Wairarapa Times-Age MONDAY, OCTOBER 11, 1943. OBJECTIVES IN ITALY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 October 1943, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age MONDAY, OCTOBER 11, 1943. OBJECTIVES IN ITALY

JN the United States and elsewhere there has been some discussion of late as to the lengths to which the Allies, in the immediate future, are likely to push their invasion of Italy. It has been suggested that there are alternatives which may be regarded as offering greater prospects of advantage for the time being than an effort to drive the Germans right out of the Italian peninsula.

One of these alternatives is an invasion of the Balkans, which could be made from the Adriatic coast of Southern Italy under cover of fighter, as well as bomber aircraft. Another is an attack on the enemy in Southern France, though this may be less likely unless an opportunity appears of synchronising it with a large-scale invasion of France or the Low Countries from Britain.

One well-known American commentator observed the other day that while the Allies undoubtedly were intent on pushing on to Rome, they might be in no great hurry to press their advance beyond that point. A good deal must depend, no doubt, on the use the Germans are prepared to make of the forces they have sent into Italy. According to the United States Secretary for War (Air Stimson) these forces amount to from 20 to 25*divisions —a strength considerably greater than the Allies meantime have at disposal.

Presumably having in mind, however, the lactois of Allied sea and air power, and the possibility of further landings, the Germans are employing only a fraction of their total strengthmention has been made of live or six divisions on the present battlefront running across the peninsula from the mouth ol the Volturno River to Termoli. With this force, under Marshal Kesserling, the Germans are able to do no more than delay the Allied advance. According to a message received on Saturday, it is believed in London that ultimately, as the Allied push continues, the enemy strategy will be to stand at all costs on a line from Pisa to Rimini—that is to say a line across the peninsula some 300 miles north of Rome. 'This line would cover by a considerable margin the industrial areas ol northern Italy, as well as the most northerly Italian airfields.

The situation holds rather open possibilities. The rate of progress of the Allied invasion is likely to be affected mateiially by developments in other war areas. It may be influenced, too, by what the Italians are able to do towards redeeming and liberating their country from the German yoke. In any case, even if they should delay for a time their advance into Northern Italy, the ’Allies need not on that account be placed at any serious disadvantage.

■ On the other hand, the maintenance of a stroiig army in Northern Italy may prove much more burdensome than profitable to the enemy. At best, from their standpoint, the Germans are called upon to make and maintain a costly military effort in Italy chiefly for the sake of delaying the bombing at short range of those parts of their own and occupied territory which hitherto have been largely immune from air attack. In the areas they already occupy and are likely soon to occupy in Italy, however. the Allies will be well placed to extend greatly their effective bombing of Southern Germany, Austria and other areas, notably in the Balkans, in which the enemy is vulnerable. It certainly will not be difficult for Allied bombers to reduce to a minimum the value of war factories in Milan, Turin and elsewhere in Northern Italy which remain for the time in German hands. As has already been demonstrated, Italian power, transport and other services are highly vulnerable to air attack.