AEGEAN CONFLICT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 November 1943, Page 3

AEGEAN CONFLICT

SEA VERSUS AIR POWER BRITISH ISLAND GARRISONS AWAITING ATTACK. HEAVY ENEMY BOMBING. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, November 6. The Germans are relentlessly bombing the small gallant British garrisons on Leros and Samos Islands in the Aegean, which have dug themselves in and are waiting for an attack which the ene'rny is likely to launch at any hour, reports the Cairo correspondent of the “Daily Telegraph.” The Germans’ most recent move was to occupy Celino, two miles from Leros. The Luftwaffe is unhampered in its bombing of Leros and Samos, because the enemy’s seizure of Kos and its airfields deprived Leros and Samos of air cover. The battle for the Aegean isles has become a struggle of sea versus air power, with British warships dominating the situation at night time, and the Luftwaffe in the daytime. The warships are taking heavy toll cf enemy shipping and menacing the enemy’s convoys to Rhodes and Crete. The correspondent adds that the official view is that in spite of the serious setback, the original object of our Aegean operations has been achieved. R.A.F. bombers and fighters yesterday carried out extensive operations in the Aegean Sea. Their targets included landing craft and barges in Kea

harbour (on an island 40 miles southeast of Athens), and at Kamares Bay, Suphnos Island (in the Cyclades group), Candia harbour, in Crete, was also bombed.