INITIATIVE LOST

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 February 1943, Page 3

INITIATIVE LOST

ROMMEL STILL RETIRING TROOPS SUFFER HEAVY LOSSES. GERMANS CAUGHT IN AERIAL NUTCRACKER. (Received This Day, 11.40 a.m.) LONDON, February 26. The Allies are now in sight of Kasserine town from which the enemy are believed to have withdrawn as part of Rommels preparations for the Eighth Army s assault. Rommel’s forces still appear to be retreating towards Gafsa. They continue to suffer heavy losses. . The Germans at Alsta are in full ilight and in the Sbiba area the Allies are within nine mles of Sbeitla. . It is clear that Rommel has lost the initiative which he held after breaking out of Faid Pass. , , . The British United Press correspondent at Algiers says that the Germans in the Kasserine area were caught in an aerial nutcracker. They were harried from Tunisia and the Tripolitania troops who jumped from their lorries to escape the bombs were slaughtered as they lay on the ground by following waves of low-flying Allied fightThe closely co-operating British and Amercan air forces yesterday did vast damage behind the enemy lines. The Eighth Army’s patrols found tne Mareth line largely manned by Italians, who were without support from panzers. General Leclere is now south of Shottelherid which protects the Mareth line.