ACTION EXPECTED AT EL ALAMEIN

Southland Times, Issue 24822, 14 August 1942, Page 5

ACTION EXPECTED AT EL ALAMEIN

ROMMEL’S DIFFICULT COMMUNICATIONS

(Rec. 10.20 p.m.) LONDON, Aug. 12 The Cairo correspondent of The Times says the lull at El Alamem. has lasted for several weeks. Doubtless it is the calm before the storm. It is not to be expected that Field-Marshal Erwin Rommel will dally while the rich Nile Delta and Alexandria are almost within sight without making another determined effort.

The pause has been imposed on Field-Marshal Rommel by the necessity to bring up reinforcements and supplies over long and difficult communications. The Italians and Germans lost heavily in lorries in June and July and are husbanding their vehicles. They are making great use of barges and lighters, which, however, have been heavily punished by British and American bombers in their discharge ports, also while creeping along the coast. The explosions and fires nightly at Tobruk must greatly complicate the Axis supply problem. Recently captured German prisoners show that new drafts of either semitrained boys or men over 40 years of age have come from the garrisons of Greece and Crete.

A message from the Egyptian Desert says fighter pilots of the United States Air Force are operating there. They have been distributed among Royal Air Force fighter squadrons to learn desert flying. Field-Marshal Rommel has broadcast to the German people. He declared: “Our task is hard and we have had to make great sacrifices in this desert battle. Many of our comrades are no longer in our ranks. We have had to fight a difficult defensive battle after reaching the very gates of Egypt.”