Editorial: Unsecret weapon
By The Washington Post
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Nazi casualties in Italy 100,000
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German general killed in France
London, England (AP) –
The German communiqué today announced the death of Lt. Gen. Hellmich in the fighting on the Cherbourg Peninsula.
The Pittsburgh Press (June 22, 1944)
Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
Somewhere in France – (by wireless)
Folks newly arrived from America say that you people at home are grave and eager about this, our greatest operation of the war so far.
But they say also that you are giving the landings themselves an important out of proportion to what must follow before the war can end. They say you feel that now that we are on the soil of France, we will just seep rapidly ahead and the Germans will soon crumble.
It is natural for you to feel that, and nobody is blaming you. But I thought maybe in this column I could help your understanding of things if we sort of charted this European campaign. This is no attempt to predict – it is just an effort to clarify.
On the German side in Western Europe, we face an opponent who has been building his defenses and his forces for four years. A great army of men was here waiting to us, well prepared and well equipped.
On the English side of the Channel, we and the British spent more than two years building up to equality in men and arms with this opponent. Finally we reached that equality, and I am sure considerably more than equality.
Then – on June 6 – came the invasion we had waited for so long. The big show has begun. So, let’s divide the remainder of this campaign into phases.
Phase No 1 was the highly vital task of getting ashore at all. That phase could not last long. We either had to break a hole in the beach defenses and have our men flowing through that hole within a few hours, or the jig was up. Phase No. 1 came out all in our favor.
We planned Phase No. 2 so that we could throw in our first follow-up waves without casualties or delay. That was also a phase we didn’t care to dillydally about. The beaches were fairly clear of shellfire within two days.
Phase No. 2 is what we are in right now. And that is to build a wall of troops around the outer rim of our beachhead that will hold off any German counterattacks.
The whole split-second question of the first few days was whether we could get troops and supplies through our little needle’s-eye of a beachhead faster than the Germans could bring theirs from all over Europe.
As this is written, no important counterattack has developed. The Germans are having plenty of trouble moving their stuff up, because of our savage air activity. Every day that passes adds to our forces and gives us greater security.
If we can hold that outer line against all attack for a short while yet, then we will have won Phase No. 3. And right now, it certainly seems that we are winning it.
Phases 1, 2, and 3 were all preliminary ones. It took three of them merely to get us a place in Europe from which to begin. The three of them merely give us the corner lot on which we are going to build our house.
Phase No. 4 is the housebuilding phase. This is the phase you folks at home have been working so hard to make possible.
In England and America, we’ve got the men and machines and supplies and munitions to overbalance the great stockpile Germany has built up in Western Europe, But we’ve got to get it over here into France before we go on.
You may have imagined that we would hit the beach and go right on, advancing 30 miles a day till we reached the German border. We could no more do that than a baby, after taking its first step, could run a hundred-yard dash. You have to wait until your strength is built up before you can run.
That is Phase No. 4. It will go on for some time yet. Don’t be impatient. The wall in front of us will hold while we gradually pile this beachhead to the saturation point with extra men, guns, trucks, food, ammunition, gasoline, telephone wire, repair shops, hospitals, airfields, and thousands of other items – pack it until we have more than the Germans have, and with lots of reserves in addition.
Then and not until then will Phase No. 5 start. Phase No. 5 is the real war – big-scale war. How long we will have to wait between now and the beginning of Phase No. 5, I don’t know. But my guess is that it will take months rather than weeks.
Naturally there will be fighting during that time. The Germans will try to crush us back onto the beaches. We at the same time will try to extend our holdings enough to protect our accumulating men and supplies.
But Phase No. 5 will be the final one. How long it will last, I also don’t know – and in that ignorance, I have a great deal of company. I doubt if anyone in the world knows. All we do know is that things look good and that it will definitely end in our favor.
So don’t be impatient if we seem to go slowly for a while. You can’t lay the foundation of a house in the forenoon and move into the house that evening. We are just now laying the foundation of our house of war in Europe. It will take a while to build the wall and get the roof on. And then…
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Völkischer Beobachter (June 23, 1944)
Lyttelton bestätigt Roosevelts Kriegsschuld
Große Erregung in Washington – Der britische Produktionsminister dreht und windet sich
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‚Perfekte Amerikaner‘
Mit dem Beginn des englisch-amerikanischen Angriffs auf die Normandie wussten die englischen Zeitungen zu berichten, daß die Straßen der englischen Städte, die Kinos, die Bars und all die anderen Stätten, an denen die Amerikaner mit der Unerschöpflichkeit ihrer prallen Geldbörsen den englischen Soldaten an die Wand gedrückt hatten, mit einem Male von der aufdringlichen US-Invasion wie reingefegt sind. Und schon regte sich bei den Engländern die Hoffnung, daß die „Yankee-gefahr“ nun bald beseitigt sein werde.
Man könnte diese Illusion mit den Argumenten, die die imperialistische Politik der Amerikaner lieferte, leicht zerstören, aber es genügt auch schon, Miß Louise Morley zu zitieren, Tochter eines amerikanischen Schriftstellers und Leiterin der Jugendsektion in der Londoner Abteilung des amerikanischen Kriegsinformationsamtes. Miß Morley hat nämlich die Entdeckung gemacht, daß die Amerikanisierung der englischen Jugend höchst bemerkenswerte Fortschritte macht und daß die jungen Engländer dem Amerikanismus mehr und mehr zum Opfer fallen. Sie hat in den letzten sieben Monaten auf ihren Reisen durch England in Jugendherbergen, Fabriken, Schulen viele tausend junge Engländer und Engländerinnen kennengelernt und war zunächst erstaunt darüber, daß sie nicht mehr Mühe damit hatte, ihren Auftrag, „für Amerika Reklame zu machen,“ auszuführen. „Die Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika stehen der jüngeren Generation in Großbritannien heute unglaublich viel näher als Frankreich, das doch nur 21 Meilen von Dover entfernt ist,“ erklärte sie. Das Interesse für Amerika und alles Amerikanische sei in England stark entwickelt.
Die junge Generation Englands scheint sich also, wie man sieht, geradezu freiwillig dem Amerikanismus in die Arme zu werfen. Es ist dabei kaum erstaunlich und ergänzt nur den Eindruck von dem gesunkenen englischen Selbstbewusstsein, daß die jungen Engländer nach dem befriedigten Urteil von Miß Louise Morley schon jetzt „perfekt amerikanisch sprechen.“ Das gehe sogar so weit, daß sie gezwungen sei, „eine andere Sprache zu sprechen,“ wenn sie vor jungen oder vor alten Engländern rede. Die jungen Hörer seien geradezu stolz darüber, wenn man ihnen mit waschechten amerikanischen Ausdrücken komme, die sie selbstverständlich verstünden und es sei bedeutend schwieriger, sich vor den „alten Leuten Englands“ auszudrücken.
Um diese „alten Leute“ aber kümmert sich das tüchtige Mädchen vom amerikanischen Kriegsinformationsamt gar nicht erst. Auf den Gedanken, einmal „Englisches“ englisch zu sprechen, ist sie im Laufe ihrer erfolgreichen Tätigkeit noch nicht gekommen, denn das hatte sie ja auch gar nicht nötig. Die „Invasion der britischen Inseln durch amerikanische Truppen“ und der Einfluß des Filmes sind ihrer Ansicht nach die Gründe für die Fortschritte des Amerikanismus auf den englischen Inseln.
Glauben die Engländer der alten Generation wirklich, daß sie dieser Entwicklung, auf die, wie ein Schweizer Blatt schreibt, „die Amerikaner zweifellos sehr stolz sind,“ je Einhalt gebieten können? Die junge Generation hat jedenfalls gezeigt, daß sie von dem, was man in früheren Zeiten unter dem „englischen Stolz“ verstand, herzlich Wenig mehr besitzt.
s.u.
Pessimistische Äußerungen des Ersten Lords der Admiralität –
‚Unsere Prüfungszeit steht jetzt bevor‘
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Artilleriekämpfe an der Landfront Cherbourg
Berlin, 22. Juni –
Am Außenrand des mehrere Kilometer tiefen Vorfeldes des Festung Cherbourg hat am 21. Juni der Artilleriekampf begonnen. Wie festgestellt, beschossen unsere Feldhaubitzen und Festungsbatterien bereitgestellte Panzerkräfte, Truppenansammlungen und Anmarschwege des Feindes.
Der Gegner suchte seinerseits, unsere Artillerie durch Luftangriffe und Feuerüberfälle niederzuhalten. Auf dem Ostflügel konzentrierten sich die Artilleriekämpfe vor allem auf die zahlreichen Wälder beiderseits des La Saure-Tales, die der Feind zur Tarnung seiner Angriffsdivisionen braucht. Die dort im Schutz schwerer Waffen vorstoßenden Aufklärungskräfte mußten jedoch im Abwehrfeuer zu Boden.
Im mittleren Teil des Cherbourg Abschnittes versuchte der Gegner unsere Sperrfeuerzonen auf den von Süden und Südwesten zur Stadt führenden Straßen mit Panzern und motorisierter Infanterie zu unterlaufen. Er setzte stärkere Kräfte an, die im Quellgebiet der Divette und Ouve erneut einen Überraschungsvorstoß in das Herz des Festungsbereiches führen sollten. Der zweimal wiederholte Angriff scheiterte unter erheblichen Verlusten für den Feind.
Im Ganzen genommen, geht es dem Gegner im Augenblick darum, sich in günstige Ausgangsstellungen für den Angriff auf Cherbourg vorzuschieben.
Im Abschnitt zwischen Vire und Caumont nimmt der Feind weiter eine abwartende Haltung ein, nach seinen schweren Verlusten bei den gescheiterten Angriffen in Richtung Saint-Lô beschränkte er sich in diesem Abschnitt auf Artilleriefeuer und Stoßtruppkämpfe. Auch die Briten scheinen von ihren vergeblichen Angriffen im Raum beiderseits Tilly schwer mitgenommen zu sein. Sie legten eine Kampfpause ein, um die klaffenden Lücken ihrer dort eingesetzten Infanterie- und Panzerverbände durch angeforderte Verstärkungen aufzufüllen.
Auch dieser Vorgang zeigt wieder, wie notwendig der Feind einen bei jedem Wetter benutzbaren Hafen mit tiefem Wasser braucht.
Zwischen Philippinen und Marianen –
Schlacht der Hochseeflotten
vb. Berlin, 22. Juni –
Wie aus Tokio und Washington übereinstimmend berichtet wird, ist im Gebiet zwischen den Philippinen und den Marianen eine große Seeschlacht zwischen Teilen der japanischen Hochseeflotte und der US-Pazifikflotte im Gang, über deren vorläufige Ergebnisse beide Seiten noch Stillschweigen bewahren, was bei dem frühen Stadium, in dem sich diese Auseinandersetzung befindet, verständlich ist. Der US-Marineminister Forrestal teilte mit, daß der Oberbefehlshaber der US-Pazifikflotte, Admiral Nimitz, „absolutes Funkschweigen“ bewahre. Es könne daher für einen gewissen Zeitraum nicht mit Einzelheiten gerechnet werden.
Soviel scheint festzustehen, daß diese Seeschlacht in engem Zusammenhang mit den Kämpfen auf der Marianeninsel Saipan steht. In die zurzeit dort zwischen den japanischen Garnisonstruppen und den amerikanischen Landungsstreitkräften heftig tobenden Kämpfe greift, nach einer japanischen Meldung, auch die auf der Tinianinsel stationierte Artillerie ein. Den amerikanischen Truppen gelang es, schwere Artillerie zu landen und aufzufahren. Unter dem Feuerschutz der Artillerie konnten die Alliierten dann am 17. Juni bis in die Nähe des Asreetflugplatzes vordringen, welcher an der südlichen Seite der Insel gelegen ist. Die japanischen Truppen halten auf der anderen Seite wichtige strategische Punkte in ihrem Besitz, von denen aus sie wiederholt heftige Nachtangriffe gegen die Amerikaner durchführen und ihnen im Nahkampf große Verluste zufügen konnten. Die alliierten Verluste scheinen dem Bericht nach zu urteilen, in Zukunft noch höher zu werden, nachdem es den Japanern gelang, weitere schwere Panzereinheiten gegen die feindlichen Landungspunkte einzusetzen.
Innsbrucker Nachrichten (June 23, 1944)
Neuer Erfolg unserer Kampf- und Torpedoflieger
Zwei Zerstörer, ein 10.000 BRT Truppen-Transporter und ein 8.000 BRT Frachter versenkt; Zwei Kreuzer, zwei Zerstörer, drei Frachter mit 28.000 BRT und vier weitere Schiffe schwer beschädigt
dnb. Aus dem Führerhauptquartier, 23. Juni –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:
In der Normandie trat der Feind gestern mit starken Kräften gegen die Landfront der Festung Cherbourg zum Angriff an. Heftige Kämpfe, in die starke feindliche Schiffsartillerie und Luftstreitkräfte eingriffen, entwickelten sich besonders an der Südost- und Ostfront der Festung. Wo einige unserer Widerstandsnester in der weitgespannten Festungsfront verlorengingen, sind Gegenangriffe im Gange. Küstenbatterien des Heeres und der Kriegsmarine griffen während des ganzen Tages in die Erdkämpfe ein und erzielten Treffer in feindlichen Bereitstellungen und Panzeransammlungen.
An der übrigen Front des Landekopfes fanden nur örtliche Kämpfe ohne größere Bedeutung statt.
Unsere Artillerie nahm feindliche Schiffsansammlungen und Ausladungen vor dem Landekopf unter Feuer. Zwei Frachter wurden getroffen, zwei feindliche Kanonenboote in der Ornemündung zum Abdrehen gezwungen.
Kampf- und Torpedoflieger versenkten in der vergangenen Nacht zwei Zerstörer, einen Truppentransporter mit 10.000 BRT und einen Frachter mit 8.000 BRT Zwei Kreuzer, zwei Zerstörer, drei Frachter mit 28.000 BRT und vier weitere Handelsschiffe wurden schwer beschädigt.
Über der normannischen Küste und den besetzten Westgebieten wurden gestern 72 feindliche Flugzeuge zum Absturz gebracht.
Das Störungsfeuer auf London hält an.
In Italien trat der Feind nach beendeter Umgruppierung gestern erneut fast auf der ganzen Front zum Angriff an. Im Raum nördlich Grosseto konnte er nach erbitterten Kämpfen unsere Front wenige Kilometer nach Norden zurückdrücken.
In allen übrigen Abschnitten wurde der Feind unter schwersten Verlusten abgewiesen. Uber 30 Panzerkampfwagen wurden vernichtet oder erbeutet.
Die dritte Flakbrigade hat in Italien in der Zeit vom 1. bis 20. Juni 114 feindliche Flugzeuge und 69 Panzer abgeschossen.
Seit Beginn des feindlichen Großangriffs in Italien wurden 1046 feindliche Panzer vernichtet oder erbeutet.
Im Süden der Ostfront scheiterten örtliche Angriffe der Sowjets an der Strypa, nordwestlich Tarnopol und südlich des Pripjet.
Im mittleren Frontabschnitt haben die Bolschewisten mit den erwarteten Angriffen begonnen. Die auf breiter Front mit Panzer- und Schlachtfliegerunterstützung geführten Angriffe wurden in harten Kämpfen abgewiesen, örtliche Einbrüche in sofortigen Gegenstößen bereinigt. Beiderseits Witebsk sind noch erbitterte Kämpfe im Gange.
Auch zwischen Polozk und Novoschew sowie nordöstlich Ostrow führte der Feind stärkere Vorstöße, die erfolglos blieben.
Starke Verbände schwerer deutscher Kampfflugzeuge führten einen zusammengefassten Angriff gegen den Flugplatz Mirgorod. 20 viermotorige Bomber und große Betriebsstoff- und Munitionsvorräte wurden vernichtet.
Einzelne britische Flugzeuge warfen in der vergangenen Nacht Bomben im Raum von Hamburg.
Deutsche Kampfflugzeuge griffen Ziele in Ostengland an.
Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (June 23, 1944)
Communiqué No. 35
Operations against the fortress of CHERBOURG are proceeding satisfactorily. Offensive action and local attacks have effectively pinned down enemy formations in the eastern sectors.
In preparation for our ground operations, waves of fighter-bombers attacked the strongly fortified German positions encircling CHERBOURG during the day and again at dusk yesterday. They went in, often at pistol range, to bomb forts, concrete pillboxes, ammunition dumps, oil stores and troop concentrations. Medium bombers also took part. Our aircraft flew through intense ground fire.
Strong forces of heavy bombers attacked rail and road transport, barges, and oil containers between the coast and PARIS, and the rail junctions at LILLE and GHENT. During these operations, six enemy aircraft were destroyed. Ten of our bombers and nine fighters are missing.
Light and medium bombers destroyed a steel works near CAEN. Fighter-bombers attacked bridges northeast of PARIS.
In ALDERNEY, one of the Channel Isles, gun posts and barracks were the target for bombers and fighters. During the evening, other formations raided fuel dumps at FORÊT DE CONCHES and BAGNOLES-DE-L’ORNE, railway yards at SAINT-QUENTIN and ARMENTIÈRES and tracks and fuel tanks at DREUX and VERNEUIL.
After dark, heavies attacked the rail centers at RHEIMS and LAON in force thus completing the biggest air effort for some days. Seven bombers are missing.
Rail targets at LISIEUX, DREUX, and ÉVREUX were the night targets for our light bombers.
Last night, our fighters and intruders destroyed seven enemy aircraft over northern FRANCE.
The weather over the beachhead has moderated and unloading is proceeding.
Special Communiqué No. 2
Since the 10th June, 1944, the French Forces of the Interior, in association with the Allied plans, have continued to harass the Germans by increasing acts of warfare and sabotage in the rear of the German lines.
In many regions, fighting has reached such proportions that the enemy has been forced to send considerable forces against the Marquis, without succeeding in overcoming them. The enemy has attacked the Marquis of the VERCORS and the AIN with armored forces, artillery and aircraft. Resistance forces have been compelled to withdraw at various points after inflicting losses on the enemy.
In addition, numerous engagements are reported from the PYRENEES, the VOSGES, the MARNE, the ARDENNES, the AISNE and the CREUSE. Elements of several German divisions and a large number of local defense troops are estimated to have been contained inside FRANCE by the action of the resistance forces.
Many cuts on the railways, and numerous obstacles on the roads have effectively hindered the passage of German reinforcements to the beachhead. In this way, two armored divisions have been seriously delayed in Southwest France.
In the BORDEAUX region, the railway lines BORDEAUX-LA ROCHELLE, LA RÉOLE-PÉRIGUEUX, BAYONNE-ANGOULÊME have been sabotaged. A large number of small bridges of the route Nationale BORDEAUX-POITIERS have also been destroyed.
Railway cuts have also been reported throughout the RHÔNE Valley and in BRITTANY, the LOIRET, AISNE and the area north of PARIS. The railway depot at AMBÉRIEUX has been sabotaged for the second time.
Strong resistance groups have occupied several localities in the departments of the JURA, AIN and HAUTE-SAVOIE, and have taken over the administration and the supply of the civil population.
After four days of hard fighting, the Forces of Resistance were compelled to evacuate one of those towns, after blowing up the railway bridges, the locomotives and the telephone lines. German losses were heavy.
In many regions, the enemy telecommunication installations, both underground and overhead, have been cut.
Many canals, in particular in the CANAL DU NIVERNAIS, the lateral canal of the MARNE, have been made unusable.
This systematic disorganization of enemy transport by the FFI has contributed directly to the success of Allied operations in NORMANDY.
U.S. Navy Department (June 23, 1944)
Communiqué No. 527
Pacific and Far East.
U.S. submarines have reported the sinking of 16 vessels, including one naval auxiliary, as a result of operations in these waters, as follows:
- 11 medium cargo vessels
- 4 small cargo vessels
- 1 medium naval auxiliary
These actions have not been announced in any previous Navy Department communiqué.
CINCPAC Communiqué No. 61
A Pacific Fleet submarine torpedoed a SHŌKAKU-class carrier on June 18 (West Longitude Date). Three torpedo hits were obtained and the Japanese carrier is regarded as probably sunk.
Supplementing POA Communiqué No. 59, the following more detailed information is now available concerning the strike by carriers of the Fifth Fleet against units of the Japanese fleet on June 19:
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One small carrier of unidentified class previously reported damaged received two aerial torpedo hits.
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One destroyer previously reported damaged sank.
Two additional Japanese Navy twin‑engined bombers were shot down by carrier aircraft returning to our carriers after attacking the Japanese force.
Ponape Island was bombed on June 20 by 7th Army Air Force Mitchell bombers, and on June 21 by 7th Army Air Force Liberators. Gun positions were principal targets.
Seventy tons of bombs were dropped on Truk Atoll by Liberators of the 7th Army Air Force on June 20 and 21. On June 20, five enemy aircraft attempted to intercept our force. Two enemy fighters were damaged, and one Liberator was damaged. On June 21, nine enemy aircraft attempted to Intercept our force. One Liberator was damaged and one enemy fighter. All of our planes returned.
Corsair fighters and Dauntless dive bombers of the 4th Marine Aircraft Wing, Catalina search planes of Fleet Air Wing Two, and Navy Hellcat fighters carried out attacks in the Marshalls on June 20 and 21, bombing and strafing gun positions and targets of opportunity.
The Free Lance-Star (June 23, 1944)
CHERBOURG BATTLE NEAR END
Germans resist strenuously but Yanks close in
City surrounded by fighting Yanks
SHAEF, England (AP) –
Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s finely tuned U.S. assault troops have stormed over one of the three fortified peaks dominating Cherbourg’s military harbor, Supreme Headquarters announced today, and speedy fall of the city is expected.
Describing Cherbourg defenses as “fairly formidable,” a headquarters announcement said a “prolonged siege is unlikely now.”
Attacking with a storm of artillery fire, and a huge array of instruments od destruction, the Americans captured a height at Tourlaville, four miles from the sea southeast of Cherbourg. The Germans had been reduced to machine guns, small arms and light artillery in defending their pillboxes and prepared defenses.
Americans and Germans were so closely interlocked in the grim battle that Allied air forces were unable to give the close battlefront the support that marked the opening of the all-out attack yesterday.
British and U.S. planes concentrated on “quarantining” the battle area, hitting rail, and road communications in a semi-circle 100 miles deep in France as the Americans clamped a visa on Cherbourg and smashed at the other two remaining hilltop bastions.
Many Germans trapped
Three German divisions, mixed with German naval units and a defense garrison, were believed caught in the American clamp.
The Germans apparently had withdrawn completely from the eastern tip of the peninsula in order to concentrate on defense of Cherbourg.
A Canadian press correspondent reported that the Germans may have evacuated Caen, at the eastern end of the Allied line in Normandy and dispersed their forces outside the city because of the terrific bombing to which the long-contested town had been subjected.
The Germans were making a desperate bid to hold the strategic port as long as possible. Everywhere fierce resistance was encountered and a particularly vicious battle was being fought for control of the big airfield at Maupertus, five miles east of the city.
Fighting is severe
Inside the besieged port, the German garrison stood up stubbornly under yesterday’s 1,000-plane assault on the forts and pillboxes comprising the city’s defense. U.S. ground troops had to fight for every inch of their advance.
Only slight German resistance was reported by U.S. troops which cut off the eastern tip of the peninsula by capturing the road junction of Saint-Pierre-Église and then driving two miles westward and taking Carneville within sight of the sea.
A report from the 21st Army Group headquarters said this advance provided “strong indications” the Germans had abandoned that tip of the peninsula despite strong fortifications in the Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue area on the eastern coast.
On the western tip of the peninsula, the Americans went forward in the area of Beaumont-Hague against scattered resistance, cutting off whatever Germans are in that area.
The Allied prisoner bag, meanwhile, was described at Supreme Headquarters as “well over” the 15,000 announced a few days ago for the period since the June 6 landings.
Underground busy
Bloody hand-to-hand fighting for Cherbourg was matched over two thirds of France where the French underground is striking at the Germans on a dozen “inner fronts,” tying up “several German divisions” in combat, a special communiqué from Gen. Eisenhower’s headquarters reported.
The French patriots, the Supreme Command announced, have blocked movement of German troops against the bridgehead, have fought several pitched battles; have even occupied several towns in various parts of France.
Despite the biggest Allied air effort in more than a week, embracing more than 6,000 sorties, Gen. Bradley’s attack on Cherbourg made only a little progress. A mixed German force of three divisions of garrison troops, marines and sailors fought with the stubbornness of Stalingrad in the French-built fortifications protecting the harbor.
In the British-Canadian sector to the east, the Germans struck with a tank attack two miles southwest of Tilly-sur-Seulles, but were beaten off. British reconnaissance parties three miles east of Caen encountered determined resistance.
Allied bombers struck and destroyed a steel works just outside Caen. The Germans had been converting it into a fortified point to block the Allied forces standing less than half a mile away.
The wind dropped and the weather improved off the Allied beachhead, permitting the Allied to resume, after four bad days, the unloading of supplies.
Japs on Saipan fighting thirst
Low water supply may finally break down enemy defenses
At a command post on Saipan, Mariana Islands (AP) – (June 22, delayed)
As the battle for Saipan enters its second week, it begins to appear that lack of drinking water may turn out to be the fatal weakness of this island’s strong defenses.
There is evidence that the water supply is critically low behind the Jap lines. Prisoners invariably beg for water when brought in and many have to be forcibly restrained from snatching the canteens of their American captors.
The naval artillery smashed big Jap water distilling apparatus and fresh water tanks before the first waves of Marines hit the beaches at Charan Kanoa. Since then, the Japan probably have existed on the island’s few wells and rainwater cisterns, most of the latter already empty because of the extremely light rainfall since the invasion.
Promises of plenty of drinking water proved an effective means of getting Japs to come out of their pillboxes and surrender – which they are doing here in large numbers.
“Why die of thirst?” says an American voice in Japanese language through loudspeakers near the frontlines.
You’ve fought as well as any soldier of the Emperor should do. Now come out with your hands up and have a drink of this good water so you’ll be alive to serve your country when the war is over.
U.S. forces are rationed two or three canteens of water daily but the supply on our side of the lines is increasing as more and more distilling plants are set up. Water has been given a number one priority – on a parallel with ammunition.
20,000 Japs seen doomed on Saipan
Men are left to fate by fleet routed in fight this week
USPACFLT HQ, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii (AP) –
Twenty thousand Japanese, apparently abandoned to their death by a routed Nipponese fleet, were hit high and low today on Saipan by a U.S. invasion army which now outnumbers the foe.
Sensing almost certain victory in the distant Marianas as the aftermath of a one-sided sea triumph, the reinforced Yanks scaled the heights and probed the flatlands of that island gateway to Japan, China and the Philippines.
The scales were tipped heavily in favor of the United States Monday by “Task Force 58,” a newly-disclosed fast and mighty armada with perhaps 20 of the nearly 100 U.S. carriers in action against Japan.
Saipan’s potential naval support was sent scurrying between Luzon and Formosa into the far China Sea by carrier planes of this specialized group which sank one Japanese carrier, heavily hit three others and damaged a battleship and cruiser. In all, four enemy ships were definitely sunk and 10 others hard hit.
Big assignment
Task Force 58, which Navy officials in Washington said has been assigned “the entire Pacific Ocean to the gates of Japan as its stamping ground,” thus paved the way for a stepped-up drive on Saipan itself. Last night, Adm. Chester W. Nimitz reported that the invasion of that island, 1,500 miles from Tokyo but 3,800 miles from Pearl Harbor, was going well.
Supported by planes operating off captured Aslito Airdrome and outgunning the Nipponese on the ground, the Yanks drove ahead more than a mile on the east side of the island at Magicienne Bay.
In the center, they were scaling 1,540-foot Mount Tapochau. In the southeast tip, they had wiped out half of an unspecified total of trapped Japanese and seized 500-foot Mount Nafutan.
Today Tokyo conceded in a dispatch heard over the German radio that the Yanks are pouring ashore, along with heavy guns, on Saipan.
Nimitz’s communiqué said:
Heavy pressure is being maintained night and day against enemy troop concentrations and defense works by our aircraft, Army, Marine artillery and naval gunfire.
Bombing fails
The only mention of enemy air action was an attempt to bomb U.S. transports but it “did no damage.”
Assessing Monday’s attack far to the west of Saipan on the Japanese fleet, Navy Secretary Forrestal said in Washington:
Our fleet did a magnificent job, but the Navy is not going to be satisfied until the Japanese fleet is wiped out.
He said the Japanese “never came very far to the eastward” and “we were able to send home but one air attack at very long range from our carriers just before dark.”
The dynamite punch of the task force was obviously a painful surprise for the Japanese whose carrier planes, at a cost of 353, superficially damaged two U.S. carriers and a battleship Sunday.
Japs alarmed by Saipan situation
By the Associated Press
Etsuzō Kurihara, chief of the Naval Press Section of Japanese Imperial Headquarters, declared in a formal statement broadcast by Tokyo today that the “battle situation in the Saipan area is the most critical one since the beginning of the war.”
The statement, recorded by the Office of War Information, said a major effort would be necessary to turn back advanced naval elements “centered around more than 20 aircraft carriers and more than a dozen battleships with more than 100 transport ships.”
Kurihara’s statement said:
The enemy’s plan of advance is the greatest since the beginning of the war in the strength of the main force and in the furiousness of the enemy’s fighting morale.
The statement broadcast on the Japanese home radio as well as abroad acknowledged the Saipan operation as an “advance of the enemy into our inner line.”