Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1941. ANOTHER GREAT VICTORY.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 February 1941, Page 4

Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1941. ANOTHER GREAT VICTORY.

XEW and most impressive demonstrate]) of the power and effect of the British Imperial offensive in Libya and of the collapse of Italian resistance has been given in the swilt capture of Benghazi. This to all intents and purposes completes the conquest of Cyrenaica and means ihat the remnants of Marshal Graziani’s army must retreat into the western extremity oi Libya round Tripoli. All hough it has been eifecten with a speed that could hardly have been anticipated, the capture of Benghazi does not come altogether as a surprise. Had the enemy been capable of defending any considerable part of Cyrenaica, strong and stubborn resistance to the British advance necessarily would have been made in the hill country well to the eastward of Benghazi, Yesterday’s news, however, showed that the Imperial forces were making rapid and unimpeded progress through that territory and were being welcomed heartily by the Italian settlers. It is clear that the powerful and unrelenting pressure of British land, sea and air forces, collaborating admirably, made an organised defensive stand by the enemy impossible. At Benghazi itself, the Italians would have been fighting with hundreds of miles of desert country, traversed only by the coastal highway, almost immediately in their rear. The completeness of the final collapse may thus easily be accounted for. At an immediate view and in its hearing on the outlook in the Balkans and elsewhere, the victory gained by the forces under General Sir A. Waved’s command is immensely important. An end has been made decisively of any question of a land approach by the enemy to Egypt and rhe Suez ('anal. Any thought of an attempt by the Italians, even if they were assisted and strengthened by German air ami other forces, to retrieve the position in North Africa is hardly to be entertained. The only military approach to Cyrenaica from Western Libya is by rhe coastal highway, through hundreds of miles of desert. Apart from being insupportable long, the enemy communications would thus be exposed throughout their length io British naval and air attack. The achievements of the lmperi.il forces in Libya must be regarded as opening the way in a highly important degree to further British offensive action in other parts of the Mediterranean regions.