NAZI THREAT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 6 September 1941, Page 5

NAZI THREAT

PREPARATIONS IN BLACK SEA FLEET BEING BUILT UP. MENACE TO CAUCASUS AND TURKEY. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) LONDON, September 4. Admiral Raeder is building up a new German navy in the Black Sea, first, for action against the Soviet and later, perhaps, against the Turks, says the foreign editor of the “Daily Express.” The basis of the new fleet is 17 Bulgarian warships, which will be manned by Germans sailors, 26 German U-boats, which are already in Rumanian ports, and a number of E-boats, which have been sent down the Danube or through the Dardanelles. Constanta will be built up as a naval base, and the whole of the Danube delta between Rumania and Bulgaria will be used as a shelter for warships. Dredgers have already been sent to the Danube city of Galati to clear a passage for ships of up to 15,000 tons, which thus will be enabled to steam inland and escape the enemy’s attention. The ports of Varna and Bursas will next be extended at Germany’s cost for a venture which may suddenly strike right across the Black Sea at the Soviet oil port of Batum or may be used to take Turkey's Dardanelles defences from the rear.