HISTORY AS IT HAPPENS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 4, Issue 99, 16 May 1941, Page 3

HISTORY AS IT HAPPENS

Thursday, May 1 The great bulk of the British and Anzac forces after fighting heroically in Greece, were safely evacuated from open beaches by the Navy and Merchant Navy. In the House of Commons, Mr. Churchill said 60,000 British troops had been in Greece and 80 per cent evacuated. President Roosevelt ordered the immediate pooling of two million tons of merchant shipping to aid the democracies. From this pool, Britain will draw to replace tonnage. R.A.F. bombed Kiel, Berlin, Hamburg, Emden and Mannheim. Friday, May 2 Evacuation of the Empire Forces from Greece was reported to be completed. Forty-three thousand got away, and there were 500 casualties at sea. Every piece of serviceable equipment left behind in Greece was destroyed. An enemy pence was begun on Tobruk. Lord Beaverbrook was appointed Minister of State and Colonel MooreBrabazon appointed Minister of Aircraft Production. The U.S. Maritime Commission placed 50 American tankers at the setvice of Britain, Saturday & Sunday, May 3 & 4 The war in the Middle East flared up in a new and threatening theatre with a Nazi-inspired revolt in Iraq. The few Iraq Government, under Rashid Ali, protested at the arrival of further British troops, and their artillery opened fire on the British aerodrome at Habbaniyah. British troops were marching on Bagdad from three directions, After several days fighting, the Italian and German attack on Tobruk broke through the outer perimeter, and was then held up. Battered Merseyside suffered its = successive heavy night raid. Twenty-six American merchant tena heavily loaded with arms and munitions, arrived at the Suez Canal.

Monday, May 5 Further British troops landed at Iraq, and tribes in northern Iraq rallied _ to Britain. German bombers heavily attacked Belfast. In a speech to the Reichstag, Hitler minimised German losses in the Balkans. The German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau at Brest suffered direct hits from the R.A.F. Tuesday, May 6 Major-General Freyberg was appointed commander-in-chief of the Allied forces on Crete, where the New Zealand Division was taken, President Roosevelt directed the Secretary for War to increase the production of heavy bombers with all zat sible speed. Wednesday, May 7 The U.S. Secretary for War, Mr. Stimson, in a nation-wide broadcast, advocated the use of the Navy to safeguard shipments of supplies to Britain, He warned Germany that America would not flinch. The Emperor, Haile Selassie, entered Addis Ababa on the anniversary of the entry five years ago of the Italians, The debate on the war situation was opened in the House of Commons by Anthony Eden.