SERIES OF TOWNS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 July 1943, Page 3

SERIES OF TOWNS

TAKEN BY AMERICANS REPORTS OF ENEMY WITHDRAWAL FROM NORTH-EASTERN TIP. CANADIANS & EIGHTH ARMY JOIN HANDS. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, July 25. The Americans have occupied Trapani, Termini and Castelvetrano. This consolidates the isolation of what Algiers radio estimates to be practically three Axis divisions in the western tip of Sicily. All the enemy’s activity is now concentrated in a triangle, with a front joughly running from San Stefano and to Regalbuto and then to Catania. “Axis forces 'nave begun an evacuation from the north-eastern tip of Sicily. We will soon hear great news from the Sicilian battlefront,” stated Cairo radio yesterday “The Americans at present are speeding eastward from Palermo and have severed the northern coastal road. The Canadians, driving from Enna, have joined up with the Eighth Army on the Catanian plain.” Reuter’s correspondent in Sicily says that the Americans occupied Trapani, Termini and Castelvetranto on Friday. Trapani has a natural, sheltered harbour. Its great salt works supply the whole island. Termini has also a natural harbour, and Castelvetranto has the largest airfield in Sicily. The Canadian troops pushing on beyond Enna have now swung eastwards and linked up with the Eighth Army south of Catania, according to Algiers radio. The Canadians are struggling through hilly country under great heat. The “Exchange Telegraph” agency says that the enemy unavailingly flung in new troops and tanks against the Canadians in a series of counter-attacks in an effort to hold them up. Roads and defiles have been heavily torn up with craters, but these only temporarily delayed the Canadians, who smashed many enemy strongpoints. One German battalion opposing the Canadians suffered 350 casualties and another battalion 300. The Rome radio, in claiming the sinking of a steamer, suggests new Allied landings behind the Axis positions in Catania. “Italian planes off Acrieale, eight miles north of Catania, sank an 8000-ton enemy steamer, which was assisting numerous landing barges,” the radio said. When the round-up of the prisoners taken at Palermo is completed, the Italian Army in Sicily can be regarded as having packed up, because the Italians acquire a large-scale habit of demobilising themselves. Occupied towns are full of young men of military age, apparently quite fit, wearing mufti and apparently without jobs. The Algiers radio says that the Axis High Command has decided not to defend central Italy in the event of invasion. This, it is reported, was decided, following the meeting between Hitler and Mussolini. The Axis intends to make a stand on the River Po, defending north Italy. The Italian Government would-be transferred to Milan. According to an estimate quoted by an agency war correspondent at the Allied force headquarters, Axis prisoners lin Sicily number at least 110,000. .* -

3,000,000 MEN CALLED IN MOBILISATION LONDON. July 24. An Italian War Ministry decree mobilises all men born between 1907 and 1922, inclusive, numbering approximately 3,000,000. This makes the total fighting forces on the Italian mainland 6,000,000, if sufficient equipment is available. Semi-official Rome sources intimate that the equipment might come from Germany under an agreement reached by Hitler and Mussolini at their recent meeting.