NAZI FABLES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 18 August 1943, Page 4

NAZI FABLES

AND FOOLISH BOMBAST REGARDING WITHDRAWAL FROM SICILY. ATTEMPT TO MAKE TRIUMPH OUT OF DISASTER. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) (Received This Day, 10.55 a.m.) LONDON, August 17. The Germans claim that all their forces were evacuated from Sicily. A special German High Command communique states: “The evacution of the island has been progressing according to plan for the last fortnight. The heaviest-losses were inflicted on the enemy in defensive fighting and in fierce counter-attacks. All the enemy attempts to cut off our troops, by continuous air attacks against the Straits of Messina, or by naval forces in the Straits of Messina, failed. Our forces succeeded in carrying out systematically a large-scale action in crossing to i Calabria, with the result that at 6 a.m. today all the Germans and Italians, , with their heavy weapons, tanks, guns, motor cycles and war material, had been transferred across the straits to the mainland. General Hube, who was ’ in charge of the Sicilian fighting, was one of the last to leave the island. The commander’s troops have fulfilled an achievement which will go down in military history, just as would a 1 victorious battle. The Berlin radio says: “Our entire •army from Sicily is now ready to ) strike with all its tanks, guns and vehicles on the Italian mainland.” The German News Agency claims that all military installations in the town and harbour of Messina were de-

stroyed before the evacuation, and adds: “In the Sicilian campaign the Allies used six tank divisions, four tank brigades, with eighteen infantry divisions and one Marine division, two airborne divisions, 1600 fighters, 1000 bombers and over 800 special purpose planes. The naval forces comprised six battleships, two aircraft-carriers, between 18 and 20 cruisers, 85 destroyers, and a transport fleet sufficient to land ten divisions.” The Berlin radio’s commentator, Captain Sertorius, claims that the Allies were heavily mauled in Sicily. “The First Canadian Division, for instance,” he says, “after losing 75 per cent of its effectives, had to be withdrawn from the front line.”