“SIGS”

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 October 1941, Page 3

“SIGS”

maintaining communications CONDITIONS IN DESERT WARFARE. (N.Z.E.F. Official News Service). CAIRO, September 6. The work of signallers in establishing and maintaining communication between units in the field is highly important during action. Upon the speedy and accurate transmission of a message or an order may depend the success of a large-scale operation.

This was borne out in the recent manoeuvres of a New Zealand infantry brigade, when signallers were given practical experience of desert conditions in relation to their particular job. Signal personnel were kept very busy for a few days while infantry and cavalry attacks were carried out with the support of artillery. Wireless telephone communication was used extensively, but cables were laid to units which were likely to be stationery for any length of time. A signalman requires to be particularly fit and able to carry on his work under conditions of extreme heat and dust. Infantry attacked and captured a ridge, and while they were still consolidating their position cables were laid from each unit to Brigade Headquarters some miles away. Riding in trucks which lurched and jolted over the rocky uneven surface of the desert, the linesmen worked at high pressure in a blazing sun to make complete the system of communication for the whole of the brigade.

Signal headquarters are established near Brigade Headquarters, and a constant stream of messages is received by telephone and radio. A runner is always waiting at the side of the operator to rush the message to the brigade staff. A hard-worked, dust-covered group of men in the desert are the despatch riders. Roaring over rocky ground or through soft sand in a swirl of dust, these men perform amazing feats of motor cycling as part of their daily work. The motor cycle slithers and slides and jolts and bounces, but the Don-Ar has no time to consider his personal comfort. Helmeted and goggled, he holds the cycle to its course with steel-like arms, using his feet like a speedway rider to check slides in the loose surface.

All this high-pressure, sometimes hectic, activity of signals units contributes largely to the smooth co-ordina-tion of troop and transport movements. The recent manoeuvres gave ample opportunity for practical experience in the use of communications in desert warfare, and the New Zealand signallers proved themselves equal to every occasion.