GUNS AND AIRCRAFT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 September 1939, Page 7

GUNS AND AIRCRAFT

active on the western front Smashing Attack on Siegfried Line WAY CLEARED FOR SLOW BUT SURE ADVANCE FRENCH DRIVING PIGS OVER MINED AREAS (By Telegraph. —Press Association. —Copyright.) NEW YORK, September 26. The Paris correspondent of the “New York Times” says that "tinners and aviators are most active on the Western Front. French heavy artillery in the Saarbrucken and Zweibrucken sectors have continued to pound the first zone of the West Wall. The German artillery;persisted in’ replying southeast of Zweibrucken, where they have been concentrating their fire for several days. French reconnaissance planes are giving the correct range for the guns and photograph the damage after the shells fall. German fighters strive to drive them back, whereupon French pursuit planes go into action. The pounding of the West Wall is likely to continue for a long time. Most of the Maginot Line is sunken and the West Wall is mostly superstructure; the West Wall, therefore is a better target for the French guns engaged in razing these superstructures, but it does not necessarily follow that when they are levelled there will be a mass advance. It was learned in the Great War that the intensity of artillery fire warned the enemy of an intention to advance, permitting them to bring up reserves behind the threatened sector. Both France and Britain have declared against rash offensives, and it is generally agreed that a storming of the West Wall would now come within that definition. Continuation of the present cautious tactics is therefore likely. So far the artillery action has been to conquer the ground for an infantry advance to occupy. After a lull for digging-in the process is repeated. It is slow but sure, and, above all, economical of troops. The Germans are striving to break that rhythm of progression by activity elsewhere, and today they are extending their heavy artillery fire to the region of the east bank of the River Lanier. The Swiss correspondent of the “New York Times” reports that in the past four days the French have herded hundreds of pigs to a depth of two miles over mined sections of the German territory near the Luxemburg border, exploding the mines without endangering human lives, after which infantry occupied the ground.