LIBYA VICTORIES

New Zealand Listener, Volume 4, Issue 82, 17 January 1941, Page 3

LIBYA VICTORIES

Early Prophecies Raise A Smile

HE glorious victories of the Imperial Army of the Nile, to use Mr. Churchill’s noble phrase, have, in altering the whole strategic situation of the Mediterranean, turned all the bombastic prophecies of the Axis Powers and their friends into so many children’s fables. Serious essays on what the Italian Armies would do in Egypt now look merely funny. Pseudo-strategists have to eat their words, Tables contrasting the numbers and armaments of the two Armies in Egypt and Libya have to be revised. Whole fields of calculations and mountains of words are now so much amusing reading. In the most recent copy of the wellknown American magazine "Current History and Forum," to reach New Zealand, that for November 26 last, there is a long article on "The Battle for Suez," by Charles J. Rolo, an American correspondent for the two English language newspapers in Cairo, a man who has spent the greater part of his life in Egypt.

Here is a sample: "To the dictator of modern Rome, the Mediterranean and the Suez Canal are, as Il Duce himself has said, ‘Life Itself’ Once in possession of Egypt and the Canal, Mussolini could strike to the south and east to achieve his imperial ambitions. With Alexandria in Egypt coaverted into an Italian air and naval base Britain would be powerless in the Eastern Mediterannean. Italy could send troops and war materials through the Canal to Ethiopia for a large scale offensive against Britain’s East African possessions. At the same time, having laid her hands on the large cotton supplies of the Nile delta, she could turn to the Easttowards the rich oil resources of Saudi Arabia, towards Persia, towards the wealth of India. What is equally important, she would for ever have broken the stranglehold of British sea power, She would no longer be a prisoner in her much-talked-of Mare Nostrum. How much this means to Il Duce, a few figures reveal. Italy has no tin, rubber, copper, petroleum. She has to import most of her coal and wool. In peacetime 86 per cent. of her trade was sea-

borne through the Mediterranean. Ninety per cent. of her oil supplies, and all of her commerce with her East African Empire, used to pass through the Suez Canal. f "The burning question’ to-day is: can Italy drive the British out of Egypt and wrest from them the control of Suez? The basic strategic factors in the situation are simple, the imponderables complex. The British can muster in Egypt a well trained army of approximately 150,000 men, many of them tough colonial units from Australia and New Zealand. In addition, Egypt has a compact little force of 50,000 to 80,000 men, which-reports from Cairo have in-dicated-would be thrown into action if the country were vitally menaced by an Italian advance. These British and Egyptian troops are backed by approximately 1,000 light tanks and armoured cars and 500 ’planes. The Italians, who have been driving eastward into Egypt from Libya, enjoy a superiority in men, *planes, and other war material of at least 2 to 1-to which must be added the fact that the major part of Italy’s home air force could be thrown into action against Egypt if required. "Tf Britain is driven lock, stock, and barrel out of the Mediterranean, if North Africa, the Arab World, and the overland route to India fall under Axis control, the British Empire will have suffered a mortal blow. But if the Axis Drang Nach Suez is routed, if the warships and legions of the Axis suffer the same fate as those of Napoleon, then Britain will have taken a decisive step toward ultimate victory in the Battle of Europe."