THREAT TO TURKEY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 August 1941, Page 6

THREAT TO TURKEY

HITLER’S REPORTER INTENTION '• ATTEMPT TO REACH IRAQ THROUGH ANATOLIA. TROOPS MASSING IN THRACE. (Received This Day, 1.15 p.m.) LONDON, August 27. Hitler is believed to be contemplating a move to counter the An-glo-Russian march into Iran, reports the “Daily Mail's” Beirut correspondent. Germany obviously wants oil, whether from Iraq, Iran or the Caucasus. Russia’s stubborn defence, together with the ■ AngloRussian occupation of Iran, is rapidly barring all routes to the Germans, ■ who, gambling for high stakes, may consider the Iraq oil the easiest to get, by attacking across Turkey and Syria. Herr von Papen has returned to Ankara to confer with M. Saracoglu (Foreign Minister), while the Turkish Ambassador to Germany is reported io have been called to Hitlers eastern headquarters, after a lightning visit to Ankara. The Bulgarian troops massed on Turkey's European frontier are now being reinforced daily by Geiman troops and planes. The Germans have concentrated 10,000 parachutists a>. Salonika, and a German .admiral is stated to have arrived at Sofia to command large shipping concentrations at Varna and Burgas for the transport of troops and munitions. The concentration of a large .number of barges at the Island of Samos is also reported, while more than 10,000 German troops are believed to have gone there recently. Many Italian troops have arrived in Bulgarianoccupied parts of Greece and Yugoslavia, and more are supposed to have landed in Thrace. The correspondent adds that a military conference at Jerusalem surveyed all the possibilities, and that the steps taken and those to be taken should encourage the Turks to resist German demands, however forceful. The Vichy news agency says it is reported from Ankara that negotiations havd been completed under which Britain has agreed to place food orders! with Turkey totalling about £4,500,000.