PURSUIT OF ENEMY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 February 1943, Page 3

PURSUIT OF ENEMY

OBSERVERS AMAZED AT CONTINUED PRESSURE. PERFECT BRITISH SUPPLY SYSTEM. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright! (Received This Day, 11.0 a.m.) NEW YORK, February 26. The New York “Sun’s” correspondent states that Washington military observers are astounded at General Montgomery’s amazing maintenance of the hot pursuit of thej Germans through the desert. It is now known that the British Mediterranean Fleet was the major decisive factor. The Afrika Korps necessarily chiefly relied on obtaining supplies across the desert from Tripoli under great difficulties, but the British Eighth Army, thanks to the magnificent work of the Royal Navy, was fed, watered and supplied as it advanced, the Navy working closely with General Montgomery. Mersa Matruh was a perfect example of how advantageously the British supply system worked, continued the correspondent. The dust of the retreating Axis had hardly settled before British ships arrived bringing ashore water and gasoline for the Eighth 1 Army’s advance guard. British tanks then drew up, refuelled and raced on without delay. This was repeated from port to port. At Tripoli for example supplies from the Navy arrived almost simultaneously with' the first British tanks clanking through the city streets.