NEARING AN END

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 August 1943, Page 3

NEARING AN END

THE STRUGGLE IN SICILY FURIOUS ALLIED AIR ATTACKS. ON ENEMY TRANSPORT ROUTES & ESCAPE PORTS. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) LONDON, August 8. There have been no Italian units on the Sicilian front since Friday. The enemy front is described as disjointed and the Axis position as deteriorating. The Eighth Army continues to advance on all sectors, and British troops are reported to have reached the region of Belpasso, on the southern slopes of Mt. Etna. Italian troops at Biancavilla, on the southern slopes of Mt. Etna, following upon heavy air raids on Friday, appeared waving white sheets, and they surrendered the town to the Eighth Army a few minutes after the last bombs fell.

The Algiers radio says that the Germans are reported to have abandoned all their defensive positions south of Mt. Etna, and no traffic has been observed on the roads there in the last 24 hours.

Allied air forces, striking from bases within a few minutes of the battle zone, are increasing their attacks to the tempo of the closing weeks of the Tunisian campaign. The blitz against the Axis evacuation route in Sicily has surpassed in concentration allying yet attempted by the Allied air forces during the whole of the campaign, says the Associated Press correspondent at the Allied head-quarters in North Africa. MESSINA LAID WASTE. The Allied air fleets laid waste the escape port of Messina in round-the-clock attacks, and Flying Fortresses, Wellingtons, Marauders and Mitchells pulverised the roads leading to evacuation beaches and other points opposite the Italian mainland. Mitchells and Bostons rained explosives on Aderno, Bronte and Randazzo, and relays of many types of plane strafed the roads and bombed the enemy positions round Mt. Etna.

Later reports from the Mt. Etna region indicate that the Germans are still retreating toward Messina under cover of fierce rearguard actions. Reuter's correspondent, attached to the advanced Allied head-quarters suggests that the struggle for Sicily is fast drawing to a close. Pilots returning from patrols believe that the Germans are making great efforts to save as much of their remaining equipment as possible. They state that the Germans are using steel craft like the landing-barges in which we invaded Sicily, and also that the enemy barges have been seen moving westward piled high with deck cargo, some of which is thought to be motor transport. This traffic between Sicily and Italy is believed to be busier during darkness, when the enemy stands a better chance of evading the air patrols. Reuter’s Algiers correspondent says that the Germans retreating toward Messina are fighting fiercely without the Italians, who have been withdrawn from the front because the Germans feared that mass surrenders would disorganise the defence. Our experienced pilots of the Desert Air Force are hammering Axis convoys jumbled bonnet to tail, winding along the mountain reads leading north-eastward from Mt. Etna.

The Navy is still shelling the eastern coast road. An American naval force on Thursday occupied Ustica Island, 40 miles north-west of Palermo, says Reuter’s Algiers correspondent. The Algiers radio says it is officially announced that the Seventh and Eighth Armies have taken 125,000 prisoners in the Sicilian campaign.

ITALIAN RAILWAYS

CUT BY ALLIED AIR ATTACKS. KEY JUNCTIONS OUT OF ACTION. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, August 7. Photographic reconnaissance shows that Allied precision raids against key railway junctions in Italy have cut all the major arteries of the railway system feeding the southern half of the country. It is unlikely that more than a very small trickle of traffic is getting through. The latest photographs show the thoroughness of the destruction to all

the main and most of the secondary north-south lines. The important junction of Bologna is not in action. No traffic has passed through the Vittoria yards at Rome since the recent shattering raid. All lines near Foggia are cut. It was previously possible to bypass Naples through Foggia. The destruction of the Salerno and Battipaglia junctions has corked the bottleneck southward. The Messina and San Giovanni railheads are also out of action.