NAVAL WATCH

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 April 1943, Page 4

NAVAL WATCH

NO SIGN OF PREPARATION.

FOR ENEMY EVACUATION BY SEA.

(Received This Day, Noon.) LONDON, April 20.

A British United Press correspondent with the British fleet east of Tunisia says a naval reconnaissance revealed no signs of any large concentration of Axis shipping for the evacuation of forces from Tunisia. “A majority of the officers with whom I have spoken,” he said, “consider that Rommel will use only planes. The belief is growing that when the key personnel have been evacuated the remainder of the Afrika Korps will be left to fight for a while and then surrender. Nevertheless the fleet is prepared for a possible evacuation by sea, even on a minor scale.”

General Montgomery, flying in his own Flying Fortress, visited the Allied headquarters yesterday and met General Eisenhower and other Allied chiefs.

An artillery expert in Cairo has revealed that the destructive power of British artillery will soon be considerably increased, with the use of a powerful explosive. The British are ahead of the Axis in one particular shell with which British guns definitely got the upper hand of enemy tanks in recent 'desert operations. Saying that the German tanks will soon be in a position similar to that of cavalry troops at the end of the last war, he added that the present six-pounder shell pierced everything.