Wairarapa Times-Age WEDNESDAY, JULY 1, 1942. DEFEAT EXTENDS IN EGYPT.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 July 1942, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age WEDNESDAY, JULY 1, 1942. DEFEAT EXTENDS IN EGYPT.

THERE is do reasonable standard by which the news which arrived from Egypt yesterday—news that the .British and Allied forces had withdrawn from Alersa Matruh and that the Axis invaders have entered upon another stage of their attempted drive to the Nile Delta and beyond it—can be regarded as anything else than exceedingly bad. At this momcnc, as the London “Times” has said, the thoughts of ad are with the men of the Eighth Army. In New Zealand our thoughts are even more poignantly with the men of our own Expeditionary borce, veterans, many of them, of Greece and Crete, who are now lighting once again on a stricken field. We know that the Axis invaders of Egypt will be withstood valiantly. What we do not yet know is whether our own men and their comrades are to be given the direct and indirect support that will enable' them ultimately to turn a British and Allied defeat into victory. One comfortable view—an all too comfortable view—that, has been taken of the existing situation in Egypt is.that Hitler and his gang in any case have missed the bus in that region and that the fate of the war can no longer be decided there, but will, be decided in Russia and .at sea. Though there may be an element of truth in these contentions, they constitute nevertheless something worse than wishful thinking. It is true, for example, that conflict is being waged on a far greater scale in Russia than in North Africa, but it is also true that the success or failure of Rommel’s drive into Egypt may go far to determine whether the Germans are or are not to gain a serious measure of success against the l Soviet armies during the remaining months of the northern summer. The campaign in North Africa has its vital bearing on the mighty struggle in progress on tlie Eastern front, particularly at Its southern end, as well as on the total position in and beyond the Mediterranean and possibly on the conflict in the Pacific as well. There is much to be said for the opinion expressed by the London “Daily Teelgraph” that: Operations that are to produce decisive relief of the pressure on Russia cannot be conducted at a distance, as convoys crawl, of 14,000 miles. They must be sited at a point or points where we, instead of the enemy, enjoy the advantage of interior lines—that is to say, somewhere within comparatively short striking distance of our own island base. However undimmed our faith in ultimate victory may be, it is the part of common sense to recognise that the position in Egypt is critical in much more than a local sense and that the outcome of the battle, or series of battles, now being fought must be expected to influence vitally at least the remaining duration of the war.