EVE OF CONFLICT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 29 June 1942, Page 3

EVE OF CONFLICT

ANTICIPATION OF SAVAGE STRUGGLE GREAT ISSUES AT STAKE. BRITISH TOMMIES SILENT BUT SURE. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) LONDON, June 27. Field-Marshal Rommel’s forces are halted well west of the outer defences of Mersa Matruh, according to an agency correspondent with the Libyan forces. Concentration of all modern arms, says this correspondent, is still going on, and tanks and aircraft are being got ready for what is expected to be a savage battle to the finish. The fight will end only wjth the destruction of Rommel’s forces or with their presence on an open road leading to the Nile Delta.

The correspondent adds, “On our side the most encouraging sight for weeks on the road leading to the front line has been lorries of all kinds carrying new arms and ammunition to the British Tommies, who, as always on the eve of battle, are cool, collected and sure of themselves. They know what the Germans are and what the fight will be, and they fully realise their responsibility. They are silent but sure.”

The correspondent declares that there is increased confidence that our army is not as weak as might have been, expected after the fall of Tobruk/which has not yet been seriously used as a supply port. Rommel is making great efforts to get supplies through to Benghazi. The “Daily Mail’s” Cairo correspondent says: “It is true enoughRommel’s army is still formidable, but he has to decide whether it is formidable enough to go in baldheaded against our prepared positions at the end of a 150-mile march.” The Cairi) correspondent of “The Times” says there is no information of Rommel attempting the intensely difficult southern crossing of the desert which, if accomplished, would land him somewhere in the Nile Delta. One small column advanced in a slightly southerly direction, but was turned back with heavy losses.