NIGHT ASSAULT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 24 July 1942, Page 4

NIGHT ASSAULT

NEW ZEALAND TROOPS ADVANCE UNDER HEAVY FIRE, OBJECTIVE REACHED AT DAWN. (Official War Correspondent, N.Z.E.F.) DESERT DIVISIONAL HEADQUARTERS, July 28. The New Zealanders gained their first objective, after fighting their way through fierce enemy resistance,' when the Eighth Army launched an attack in the central sector last night. They smashed their way through over two miles under heavy fire. Scattered enemy forces rallied, and counter-attacks were launched against the New Zealanders but they pushed on relentlessly. By dawn they had their objective. A dark pall of dust and smoke lies just to the north-west, over the area where, since early last night, the New Zealanders have been in fierce combat with the enemy. It is a major engagement against German panzer and light divisions —an engagement in which, reports this morning indicate, our troops are fighting sternly after an advance of about two miles. Strong resistance has been met from tanks and infantry. The advance has been made in a north-westerly direction, through an area which patrols on previous nights found unoccupied by the enemy. Last night the enemy was there in force, with tanks in close support. The thunder of artillery fire began before dusk, as every gun on our side shelled the enemy positions. Flash upon flash lighted the sky. When darkness fell distant spurts of flame were shooting high in the air as transport was hit. Overhead roared R.A.F. planes as they returned from their first task of the action—bombing the enemy forward concentrations. Machine-

gun fire traced a close pattern across the sky when the infantry moved forward, at about nine o clock. The fighting was hard almost all the way. It was not long before our troops were at close grips with the enemy infantry, which fell back before a determined bayonet attack. A strong coun-ter-attack was dealt with in a similar manner, but the enemy was far from being finished. Near the objective, one body of our troops encountered a large formation of tanks in a depression and engaged them with stick bombs and machine-gun fire The rattle of bullets against the sides oi the tanks could be heard and three were soon blazing. To the north-east, Indian and New Zealand engineers were working under heavy shell and mortar fire, clearing mines from a wide gap to allow armoured forces to come to our support. Our tanks were to be forward at dawn, and the engineers worked strenuously' in the darkness, searching for isolated mines which might hinder their advance* The infantry were fighting a confused battle for forward positions when our tanks arrived to engage the German armoured forces. Between occasional artillery exchanges this morning, the muffled roar of tank fighting drifted back toward our lines. After night artillery fire and bombing by the R.A.F., the hot, still morning is strangely quiet.