkish system and the frontier line that runs across to Mosul and northern Irak. From Mosul and Kirkuk there are now good roads to Tabriz, near the Russian frontier, and to the Caspian Sea. At one time the Trans-Iranian railway was the only feasible channel of communication from the Persian Gulf to the Caspian, but it has now been largely supplemented by a road system connecting Irak with Iran on the west and Iran with India to the southeast. Across Persia The difficulties with the railway, apart from the terrific grades encountered in the crossing of mountainous ranges, were the inadequacy of the terbiinal ports, Bandar Shah on the Caspian having been left high a'nd dry by the shrinkage of the Caspian waters and Bandar Sharpur on the Persian Gulf being far too small for heavy war traffic. The chief bottleneck is' still the Persian Gulf terminals, but these are being rapidly transformed. Many means of transport are used, from river steamers on the.. Tigris and Euphrates to great six-wheeled trucks ■over the road system. The railway from Quetta in Baluchistan, connecting with India, runs a short distance to Zanedan in East Persia (or Iran), and thence there is a lorry road across the Persian plateau to Uskabad, on the Russian railway running through Turkestan from Merv to the Caspian. Vehicles take six days to cover the 759 miles.

Andimeshk in southern Persia, about 90 miles north of Ahwaz, one of the Persian Gulf ports, is the chief distributing centre for the other four road routes, and has become a cosmopolitan boom town, with men from all over the world working to supply Russia with the material of war. Road transport is mainly controlled by the U.K.C.C. (United Kingdom Commercial Corporation), an organisation formed originally to fight the economic war against the Axis. It is obvious that this roundabout road to Russia, with its voyages from Britain and America * halfway round the world and its overland route to the Caspian taking another eight to ten days, is very much longer than the Arctic route to Murmansk, but it is also very much safer, and is open all the year round.

It also delivers more directly to the southern half of the Russian front, avoiding any clogging of Russian railway transport in the north. Incidentally, as time goes on, it may be found a convenient way for supplying China and thus helping, like the Alcan road across Canada to Alaska, in the war against Japan. >