ATTACK BY AIR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 September 1940, Page 2

ATTACK BY AIR

NO CHANGE IN BRITISH POLICY SELECTION OF MILITARY OBJECTIVES. REPRISALS REGARDED AS UNPROFITABLE. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, September 9. It can be plainly stated that the British Air Ministry’s general policy is still to attack military objectives, and. so far as is possible, not to bomb civilians indiscriminately. It is felt that by this means the road to victory will be more certain than by haphazard attacks upon the civilian populations. The Air Ministry also points out that reprisals is a very foolish strategic principle on which to carry out operations. The entire force of German propaganda, on the other hand, is shouting that the raids on London are reprisals and revenge for British raids. Day by day, the accumulated effect of those raids on Germany is mounting. Referring to the R.A.F. attacks on military objectives, a London commentator said their aim was the systematic destruction of the German war machine. He drew a distinction between self-contained Germany and Great Britain and said that to destroy British war supplies Germany would have to bomb almost every corner of the world if she were to destroy Britain’s war effort. For instance, to destroy the oil supply she would have to bomb Trinidad, Irak and Texas, and that she could not do. GERMAN VULNERABILITY German, on the other hand, had built herself up to defy the blockade by getting oil from coal. These factories had been attacked with determination by aircraft of the Bomber Command, and in many of them there had been a substantial reduction in output. Also, many stores of oil and motor spirit had become targets of the British bombers. Further, such crude oil as Germany could import from Rumania and Russia must be refined, and refineries had come under attack. Such attacks might be less spectacular than scattering bombs on London, but they were far more deadly, and they had been going on nightly since May. Distilled oil and other material had to be distributed to the points where it was most needed, and here again Continental railroads offered some splendid targets from the air. The commentator instanced the marshalling yards at Hamm, about three miles long and half a mile wide, where supplies were assembled and distributed over a wide area, and stressed how these yards had been a constant target for the R.A.F. The slightest breakdown in the intricacies of a railway system had far-reaching effects irrespective of whether the breakdown affected passenger trains or goods traffic. The vital point of a railroad was often an isolated point and not the big glass roof of a railway station. ' The commentator also referred to the Leipzig fair —or Leipzig fiasco, as he called it—and said that while German broadcasters had been crying out that it had been a record, it was only when foreign visitors had reached London that it had become known that the fair had closed down early. AN UNGUARDED ADMISSION.

Referring to the German propaganda for home consumption, the commentator said that occasionally an indiscretion crept in. He quoted from a Berlin report on Stock Exchange dealings in which it was stated that the weakness of the Stock Exchange was largely due to the absence of orders from northwest Germany, where air-raids had caused most acute dislocation and inconvenience to business. It was also interesting, he said, to hear that people had left north-west Germany, not for the central or other districts, but for Belgium and even occupied France, and there was further information to the effect that those who had withdrawn were party officials, army officers, and business men; in other words, they were those who were in a position to get out. Their withdrawal had not been made public. All schools in north-west Germany had been closed, and one was glad to hear that many of the children had been evacuated to Austria. It could not be stated too often, the commentator said, that indiscriminate bombing could never decide the issue of the war. In the case of Germany the systematic destruction of the measures she had built for the war would be one of the factors in her defeat, and it was that systematic destruction that the R.A.F. was achieving night after night.