Move to reduce post-war taxes
…
Völkischer Beobachter (June 26, 1944)
‚Eine ‚V. 1‘-Serie folgt der anderen in wütendem Tempo‘ –
Britische Presse gesteht jetzt schwere Schäden ein
Verzweifelte, aber erfolglose Abwehrversuche
…
Französische Passion 1944
Von Kriegsberichter Fritz Zierke
pk. In Caen, 25. Juni –
Nun sind die Gewitter des Krieges, die seit Wochen ihre Vorboten über den Himmel Frankreichs geschickt hatten, mit wilder Wut losgebrochen, und sie rasen grausamer, als es die finstersten Seher vorausschauend verkündet hatten. Denn es gibt Grenzen der menschlichen Vorstellung, über die nicht einmal die Fieberträume der Furcht hinausdringen, es gibt Wirklichkeiten, die erst dann ihre ganze Abgründigkeit offenbaren, wenn sie den Menschen in ihren Strudel reißen. In einen solchen Abgrund blickt heute Frankreich – und ein Zittern geht durch seinen gepeinigten Leib.
Bis an die Schwelle des vergangenen Frühjahres war Frankreich von den schlimmsten Schrecken des Krieges verschont geblieben – mehr als jedes andere der großen europäischen Länder. Als wir in sechs Wochen von der Maginotlinie zum Atlantik flogen, zeigte der Krieg noch ein menschlicheres Antlitz. Nirgends, es sei denn in Serbien und Griechenland, hinterließ er weniger tiefe Spuren. Nur dort, wo wir die ersten Breschen in das feindliche Land schlugen und wo der Gegner, bereits schwankend, sich noch einmal zu aussichtslosem Widerstand stellte, an der Maas und an der Somme, an der Seine und der Aisne, sanken Dörfer in Schutt, fiel auch in einige Städte die Brandfackel der Schlachten, aber das alles wirkte doch wie ein Spuk, der ebenso rasch verflog, wie er kam. Und so blickten wir damals halb fragend auf die Karawanen der Flüchtlinge, die sich über alle Straßen des Landes wälzten.
Wovor flohen sie? Nicht eigentlich vor der Wirklichkeit des Krieges, die weit weniger grausam war als ihr Wahn, sondern vor Gespenstern, die eine aberwitzige Schreckpropaganda ihrer Regierung entfesselt hatte. Und schon auf dem Wege, als der Krieg, schneller als ihre den Schritt beflügelnde Angst, sie überholte, wurden sie ihrer Täuschung inne. Sie kehrten, erleichtert, ernüchtert, zum Teil beschämt und verbittert in ihre Dörfer und Städte zurück, und nur sehr wenige fanden verbrannte Erde und Ruinen vor, wo sie blühende Felder und freundliche Häuser verlassen hatten.
An jene Flüchtlingsscharen des Jahres 1940 mußten wir auf Schritt und Tritt denken, als uns der Krieg nun abermals durch die französische Landschaft trug. Ein verwandtes Bild und doch ganz anders. Damals fuhren sie in großen Lastwagen mit hochbeladenen Fuhrwerken, in Zügen ohne Ende strömten sie dahin, um von ihrem Besitz zu retten, was sich retten ließ – heute wandern sie einzeln, mit bescheidensten Kartons, mit einem Bett, manche nur mit ihrer letzten, freilich schönsten Habe, ihren kleinen Kindern, die Landstraßen entlang. Damals waren sie sinnlos davongestürzt, ohne zwingende Not, heute gingen die meisten, als es zu spät war. Oft genug war an sie die Aufforderung gelangt, ihre gefährdeten Städte zu verlassen – aber sie wollten ihr nicht folgen. War es die stille, feste Liebe zur Heimat, Haus und Herd vor allem, die sie festhielt – war es der trügerische Glaube, daß auch diesmal alles weniger schlimm kommen würde? Die sich diesem Wahn hingaben, sind inzwischen fürchterlich erwacht – sie wissen jetzt, wie es aussieht, wenn Briten und Amerikaner ihre Kreuzzüge für Menschlichkeit und „Freiheit von Not“ führen.
Es ist an dieser Stelle bereits an einem der ungeheuerlichsten Beispiele – an einem freilich nur neben anderen – aufgezeigt worden, mit welchen Methoden die Horden der Invasion über die Städte tief im Hinterland der Front hergefallen sind. (Vergleiche „VB.“ vom 15. Juni: „Das Verbrechen von Saint-Lô.“) Was damals, drei Tage nach Beginn des feindlichen Angriffs, in den Elementen sichtbar wurde, läßt sich heute im Gesamtbild erfassen – und dies Bild ist für Frankreich wahrhaft erschreckend. Zehn Tage Invasionsschlacht haben dem Lande bereits tiefere Wunden geschlagen als die sechs Wochen des Sommerfeldzuges von 1940 – und dabei feiert die Zerstörungswut der anglo-amerikanischen Geschwader täglich neue Orgien und verschlingt eine Stadt nach der anderen. Soviel ist bei jedem denkenden Franzosen im eigentlichen Kriegsgebiet und im weiteren Hinterlande der Front inzwischen klargeworden: wenn der Krieg in den bisherigen Formen weitergeht und wenn unsere Gegner sich tiefer in das Land hineinbohren könnten, so wäre das gleichbedeutend mit dem Ende Frankreichs.
Was die Normandie, eine der Kernprovinzen des Landes, heute schon an seelischer und materieller Substanz eingebüßt hat, läßt sich noch gar nicht ermessen. Der einfache Mann sieht und empfindet vielleicht nicht einmal so sehr den unwiederbringlichen Verlust einiger der stolzesten und reichsten Einzeldenkmäler der französischen Geschichte und Kunst – er beklagt vor allem die radikale Austilgung ganzer Landstädte und Zehntausender von Menschen, die unter ihren Trümmern begraben wurden, überall dort, wo sich wichtigere Durchgangsstraßen kreuzten, setzten Eisenhower und sein britischer Beigeordneter für den Luftkrieg ihre Bomber mit einer Rücksichtslosigkeit ein, für die selbst dieser Krieg kein Beispiel kennt. Niemals ist für einen derartig geringen militärischen Nutzeffekt – denn eine Unterbrechung des Straßenverkehrs ist bei dem engmaschigen und ausgezeichnet gepflegten französischen Netz ein Ding der Unmöglichkeit – die Flut absoluter Vernichtung gleich skrupellos und gleich mörderisch entfesselt worden. Es gibt ein rundes Dutzend normannischer Städte, die buchstäblich nur noch Trümmerhaufen sind. In Saint-Lô versucht man vergeblich zu erkennen, wo früher die Hauptstraßen verliefen – der frühere Stadtkern ist nur noch ein wildes Gemisch von Trichtern und Steinen, er ist nicht einmal, sondern mehrfach von Bomben ungeheuren Kalibers umgepflügt worden.
Niemals wieder, dass ahnen die Flüchtlinge, die diesen Stätten des Grauens als letzte den Rücken kehren, wird aus den Ruinen neues Leben erblühen. Wenn das deutsche Volk im Angesicht seiner ausgebrannten Städte den festen Glauben hegt, daß mit den Glocken des Friedens zugleich die Stunde des Wiederaufbauens schlagen wird – woher soll Frankreich die Kraft zu einem solchen umfassenden Werk nehmen? Verfielen nicht schon vor dem Kriege, im Wohlstand seines Überflusses, in seinen fruchtbarsten Landschaften stattliche Bauernhöfe von ehedem starben in den von der Natur stiefmütterlicher behandelten Departements nicht ganze Gemeinden ab, weil die nachlassende Volkskraft einfach nicht mehr ausreichte, das Bestehende zu erhalten? Und bis zu welcher Höhe werden die blutigen Verluste des französischen Volkes in diesem Kriege noch ansteigen? Schon heute kann man rechnen, daß allein die die Invasion vorbereitende Bombenoffensive und die ersten zehn Tage des Invasionsfeldzuges selbst 40.000 Franzosen das Leben gekostet haben. Wer die chaotischen Massengräber gesehen hat, in die sich ganze normannische Städte in wenigen Stunden verwandelten, wird geneigt sein zu bezweifeln, ob diese Zahl nicht weit hinter der Wirklichkeit zurückbleibt.
Die Gefühle, mit denen die französische Nation dieses Schauspiel der Vernichtung begleitet, lassen sich schwerlich auf eine einfache und allgemeingültige Formel bringen. Soviel ist gewiss, daß in den geschändeten Landstrichen selbst der Haß gegen England und die USA in wenigen Tagen zu einer Flamme angeschwollen ist, die nicht mehr erlöschen wird. Englische Gefangene waren bestürzt über die Drohungen und Verwünschungen, die ihnen auf ihrem Marsch durch die französischen Dörfer entgegenhallten – die Rolle der Befreier, in der Roosevelt und Churchill aufzutreten gedachten, ist schon gründlich ausgespielt. Sicherlich waren die französischen Massen in einem bis zur Selbstverleugnung gehenden Maß bereit, manche von den Handlungen unserer Feinde als ein Gebot kriegerischer Notwendigkeit zu entschuldigen – der Krieg aber, den die Anglo-Amerikaner nun nach Frankreich getragen haben, findet bei keinem mehr, der ihn sah oder gar am eigenen Leibe erlebte, Fürsprache und Verzeihung.
Wir sahen die verängstigten Flüchtlinge, die sich in die Straßengräben kauerten oder im tarnenden Buschwerk verkrochen, sobald sie nur das Geräusch eines amerikanischen Flugzeuges in der Luft vernahmen. In den ersten Tagen hatten einzelne Optimisten noch geglaubt, sie würden verschont bleiben von den Menschenjägern der demokratischen Welt, wenn sie mit weißen Tüchern oder mit Fahnen des Roten Kreuzes ihre Wagen und Karren kenntlich machten. In der Wahllösigkeit des mechanisierten Mordes verflogen bald die letzten Illusionen. Der Mann, der die Leiche seiner schönen jungen Frau aus der Hölle des brennenden Saint-Lô fuhr, sagte kein Wort in seinem gefrorenen Schmerz, aber seine Mitbürger, die gesehen hatten, wie die Beklagenswerte an seiner Seite auf offener Straße von einem Tiefflieger mit dem Maschinengewehr umgebracht worden war, als sie nebeneinander aufrecht dahingingen, riefen in wildem Grimm die Rache des Himmels auf die Mörder herab.
Niemals verspürte man aus einem politischen Gespräch mit Franzosen in der jüngsten Vergangenheit eine heißere Leidenschaft und tiefere Wahrheit, als aus dem Aufschrei einer alleinstehenden Frau, die mit tränenden Augen auf die Ruinen ihres Dorfes blickte – dabei hatte ein gnädiges Schicksal ihr eigenes Anwesen verschont. „Wenn ihr Deutschen diesen Krieg nicht gewinnen solltet,“ so sprach sie, „so will ich nur für eines am Leben bleiben: Ich will noch den Tag sehen, an dem Stalin auch die Engländer auffrisst. Sie haben es doppelt verdient, an euch so gut wie an uns!“
Es wäre falsch, wollte man diese Gefühle und die Regungen tätiger Vergeltung in der französischen Seele verallgemeinern, wenn auch im Kampfgebiet selbst der deutsche Soldat heute eine Hilfsbereitschaft findet wie nie zuvor, wenn die Wünsche der weit überwiegenden Mehrheit der Bevölkerung für den Sieg unserer Waffen ehrlich sind und aus tieferer Quelle entspringen als der Hoffnung, nur so den vollen Schrecken des Krieges zu entrinnen. Abseits des Feldes der Not und Verwüstung scheint das französische Volk noch kaum erfaßt zu haben, daß heute auf den Fluren der Normandie sein Schicksal im Spiele ist. Die lahme Tatenlosigkeit des Abwartens, die seit dem Zusammenbruch von 1940 Frankreichs Tun und Denken kennzeichnet, liegt selbst in diesen Stunden der Entscheidung wie ein Schleier über dem Lande, und die Brandsäulen von Rouen und Caen, von Flers und Falaise wirken nicht weiter, als ihr feuriger Schein reicht. Es ist, als müsse die anglo-amerikanische Sintflut noch tiefer in das Land einbrechen, ehe Frankreich hinter den künstlichen Deichen seiner selbstmörderischen Ruhe erwacht. Der Weg der französischen Passion ist noch nicht an seiner letzten Station angelangt – und selbst in Frankreichs besten Herzen wohnt nicht der feste Glaube, sondern banger Zweifel, ob er sein krönendes Ende in einer Auferstehung findet.
Schwere Abwehrkämpfe im Osten –
Beispielhafte Tapferkeit der Verteidiger Cherbourgs
Fortsetzung des schweren Störungsfeuers auf London und seine Außenbezirke
dnb. Führerhauptquartier, 25. Juni –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:
Im Kampfraum der Festung Cherbourg erlitt der Feind gestern bei seinen Angriffen gegen unsere Widerstandstruppen, die mit beispielhafter Tapferkeit aushalten, besonders schwere Verluste. Erst nachdem in den Abendstunden südwestlich und südöstlich Cherbourg einige unserer Stützpunkte nach erbitterten Nahkämpfen verlorengingen, konnte der Gegner dort die Stadtränder erreichen. Im Raum von Tilly trat der Feind mit starken Kräften zum Angriff an. Die Kämpfe sind dort in vollem Gange.
Unsere Küstenbatterien griffen trotz schweren Feuers der feindlichen Schiffsartillerie und rollender Luftangriffe wirksam in die Erdkämpfe ein. Außerdem erzielten sie mehrere Treffer auf feindlichen Kreuzern und Zerstörern.
Im Ostteil der Seinebucht schossen Heeresküstenbatterien einen Transporter von 5.000 BRT in Brand. Ein feindlicher Monitor und mehrere feindliche Kriegsschiffe wurden zum Abdrehen gezwungen. Nach Minentreffern ging im gleichen Seegebiet ein feindlicher Zerstörer unter, ein weiterer größerer Transporter geriet in Brand.
Unsere Schnellboote und Vorpostenstreitkräfte erzielten im Gefecht mit feindlichen Seestreitkräfte Treffer auf Zerstörern und Schnellbooten.
Fernkampfbatterien der Kriegsmarine vernichteten im Kanal vor Dover einen feindlichen Frachter von 7.000 BRT.
Schweres Störungsfeuer lag weiterhin auf London und seinen Außenbezirken.
In Mittelitalien griff der Feind gestern im Westabschnitt unsere Front erneut an mehreren Stellen mit starken Kräften an. Nach schweren Kämpfen, die sich bis zum Abend hinzogen, konnte der Feind im Küstenabschnitt unsere Linien wenige Kilometer zurückdrücken. An den übrigen Stellen wurden alle Angriffe zerschlagen.
Im Osten stehen unsere Divisionen im gesamten mittleren Frontabschnitt im schweren Abwehrkampf gegen die mit starken Infanterie-, Panzer- und Luftstreitkräften geführte Offensive der Sowjets. Es gelang dem Feind nur östlich Mogilew, an der Smolensker Rollbahn und besonders im Raum von Witebsk seine Einbrüche zu erweitern. An allen anderen Stellen brach der feindliche Ansturm nach harten, wechselvollen Kämpfen blutig zusammen. 252 feindliche Panzer wurden vernichtet.
Jäger und Flakartillerie brachten 42 sowjetische Flugzeuge zum Absturz.
Zwischen Polock und Pleskau führten die Bolschewisten zahlreiche vergebliche Angriffe, bei denen weitere 27 Panzer abgeschossen wurden.
Ein nordamerikanischer Bomberverband griff erneut rumänisches Gebiet an und warf Bomben im Raum von Ploesti. Deutsche, rumänische und bulgarische Luftverteidigungskräfte vernichteten 23 feindliche Flugzeuge, darunter 20 viermotorige Bomber.
Nordamerikanische Bomber führten in den gestrigen Mittagsstunden einen Terrorangriff gegen Bremen. Es entstanden Schäden in Wohnvierteln. Die Bevölkerung hatte Verluste.
In der Nacht warfen einzelne britische Flugzeuge Bomben im Raum von Berlin.
Durch Luftverteidigungskräfte wurden über dem Reichsgebiet und den besetzten Westgebieten bei Tage und in der Nacht 59 feindliche Flugzeuge vernichtet.
Nationale Konvention der Republikaner tagt in Chikago –
Auftakt zur Wahlschlacht in den USA
v. m. Lissabon, 25. Juni –
Am 26. Juni, also morgen Montag, tritt in Chikago die Nationale Konvention der Republikanischen Partei zusammen, um ihren Präsidentschaftskandidaten aufzustellen. Nach dem Verzicht Wendell Willkies und General MacArthurs auf die Kandidatur stehen der Gouverneur von Neuyork, Dewey, der Gouverneur von Ohio, Bricker, und die beiden Senatoren Taft und Stassen in der engeren Wahl. Über 70 Prozent aller Voraussagen glauben, daß Dewey mit einer großen Mehrheit zum Kandidaten gewählt werden wird. Der Daily Express läßt sich aus Washington berichten, daß er über ein Minimum von 700 Wahlmännerstimmen verfügt, während er 530 nur brauchen würde, um zu kandidieren.
Roosevelt hat mit allen Mitteln versucht, die Konvention seiner Parteigegner von vornherein zu beeinflussen, damit sie einen Mann aufstellen, der ihm in keiner Weise gefährlich werden kann. In Teheran bestand er auf der Vorverlegung der zweiten Front, obwohl Churchill für ihre Durchführung im Spätsommer plädierte. Die katholische Zeitung America enthüllt nun, daß Roosevelt immer wieder erklärte habe, man müsse die Wahlschlacht an der französischen Kanalküste gewinnen. Die republikanische Parteikonvention müsse im Zeichen amerikanischer Erfolge in Europa zusammentreten, damit die Kritik an seiner Außenpolitik und seiner Kriegführung nicht zum Hauptargument des republikanischen Wahlkampfes werden könne.
Dieser Umstand zeigt die Anstrengungen, die der US-General Bradley vor Cherbourg machen läßt, im besonderen Licht und läßt auch vermuten, weshalb Roosevelt nach dem wenig überzeugenden Anfang der Invasion und dem Erscheinen der deutschen Geheimwaffe auf den Gedanken gekommen ist, den Admiral Nimitz zur grotesken Behauptung von der „vollständigen Vernichtung der japanischen Flotte“ zu veranlassen.
Die Lüge hatte allerdings so kurze Beine, daß der Präsident in seiner letzten Pressekonferenz von ihr abgerückt ist. Er erklärte den Journalisten, seine Generalstabschefs bedauerten sehr, daß es nicht gelungen sei, die japanische Flotte entscheidend zu schlagen. Auch die heftigen republikanischen Vorwürfe gegen seine Ibero-Amerika-Politik versuchte Roosevelt rechtzeitig durch die Versöhnung mit der revolutionären Regierung Boliviens zu entkräften. Die jüdischen Finanzkreise hinter der republikanischen Front beruhigte er dabei auf besondere Weise: er stellte bei den Verhandlungen mit Bolivien die Freilassung des gefangen gehaltenen jüdischen Zinnkönigs Moritz Rothschild zur Bedingung und setzte sie durch.
Die Republikaner haben ihrerseits auch alles in Bewegung gesetzt, um die Konvention ihrer Partei zu einer gewaltigen Anti-Roosevelt-Kundgebung werden zu lassen. Die Enthüllungen des englischen Produktionsministers Lyttelton über das kriegstreiberische Verhalten der amerikanischen Außenpolitik, das damit verbundene neuerliche Aufrühren des geheimen Briefwechsels zwischen Roosevelt, Churchill und Eden hinter dem Rücken des alten Chamberlains und die in diesem Zusammenhänge erfolgte Verhaftung des englischen Unterhausabgeordneten Ramsay und des amerikanischen Konsulatssekretärs, durch dessen Indiskretion diese Ränke bekannt wurden sowie die verzweifelten Entschuldigungsversuche des US-Außenministers Hull, das alles gibt einen allerdings ungewöhnlich guten Start für den Angriff auf Roosevelt.
Selbst der Versuch der Roosevelt freundlichen Presse, die Reisen des Vizepräsidenten Wallace nach Tschungking und des Handelskammerpräsidenten Johnston nach Moskau als großen außenpolitischen Erfolg darzustellen, vermochten nicht die Stärke der republikanischen Attacke abzuschwächen. Die Neuyorker Zeitung PM befürchtet daher, daß die Republikaner jetzt in Chikago „besonders viel schmutzige Wäsche waschen werden.“ Einstweilen richtet sich aber die amerikanische Dreckschleuder gegen Lyttelton, dessen Rücktritt energisch gefordert wird.
Die Kämpfe im Pazifik –
Zwei Flugzeugträger versenkt
Tokio, 25. Juni –
Japanische Luftstreitkräfte führen seit Samstagmorgen wiederholte Angriffe auf feindliche Marinestreitkräfte in den Gewässern südöstlich von Iwoojina Ogasawara (Boningruppe). Als Ergebnis der kühnen Torpedoangriffe wurden zwei feindliche Flugzeugträger versenkt. Die Angriffe werden fortgesetzt. Japanische Störflugzeuge haben in den Luftkämpfen mit ungefähr 60 feindlichen von Flugzeugträgern gestarteten Bombern über Iwoojina Ogasawara am Samstagmorgen mindestens 37 feindliche Flugzeuge abgeschossen.
Die gegen Saipan eingesetzten starken feindlichen Schlachtschiffformationen setzten ihre Operationen trotz ihrer Verluste auch weiterhin östlich und westlich der Marianengruppe fort. Die hartnäckigen japanischen Abwehrkämpfe werden vor allem von der Luftwaffe unterstützt, die in ununterbrochenen Angriffen den feindlichen Landekopf auf Saipan, Munitionslager und Ansammlungen von Landungsbooten mit Bomben belegte.
In den Gewässern westlich von Saipan haben japanische Fliegereinheiten einen 10.000 BRT großen feindlichen Transporter versenkt. Sämtliche Flugzeuge sind wohlbehalten zurückgekehrt.
Die Minimalverluste der bei Saipan eingesetzten nordamerikanischen Flottenstreitkräfte werden unter Zugrundelegung der Verlustziffern, die von Marinefachleuten bei versenkten Kriegsschiffen auf 40 Prozent, bei schwerbeschädigten auf 10 Prozent und bei leichtbeschädigten auf 5 Prozent der Offiziere und Mannschaften geschätzt werden, auf mindestens 7.000 Offiziere und Mannschaften beziffert. Bei dieser Errechnung ist die Besatzung eines Schlachtschiffes auf durchschnittlich 1.500 Offiziere und Mannschaften, eines schweren Kreuzers auf 900, eines leichten Kreuzers auf 400, eines Zerstörers auf 300, eines großen Flugzeugträgers auf 2.000 und eines mittleren Transporters auf 500 angesetzt.
Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (June 26, 1944)
Communiqué No. 41
The liberation of CHERBOURG cannot be long delayed. Allied troops are fighting in the streets and by yesterday afternoon had reached the sea within a mile of the port on the east side.
During a day of fierce fighting with the support of naval bombardment, enemy strongpoints were reduced one by one and the town was entered at many points simultaneously. The mopping-up of other portions of the original outer defenses continues.
In the eastern sector, our progress in the FONTENAY area was maintained and our positions were further strengthened.
Further enemy counterattacks near SAINTE-HONORINE were beaten back.
Our Air Forces continued their attacks on the enemy’s supply system during the afternoon and evening yesterday and also gave immediate support to the land and naval forces assaulting CHERBOURG.
The railway network east and south of NORMANDY was subjected to many attacks. Targets included the railway yards at DREUX and CHARTRES and bridges and embankments in the same area.
Air fields at BRÉTIGNY and VILLACOUBLAY were bombed and a large formation of medium bombers attacked supply dumps in the SENONCHES area with good results.
Enemy opposition was on a limited scale yesterday though flak was intense at many points.
Troop concentrations south of CAEN were bombed last night.
Communiqué No. 42
Street fighting continues in CHERBOURG. The Germans are resisting desperately but the town is steadily being cleared.
In the northeastern tip of the peninsula, little opposition has been met. To the northwest in the CAP DE LA HAGUE area, there is still some enemy strength.
Progress has been made in the FONTENAY sector, east of TILLY, after heavy fighting and our positions are improved.
More than 20,000 prisoners have been taken in the beachhead since the landings.
Dense cloud and fog over the continent today brought our air operations to a virtual standstill.
Last night, two enemy aircraft were destroyed by our patrols over northern FRANCE.
Innsbrucker Nachrichten (June 26, 1944)
Heldenhafter Widerstand der Verteidiger von Cherbourg
Hafen und alle kriegswichtigen Anlagen gesprengt – Zwei Feindkreuzer und ein Zerstörer versenkt – Zäher Widerstand unserer Truppen in Italien – Unvermindert heftige Abwehrschlacht im Mittelabschnitt der Ostfront
dnb. Aus dem Führerhauptquartier, 26. Juni –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:
Die tapfere Besatzung von Cherbourg unter Führung des Generalleutnants von Schlieben zusammen mit starken Teilen der Kriegsmarine und der Luftwaffe steht seit gestern Innerhalb der Stadt und im Hafengebiet in erbittertem Häuserkampf. Zwei Aufforderungen des Gegners, den Kampf einzustellen und die Festung zu übergeben, wurden nicht beantwortet. Der Hafen und alle kriegswichtigen Anlagen sind gesprengt. Vor dem Gefechtsstand des Festungskommandanten und vor dem Arsenal brachen die feindlichen Angriffe im Feuer der Verteidiger zusammen.
Die unter dem Befehl des Oberleutnants der Marineartillerie Gelbhaar stehende Batterie „Hamburg“ hat, selbst unter schwerem Artilleriefeuer liegend, gestern im Raum von Cherbourg zwei feindliche Kreuzer versenkt. Außerdem wurden am vergangenen Tage vier Kreuzer durch Marinebatterien schwer beschädigt. Schnellboote versenkten in der letzten Nacht einen feindlichen Zerstörer nördlich der Halbinsel Cotentin.
An der Südfront des normannischen Landekopfes brachen feindliche Vorstöße östlich der Orne vor unseren Stellungen zusammen. Ein örtlicher Einbruch wurde im Gegenangriff wieder beseitigt, östlich der Ornemündung wurde ein großer feindlicher Transporter durch Artillerievolltreffer beschädigt.
Im Raum von Tilly gelang es dem während des ganzen Tages mit starken Infanterie- und Panzerkräften angreifenden Feind unter schwersten blutigen Verlusten, die Ruinen der Stadt zu besetzen.
Im Kampf gegen drei der besten englischen Divisionen hat sich die Panzerdivision unter der Führung von Generalleutnant Bayerlein hervorragend bewährt.
Südwestlich Carentan griff der Feind nach starker Artillerievorbereitung wiederholt vergeblich an.
In der Nacht vom 24. und 25. Juni wurden nach abschließenden Meldungen vier große feindliche Kriegsschiffe und ein Frachter durch Bombentreffer schwer beschädigt. Ein seit langem im Kampf gegen England stehendes Fliegerkorps unter Führung von Generalmajor Peltz hat sich hierbei besonders ausgezeichnet.
Das Störungsfeuer gegen Südengland wurde bei Tag und Nacht fortgesetzt.
In Italien lag der Schwerpunkt der Kämpfe auch gestern im Abschnitt von der Küste bis zum Trasimenischen See. Der Feind konnte hier nach erbitterten Kämpfen mit unseren zäh Widerstand leistenden Truppen nur wenige Kilometer nach Norden Boden gewinnen.
Bei dem Seegefecht im Golf von Genua in der Nacht zum 24. Juni wurden nach endgültigen Meldungen vier feindliche Schnellboote versenkt, ein fünftes in Brand geschossen.
Im mittleren Abschnitt der Ostfront dauert die Abwehrschlacht mit unverminderter Heftigkeit an. Die Sowjets wurden in den meisten Abschnitten abgewiesen. Südlich und östlich Bobruisk konnte der Feind jedoch einige Einbrüche erzielen. Auch im Raum östlich Mogilew gewann der feindliche Angriff nach blutigen Kämpfen nach Westen Boden.
An der Düna sind ebenfalls erbitterte Kämpfe im Gange, während östlich Polosk und südöstlich Pleskau von Panzern und Schlachtfliegern unterstützte Angriffe der Sowjets scheiterten. In diesen Kämpfen hat sich die sächsische 24. Infanteriedivision unter Führung von Generalleutnant Versock hervorragend bewährt.
Schlachtflieger unterstützten den Abwehrkampf des Heeres, vernichteten zahlreiche Panzer sowie eine große Anzahl von Fahrzeugen und fügten dem Feind schwere blutige Verluste zu.
Durch Jäger und Flakartillerie wurden 37 feindliche Flugzeuge abgeschossen.
In der Nacht griff ein starker Verband schwerer Kampfflugzeuge den Bahnhof Smolensk an. Zahlreiche Großbrände wurden beobachtet, große Mengen an Nachschubmaterial vernichtet.
Auf dem Balkan haben unter dem Oberbefehl des Generalobersten Löhr stehende Truppen eines Gebirgskorps in dreiwöchigen schweren Kämpfen in den Bergen Südalbaniens kommunistische Bandengruppen zerschlagen. Der Feind verlor außer 3.000 Toten zahlreiche Gefangene, viele Waffen aller Art sowie große Munitions- und Versorgungslager.
Ein schwächerer feindlicher Bomberverband griff in der letzten Nacht das Stadtgebiet von Budapest an. Sieben Flugzeuge wurden abgeschossen.
Britische Flugzeuge warfen in der letzten Nacht Bomben im rheinisch-westfälischen Raum.
The New York Times (June 26, 1944)
AMERICANS IN CHERBOURG, FIGHT WAY TO DOCKS
Warship guns aid; smash forts blocking advance of infantry into vital port
Battles in streets; British gain two miles in barrage-led drive from Tilly-sur-Seulles
By Drew Middleton
Transatlantic port being wrested from the enemy
Cherbourg was entered by U.S. troop columns from three directions. Two of the stubbornest points of resistance were Fort du Roule (1) and Octeville (2). While the Germans still fought at Fort du Roule, our forces hammered their way in from the south and the east. Our dive bombers and warships were called upon to silence the fort on Pelée Island (3) and Fort des Flamands (4). Smoke rising from the arsenal in the naval establishment (5) suggested demolitions there by the Germans.
SHAEF, England –
U.S. infantry drove into the streets of Cherbourg from the east, south and southwest yesterday, and a spokesman at headquarters said last night that the city was “almost in our possession.”
After five days of the hardest fighting of the campaign, Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s doughboys were driving the German defenders from house to house and street to street into the interior of the city last evening, and one battalion was only a few hundred yards from the docks.
A United Press correspondent at the front said some troops had even reached the docks and had surprised Germans in the act of blowing up installations.
The forces that entered from the south silenced Fort du Roule, the last German stronghold in that area, yesterday afternoon, to open their way into the city.
However, later reports from the front said that some Germans had crawled back into the fort through tunnels and from intact pillboxes were firing at the Americans from the rear.
Navy shells port defenses
Other forces smashed into the city in the afternoon from the east and southwest after storming German positions on high ground on both sides of the city, while guns of a powerful Allied squadron of battleships and cruisers, commanded by RAdm. Morton L. Deyo, flying his flag in the cruiser USS Tuscaloosa, knocked out German guns on the far side of the harbor that had been harassing our advancing troops.
The entry into Cherbourg, France’s third largest port, was a major victory and all signs of such triumph are in evidence yesterday. Hundreds of dazed German soldiers surrendered as tanks rumbled along the cobbled streets and a white flag fluttered from one battered blockhouse.
Some Germans continued to fight to the last. Snipers moved from house to house, trading shots with oncoming U.S. machine-gunners, and fired their pieces until their last round or until they died by grenade or bayonet. Whole sections of the city were ablaze and a great pall of smoke hung over the port where the Germans had blown up stores and had fired fuel.
So swift was the American advance in the final phase that bombing by the clouds of fighter-bombers that hung over the city had to be restricted because of the danger to U.S. troops. But the bombers had done their job, for when the troops moved forward yesterday morning, German artillery fire was pitiful and inaccurate, and prisoners were already coming in from the most heavily bombed fortifications. One infantry unit swept up 300 in its first advance.
Far to the east of the American sector in Normandy, the British again hammered their way forward, advancing more than two miles southeast of Tilly-sur-Seulles on what reports from the field described as an eight-and-a-half-mile front. There was fighting around Fontenay-le-Pesnel, two-and-a-quarter miles southeast of Tilly, and the British smashed one strong German counterattack in the area.
Part of this area will undoubtedly become the main battle sector with the fall of Cherbourg, for it is here that the enemy has concentrated his armor, and it is here that a successful offensive would offer him the greatest rewards. The Germans are worried about the Allied attack here. They say a great fleet of transports has disgorged fresh divisions off the mouth of the Orne River during the past two days and predicted that Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery would open an offensive as soon as he had these troops in line. The Cherbourg fight moved at a tremendous pace yesterday, faster than it had since Gen. Bradley hurled his divisions up the peninsula after they had broken through to the sea around Barneville a week ago. Our troops were looking down into the city from some of the high ground to the south by late Saturday, but Fort du Roule still held out during the night.
Yesterday morning, as the field guns resumed their iron clamor, the Americans drove the Germans out of field positions on the high ground and assaulted Fort du Roule.
The advance from the west progressed over high ground west of Équeurdreville. Here again, a fort was knocked out and the road from Cherbourg west of Beaumont was cut again – it had been cut farther west Friday – and patrols fought their way into the area just west and south of the naval base in the region of the Municipal Stadium on Rue de la Bucaille.
Other units to the southwest met bitter resistance in the area of Sainte-Croix-Hague, but these Germans have probably been outflanked by the advance further north. A few enemy detachments were still reported holding out in the area of Bois du Mont du Roc.
In other areas, prisoners drifted in by twos and threes, and sometimes by the dozen. Some complained of lack of ammunition, others of a terrific hammering by American artillery. The enemy suffered heavy casualties. Along the Cherbourg-Valognes road, the dead were so thick that a path had to be cleared through the bodies so that jeeps could pass to the front.
Two German generals have been killed in Normandy since Friday. On Saturday, the German radio announced the death of Lt. Gen. Richter and that of Gen. Stegman, who was killed in action at Cherbourg.
Here and there across the stricken field, the Germans fought bravely. German troops were defending the airfield at Maupertus, five miles east of the city, with bitter tenacity. German gunners served their weapons in the port area under the accurate fire of Allied battleships and cruisers until the guns were knocked out.
Except for fighting around Maupertus, there was little sign of the enemy in the Barfleur-Saint-Vaast area. Once occupied, Barfleur, a fishing port with long docks, will be useful for the Allies.
While the infantry, supported by tanks, were cracking Cherbourg’s last landward defenses, Allied cruisers and battleships were engaging in a duel with German batteries in the port. One by one, the German batteries “Bromm” and “York” under the command of RAdm. Hennecke, naval commander in Normandy, were knocked out by Allied shells, according to the enemy. Above the forts circled observation planes of the U.S. and British Fleet Air Arm, the British spotting for warships.
An unofficial but reliable estimate received by this correspondent yesterday said that the capture of Cherbourg would complete the destruction of four German divisions – the 91st, the 77th, the 243rd and the 109th, the latter under Lt. Gen. Karl-Wilhelm von Schlieben, who also commands the whole Cherbourg garrison. Remnants of these four units, plus German paratroopers and marine and naval units in the city, probably will bring the total Allied bag to about 32,000 effectives.
EDGE LEADS DRIVE TO BROADEN PLANK ON FOREIGN POLICY
Group led by Governor insists Republicans take a stronger stand on post-war unity
Pennsylvania for Dewey; votes of Illinois, Michigan, Tennessee, South Dakota help make his nomination sure
By Turner Catledge
Chicago, Illinois – (June 25)
A demand by outspoken Republican internationalists, headed by Governor Walter E. Edge of New Jersey, that the party stand up and “take it” on the international issue, stood tonight as the chief possibility for important new development at the party’s national convention, which opens in the Chicago Stadium at 10:15 a.m. CT tomorrow.
The prospect that Governor Thomas E. Dewey of New York would become the presidential nominee and that Governor Earl Warren of California would be called upon to take the vice-presidential honor increased hourly.
The dominant party leaders, moreover, were intent upon centering on such policy declarations as would permit the Republicans to launch the 1944 election campaign with the utmost in harmony.
The likelihood of Mr. Dewey’s nomination increased immeasurably with a caucus of the 70-vote delegation of Pennsylvania, which went unanimously for the New York Governor. With this force, plus what he already had amassed in the states of New York, Illinois and California, Mr. Dewey had more than half the number of delegates needed to guarantee his nomination, while the addition of smaller delegations, either in whole or in part, ran his prospective total to well above the required 529.
Other states on bandwagon
Other states that climbed on the Dewey bandwagon during the day were New Jersey with 34 of 35 delegates, Michigan with 41, South Dakota with 11, Tennessee with 19, Connecticut with 16 and Massachusetts with 30 of 35.
After a conference, Governors Leverett Saltonstall of Massachusetts, Raymond E. Baldwin of Connecticut, William H. Wills of Vermont and Robert O. Blood of New Hampshire decided to support Governor Dewey and to notify Governor Bricker of their position.
The one possibility – it decreased from a “probability” to a “possibility” during the night – of a fight over the platform was the most tangible promise to date that the party conclave might rise above a dull meeting on ratification.
Governor Edge at first threatened to take the matter to the floor of the convention itself and there to insist upon a stronger and clearer stand in favor of international post-war collaboration than has yet been seriously proposed. He was uncertain of his course late tonight, however, after some of the convention managers had said that any attempt to tamper with the “official” foreign policy plank might result in a stronger “nationalist” position.
Any possibility of a serious contest over the presidential nomination had vanished well before today’s events. Selection of Governor Dewey as head of the national ticket had become so much a foregone certainty that his managers were considering plans to bring him to Chicago for an acceptance ceremony before the convention adjourns – Wednesday night or Thursday.
Bricker drive keeps on
Backers of John W. Bricker of Ohio were still boosting their candidate, but they conceded candidly that the drift seemed to be away from them. They had never claimed any more than a one-to-three chance for their man. They continued to reject, however, the suggestion that Mr. Bricker should withdraw before the balloting starts, and take the honor of putting Governor Dewey’s name before the convention.
Spokesmen for former Governor Harold E. Stassen had not determined what to do about their candidate, in the light of the evident Dewey bandwagon movement, and so continued for the time being with original plans to have his name presented.
The question of a vice-presidential candidate had not been so definitely settled, due to the persistent reluctance of Governor Warren, who will deliver the “keynote” address at tomorrow night’s session, to take it. Mr. Warren arrived in Chicago today and immediately reiterated his earlier assertions that he is not seeking, and does noy want, any place on the ticket. He said, further, that he had put his own California delegation under obligation not to advance him and not to support him if some other delegation puts him in nomination.
Governor Warren is regarded by most observers as the odds-on choice of the convention delegates for the vice-presidential place and therefore is expected to be induced to take it by the sheer pressure of the demand for him.
With the main candidate contests thus developing into lopsided affairs, the possibility of fireworks had reposed, before today, in the one slight chance that Wendell L. Willkie, the 1940 nominee, might come to Chicago, or send a statement, demanding changes in some of the party declarations. This possibility was waning with each passing hour, however.
Edge talks of the platform
It was under such circumstances that Governor Edge’s demands and warnings immediately captured the interest of the delegates and spectators, who literally swarmed about the hotel lobbies all day and far into the night.
Addressing the New Jersey caucus at the Hotel Blackstone, and after expressing his own hope that the delegation would support Governor Dewey – which it did – Governor Edge swung into his discussion of the platform.
The veteran leader said:
I am worried about the platform. I’m a definite internationalist. Either we take the responsibility to maintain the peace, or we do not, and all this talk of “peace force” is silly. We cannot escape a very leading position in world affairs. It is better to be a party to war with its mass murder, and I believe that the Eastern and coastal states feel that way about it. I’m sorry about the Midwest. But let’s give our nominees a platform that the Eastern and coastal states will be proud of.
Ready for convention fight
I hope the plank [on world affairs] will be satisfactory, but I’m serving notice here and now that I am willing and ready to carry the fight to the convention floor. It must be an out-and-out American plank.
At this point, after applause, a delegate moved that the New Jersey delegation be bound by resolution to support Mr. Edge’s stand. Before the question could be put to a vote – it was carried unanimously a few moments later – Senator Hawkes asked to be excused from voting on it, since he was a member of the Resolutions Committee.
Senator Hawkes added that he had seen Senator Austin, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Subcommittee, only a few minutes before and that Senator Austin had expressed approval of the plank in the form in which it then stood, the form of which Governor Edge disapproved, and that the plank had been unanimously recommended by the subcommittee to the full committee.
In an impromptu press conference a few moments later, Governor Edge said that his principal objection lay in the use of the words “peace force” in the plank, in referring to maintenance of peace by the United States after the present war.
He asked rhetorically:
What the devil is “peace force”? If it is force, it’s force and it’s better to tell the public about it, and not kid them.
Plank authors give warning
Authors of the compromise plank, which was unofficially adopted yesterday by the Resolutions Subcommittee on Foreign Affairs said that some changes might be made in the wording, but insisted that the substance of the plank would not be changed. Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg, who headed a pre-convention group of Republican leaders who evolved the declaration on the model of the so-called Mackinac Charter, warned that tampering with the proposal now might result in a greatly more “nationalistic” declaration.
Senator Vandenberg said:
If Governor Edge carries the fight to the convention floor, he may get the very thing he dislikes the most.
Leaders who have had opportunity during these few days to canvass opinion and feeling among the delegates and who, of course, assume that they represent the sentiments of their home districts, said that there was a strong current of “nationalist” and even “isolationist” in certain quarters of the party.
Governor Edge will likely await the official report of the Resolutions Committee, which was wrestling today with several other planks, before taking any definite action. The contest between national and international approaches to political problems was being waged over the party’s policies on international trade.
A subcommittee headed by former Governor Alf M. Landon of Kansas was trying to compose the views of two groups. One of these, led by Mr. Landon himself, favored a declaration favoring trade reciprocity among nations. The other, said to be sparked by former Senator Joseph R. Grundy of Pennsylvania, was reported as insisting that the party reassert its traditional doctrine of high tariffs in strongest possible language.
Drift to Dewey continues
The drift toward Mr. Dewey was marked throughout today and tonight as state delegations arrived, looked over the lay of the land, and went into caucus.
The Missouri contingent met for an hour, and then announced that it had divided – 19 for Mr. Dewey, four for Mr. Bricker, five not voting and seven absent.
The Illinois group, numbering 59, caucused late last night, and on a count of noses pledged 50 to Mr. Dewey. The nine others were regarded as largely favorable to Mr. Bricker.
The Oklahoma delegates were represented as lined up 22 for Mr. Dewey and one for Mr. Bricker, the one Brickerite being Senator E. H. Moore.
Favors rewriting international law
Proposed draft of Republican platform would prohibit robot planes
By C. P. Trussell
Chicago, Illinois –
A rewriting of international law to restore morality in the dealings of nations, to prohibit under extreme penalties such devices as robot planes, such practices as the execution of prisoners and other procedures repugnant to civilized society is proposed in the draft of the foreign policy plank submitted for the Republican platform, it was learned tonight.
In the same draft, it was disclosed authoritatively, the proposals for the establishment of post-war collaboration for maintenance of the peace leave room for the setting up of a Supreme United Nations Council, under which there could operate an assembly for dealing with international political problems and “regional tribunals” for the settlement of questions arising at various parts of the globe, the tribunals to function somewhat in the manner of large-scale circuit courts.
This, in addition to points of the plank disclosed previously, reportedly underwent discussion within the Platform Drafting Committee today as substantial agreement on a 16-point agricultural plank was reached after hours of consultation between the convention Committee on Agriculture and the Mackinac Island advisory group which made the party’s initial declarations last September.
At almost the same time, the Committee on Labor completed its trial draft of a plank which was expected to advocate the amendment of the National Labor Relations Act to “carry out both the spirit and purposes of the act” and specifically deprive the NLRB of authority arbitrarily to determine the kind of collective bargaining agent for workers employed in a plant and confer that authority upon the workers.
It was also expected that recommendation would be made for a reorganization of the Department of Labor “under a Secretary satisfactory to labor.”
Signs also appeared that the Republicans would attempt to get out front with specific plans and programs for the reconversion of industry to peacetime production.
Recommendations for a post-war readjustment of the tax structure to peacetime levels at the earliest practicable date were asserted to form a major phase of a plank submitted to the Platform Drafting Committee on Post-War Business, headed by Senator E. H. Moore of Oklahoma.
In this matter, the Moore Committee took direct issue with Henry Morgenthau Jr., Secretary of the Treasury, who recently contended that too-rapid approach to peacetime tax levels could not be expected.
Despite the spurts of action by plank-drafting committees and a four-day pre-convention start, no assurances were given by leaders tonight that the platform would be completed for presentation to the convention Tuesday as scheduled.
After an all-day session of the Drafting Committee, Senator Robert A. Taft of Ohio, the chairman, announced that it would work far into the night and reconvene again tomorrow morning.
After the formal appointment tomorrow of the Resolutions Committee, and its organization, a public hearing will be held to hear Van A. Bittner, assistant to Philip Murray, CIO president, in the United Steel Workers and a leader of the CIO Political Action Committee, and spokesmen for other national organizations which have not been heard by platform groups.
Not until after these spokesmen had been heard, Mr. Taft indicated, would the Resolutions Committee settle down in executive session to work out the final platform draft.
Program for agriculture
The 16 points upon which the committee and the Mackinac Island advisory body reached substantial agreement late today were, in brief, as follows:
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Denunciation of “bungling” and “impractical” production programs.
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Recognition of the role of agriculture in providing wealth and prosperity for the nation and demand that it receive equal encouragement and maintenance with labor and industry.
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A philosophy of abundance, rather than scarcity.
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Freedom by agriculture from “regimentation and impractical bureaucracy.”
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Recommendations for a reorganization of the Department of Agriculture under experienced administration free of politics and regimentation.
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U.S. markets for American farmers.
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Protection of the farm economy by fair prices.
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Opposition to subsidies “as a substitute for fair market prices.”
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Advocacy of support prices, commodity loans or a combination of both, with specialized means of meeting price situations in specialized fields.
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Demand for the orderly disposal of surpluses without disruption of production and without benefit to speculative profiteers.
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Control of future surpluses through the finding of new uses for products, the development of new markets and efficient domestic distribution.
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Research looking to the discovery of new crops and new uses for existing crops.
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Approval of farmer-owned and operated farmer cooperatives.
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Consolidation of farm credit under administration by a non-partisan board.
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“Adequate and fair” tariff protection to prevent foreign competition with American agricultural products.
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The making of life more attractive for the family-type farmer, with the development of rural roads, rural home and farm electrification and the elimination of the basic evils of tenancy wherever they are found to exist, and a “serious study and search” for “a sound program of crop insurance with emphasis upon establishment of a self-supporting program.”
On this latter point, the platform framers propose a comprehensive program for soil, forest, water and wildlife conservation and development and of irrigation projects as far as possible at state and local levels.
In discussing the tentative agreement by the agricultural plank drafters, Governor Bourke B. Hickenlooper of Iowa, chairman of the convention committee, explained that it was not certain that all of the points would be included in the draft submitted for party action.
To avoid overlapping
At one or more points, he brought out, the views and recommendations of the committee and its advisors overlapped those of the Foreign Trade Committee, headed by former Governor Alf M. Landon of Kansas, which worked through tonight on a proposed plank that was reported to be weighted heavily with protective tariff declarations. While there was agreement in general view between his committee and that of Mr. Landon, Governor Hickenlooper said, care would be taken to avoid infringements upon jurisdictions.
The Platform Drafting Committee, Senator Taft disclosed today, would be unable to hold the platform to 1,500 to 2,000 words, as had been hoped when the policy committee began its preparatory work. In fact, Mr. Taft observed, it will be “darn long.”
The Drafting Committee continued to pledge its members to secrecy as to what was going on within the west ballroom of the Stevens Hotel, where it was reported to be working through the night on such platform subjects as Negro problems, equal rights for women, social security, post-war organization of the Armed Forces, control of insurance and the coal industry and the St. Lawrence Seaway, besides the planks submitted by special committees.
‘Heavies’ hit Nazis in France five blows
8th Air Force bombers attack from Pas-de-Calais to Toulouse – RAF and 15th strike
By David Anderson
South of France now gets attention of Allied fliers
Behind the Normandy beachhead (shown in black at 1), U.S. and British planes continue to blast airfields and communications, while in the Pas-de-Calais area (2) they kept up their battering of rocket bomb installations. In central France, they attacked enemy plane nests at Bourges and Avord (3). Flying to points not far from the Spanish border, Allied airmen struck at fuel depots and airdromes around Toulouse and Blagnac (4). Meanwhile, Italy-based bombers smashed at railroads and bridges north and west of Marseille (5), on the southern coast.
SHAEF, England –
Flying high over the Normandy battle zone and southward another 400 miles to within 70 miles of the Spanish border, a powerful force of U.S. heavy bombers yesterday attacked a Nazi fuel dump and airdromes in the Toulouse area.
Other Liberators and Flying Fortresses striking from Italy blasted bridges over the Rhône River at Avignon, 170 miles east of Toulouse, and other enemy traffic and oil targets north and west of Marseille.
The 8th Air Force’s Fortresses and Liberators from Britain, also smashing at targets among the Nazis’ flying-bomb installations in Pas-de-Calais, made a third attack in the evening on Luftwaffe fields in northern France and bridges southeast of Paris. The airdromes hit included Villacoublay and Brétigny.
Steady Allied attacks from west and south Sunday night were indicated by Nazi radio reports of planes over Germany and the Danube area.
While these heavy-bomber missions were being carried out, medium and light components of the Allied air forces swarmed across northwestern France in search of German troop movements and on wrecking jobs against specific objectives.
The battle within the Battle of France is being waged relentlessly against the enemy’s pilotless plane installations in Pas-de-Calais.
Thousands of U.S., Canadian and British bombers and fighters continued yesterday their hammering of the well-concealed, strongly built placements buried in woods and scattered among farms in the strip of France back of the coast from Dieppe to Ostend, about 30 miles in depth.
In the twelve hours ended at 3:00 a.m. Sunday, at least 1,000 heavy bombers of the Royal Air Force went on duty over the Pas-de-Calais area.
Liberators of the 8th Air Force attacked 12 power stations connected with the robot bases and returned without loss.
The Nazis’ pilotless planes continued smashing homes and killing people in the south of England yesterday, although in a greatly reduced scale compared with last week.
Allied air operations in every form against the Nazis were stepped up yesterday compared with Saturday. Some idea of the scope of these operations will be gathered from Saturday’s activity when 6,000 sorties were flown on 200 missions.
The persistent U.S. and RAF fighter-bomber attacks on enemy communications leading in the direction of Normandy were maintained yesterday with the same intensity that has marked recent operations.
Bridges, fuel, Nazi tanks and rolling stock in the Dreux-Chartres-Mantes area were blasted and shot up. On the railroad between Chartres and Mantes, west of Paris, the tracks were severed in four places and direct hits were scored on a tunnel.
An outstanding success was achieved by a group of U.S. fighter-bombers that attacked chokepoints on the railway linking Paris and Orléans, a 75-mile stretch of electrified line carrying heavy traffic. It runs through a series of deep and narrow cuttings. Seven of these cuttings were bombed, the rails ripped up and the banks sent tumbling onto the roadbeds.
Denny: Blasting of forts viewed from ‘box seat’ on cliff
By Harold Denny
With U.S. forces before Cherbourg, France – (June 25)
Few battles have been as visible and as spectacular as today’s. I watched much of it from the edge of a cliff looking directly down on most of Cherbourg, like a box seat at a theater. It was the forward observation post of one of the leading elements in this assault and for a while an officer watched and gave directions for the supporting artillery fire.
In today’s battle were our infantry, artillery, tanks and even our warships, while the Germans were fighting back with heavy coastal guns, field artillery, machine guns, rifles and nasty-sounding rockets. And the operations of all these were spread out in full view on the stage below.
The day was warm and brilliant.
A big quarry had been dug into a cliff on the edge of the village of Hau Gringore, a suburb of Cherbourg, where 300 prisoners were taken when it fell yesterday. The quarry was still making trouble, however. With tunnels it was connected with the coastal plain and with Fort de Roule on our left, still unconquered then. Sometimes the Germans crept through the tunnel, fired a few bursts in our direction and retreated back. So, guards were posted there and eventually the mouth of the tunnel was blown up, after a dozen or two French men, women and children, with their baggage, dogs and cats, had been ushered from their shelters to a point beyond the town.
Three women captured
Among yesterday’s prisoners, an officer told me, were three women. One was a Ukrainian girl, together with her very young Ukrainian husband, who said they had been brought here as captives and forced to work as servants of the Germans. The girl was in an advanced state of pregnancy.
On our left, between us and Fort du Roule, was a fire-blackened ridge up which the Germans would sometime creep and open fire with machine guns. We could hear our infantry toiling up its slope.
To our right, across a green valley dotted with gray, little red-roofed houses and garden patches crisscrossed with hedges, was a ridge topped by German fortifications. Troops from another American unit were advancing on it from the other side of the ridge and American tanks could be seen nosing about on our side of the ridge. Those Germans were trapped.
City proper little damaged
Tourists who visited France in better days will remember the six-mile-long breakwater studded with the medieval-looking French fortifications that made this artificial harbor. On your left, as you used to enter Cherbourg on the liner Normandie from New York, you probably noticed an old fort and lighthouse on Île Pelée, which forms one doorpost of the main entrance through the breakwater. As your ship steamed farther in through the inner breakwater, you may have seen a similar old fort, Des Flamands, on your left as you turned into the French Line pier.
From my box seat, I could see the western half of the town of the ship canal, just to the west of the French Line pier. The city itself looked little damaged, but empty and dead. Few civilians are left there now.
Pelée and Flamands made nuisances of themselves to our troops yesterday, so at 8 o’clock this morning, our dive bombers smacked them and also Fort du Roule and the German positions on the ridge to our right. When I arrived in the frontline an hour later, Flamands and Pelée were silent, and smoke poured from the fortifications on the ridge to our right. The forts on the ridge still fired, however, and 88mm shells occasionally came in from Fort du Roule. And on a sandspit to my left of Flamands, as I saw it, were three determined 88s – pestiferous guns, with a hard, flat report and a shell that comes so fast you can hardly duck. They had fired all night and were at it again today.
Navy guns back artillery
Sitting beside me with field glasses was Army Lt. James S. Timothy of Washington, DC. He was observing for some 81mm howitzers behind, and this was an artilleryman’s dream. He called for blank range and down came his shells smack on the target. Billows of gray and yellow smoke, sand and black-burning explosive poured up, and we could see the Germans running for their dugouts. Lt. Timothy sent in shell after shell, but the Germans had their guns mounted in dugouts. They ran the guns out on tracks to shoot and then withdrew them. The German fire grew less frequent but persisted.
This was what we wanted to pacify; those forts that had been holding us up, geysers began appearing in the water just off Fort des Flamands. The Navy was firing a “ladder,” each shell moving in closer to the guns on that sandspit. Finally, they fell directly on the enemy positions. Then our ships opened up with shells that turned that little strip into a hell of red flame, black smoke and yellow dust.
I sat beside a Navy observer and could hear over his telephone the gibberish in which one officer on a distant ship conversed with him. The Navy gave the Germans a few more salvos and that was the end of that opposition.
Then the German nebelwerfers in the city began their big incendiary rockets toward our men off the right. They make an indescribable noise – something like titanic horse whinnying, or a gigantic aching creak – and you can see their missiles sail through the air. They make great bursts of flame where they hit and send up clouds of oily black smoke. They set grass fires and it seemed that the Germans were trying to burn our fellows out that way.
15 scout way into town
Meanwhile, an audacious patrol of 15 men, led by Lt. Shirley Landon of Spokane, Washington, went out around the right edge of the ridge and into the town, to scout the best way for the infantry to enter the city. We watched them anxiously through glasses as they skirted hedges and dodged behind the buildings below. Lt. Timothy and his mortars were ready to give fire support to them if they got into trouble.
We watched Lt. Landon, walking ahead, signal his men and they deployed across an open field and disappeared behind some buildings. They were daringly far into the town. We heard rifle fire down where they were but could see nothing. A general came up and watched, too. There was perhaps half an hour of suspense, which we relieved by watching our tanks maneuver across a valley, and then someone shouted.
Up the lane towards us came two doughboys and after them a long line of Germans with their hands clasped over their heads. Other doughboys walked at their flanks and a few more brought up the rear. I counted 78 prisoners before a startling explosion in my ear jarred my count and mystified me until I learned it had been one of our own blasts. Afterward, I learned there were 81 prisoners.
A Frenchman in the town met the patrol and pointed out the Germans in a ditch at the edge of a highway behind it. Pfc. William K. Petty of Indianapolis went in and flushed them out. Three started to pick up their rifles but they were instantly disarmed and all marched back.
Things were getting warm again on that right-hand ridge. At times this afternoon, it was like watching a circus, where so much was going on in different rings that it was impossible to see everything.
Those German fortifications were wreathed in smoke, and vehicles parked near them had disappeared. Yet some of them kept shooting. One 175mm coastal gun took potshots at one of our warships. It was just as if our warships had lost their tempers. They cut loose on the fortress then. Vast explosions shook the ground and pillars of smoke and dust rose. Then we saw a white flag go up above the skyline. The warships ceased firing. A few minutes later, we saw a long column of Germans come out of the fort and march toward our tanks in formation to give themselves up. Everybody on the cliff cheered, and that’s how the way was cleared for our infantry attack into the town, which began soon after. The way was not entirely cleared. Some surviving nebelwerfers still fired at us, and the enemy artillerymen and machine-gunners persisted. But the way had been cleared enough for our fellows to go ahead.
Americans drive closer to Leghorn
Reach point 32 miles from port city, which Germans seem ready to quit
…
Japanese losses in Marianas soar
Nimitz checkup adds three warships to damaged list and 109 planes downed
By George F. Horne
USPACFLT HQ, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii – (June 25)
One hundred and nine aircraft and several damaged ships have been added to the enemy’s losses in the Marianas campaign as a result of a more complete checkup.
Adm. Chester W. Nimitz stated in a communiqué this afternoon that the latest reports on actions in the Marianas and Philippine Sea areas last Sunday and Monday brought enemy plane losses up considerably and added a heavy cruiser, a light cruiser and a light aircraft carrier to the roster of enemy fleet units damaged by our aircraft.
Our own losses have now been completely tabulated for the first time and they have been fairly severe in aircraft and fliers, although not at all large when viewed in the light of enemy losses and the magnitude of the actions involved.
The official score of the Marianas campaign from June 10 to June 23 follows:
| Japan | U.S. | |
|---|---|---|
| Ships sunk | 30 | 0 |
| Probably sunk | 2 | 0 |
| Ships damaged | 51 | 4 |
| Barges sunk | 13 | 0 |
| Planes lost | 747 | 151 |
| Fliers lost | ? | 98 |
In addition, our forces damaged four aircraft and probably destroyed 16.
Our greatest plane loss occurred in the battle in the Philippine Sea last Monday, when our fliers attacked the Japanese task force. The damage to four of our ships, including two carriers, was reported minor.
Adm. Nimitz reported that U.S. Marine and Army forces had launched an attack against enemy ground forces on Saipan and had forged ahead against continuing stiff resistance. Advances on the western U.S. flank and around Mount Tapochau range from 500 to 800 yards.
This attack, preceded by intense naval gunfire and ground artillery preparation, occurred yesterday.
Enemy aircraft twice attacked us on Friday, dropping bombs among our transports off Saipan that did minor damage to several landing craft. That evening, a small flight of enemy planes dropped several bombs among our ground forces on Saipan Island, but casualties were very light.
The admiral’s recapitulation of damage and losses inflicted on the enemy disclosed that a week ago in the Sunday attack on our big fleet by swarms of enemy aircraft, we destroyed 402 planes, of these 369 were shot down by our carrier-based fighter planes in one of the great victories of the war for this category of warplane.
Eighteen enemy planes were brought down by anti-aircraft fire and 15 were destroyed on the ground in corollary engagements.
In this battle, we lost 27 aircraft, 18 pilots and six aircrewmen.
The communiqué said:
In the attack by our carrier aircraft upon units of the Japanese Fleet in the late afternoon of June 19 [Monday], one heavy cruiser and one light cruiser, neither of which was previously reported, were damaged.
One light carrier, not previously reported, received seven 500‑pound bomb hits. One of the three tankers previously reported sunk has been. transferred to the severely damaged category.
Twenty-six enemy aircraft were shot down, instead of the previously reported 17 to 22. We lost 22 pilots and 27 aircrewmen from 95 aircraft either shot down by the enemy or forced to land in the water.
Adm. Nimitz said the fighter sweep over Iwo Jima in the Volcano group on Friday cost the enemy 116 craft instead of 60 and said 11 more were probably shot down. We lost five fighters instead of four.
Fleet headquarters today made public the text of a message to Adm. Nimitz and the fleet from Adm. King, Commander-in-Chief, who said U.S. aircrews had established a new high in performance and that the damage done to the enemy was “unequaled in all seagoing aviation.”
Japanese claim 11 carriers
In a Dōmei broadcast from Tokyo, the Japanese claimed yesterday that thus far in the Mariana naval-air battle, U.S. losses included eleven aircraft carriers, four battleships and six cruisers sunk or damaged and more than 400 planes destroyed, the Associated Press said.
The broadcast said 70 U.S. fighters and bombers appeared over the Bonin Islands, north of the Marianas, on Saturday and claimed Japanese fighters shot down 37.
A Berlin broadcast, quoting a Dōmei dispatch, said that since Saturday morning the Japanese Air Force had sunk two carriers southeast of the Bonin Island group and a 10,000-ton transport east of Saipan.
Use of Cherbourg expected quickly
Limited utilization 24 hours after capture seen – Army repair units ready
SHAEF, England (AP) –
Cherbourg’s multiple harbors and elaborate port installations offered the Germans many chances for demolitions and obstructions, but it was doubtful whether their best efforts could prevent the Allies from swiftly exploiting this prize once it was securely in their hands.
Eyewitness reports have told of many fires and explosions in the dock area and apparently some attempt has been made to block the entrance to the basin where transatlantic liners once docked, but it will be a surprise if limited unloadings are not underway within 24 hours after the capture, and if a flood of men and supplies is not pouring in within ten days.
Moving in from the outside, ships come first to the outer roads of the great deep-water basin, about nine miles from east to west and two miles north to south. The basin is protected on three sides by land and on the north by some of the world’s greatest breakwaters. It is entered by two channels, each nearly 2,000 feet wide. It is regarded as impossible that the Germans can prevent the use of this anchorage, which could take many hundreds of big ships, even at low water.
Next is the inner basin, about four miles long and two miles wide, which is entered through a 1,500-foot gap in the breakwater. If the Germans have three or four big ships in the harbor – as is doubtful – they will probably try to close this channel.
Quai de France has best docks
Sticking out into the inner basin from the shore is a massive 1,800-foot quay, the Quai de France, on the east side of which are the best and deepest slip and docks, where four or five sizeable merchant ships could unload simultaneously. The entrance to this basin is about 600 feet wide, between the quay and the jetty, to the east, and there are reports that ships have already been sunk across it.
On the west side of the quay is a narrow channel, about 225 feet wide and 600 feet long, leading to the inner commercial basin and tidal drydock, which could presumably be blocked quite easily. Similarly, the entrance to the triple naval basins, about three-quarters of a mile to the west, is only about 275-300 feet across and might be blocked. The 25-foot tide offers a great advantage for swift clearing of any blocks, however, since it permits the cutting and blasting of obstacles at low tide.
Troops specially trained
The job of rehabilitation, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said yesterday, will be greatly facilitated by a new unit, likely to play a prominent part in the war from now on. It is the Port Repair Ship Company, manned and operated entirely by Army engineers.
These men, dubbed “sailjers,” have been specially trained in this country for such jobs. Many of the Army divers got their experience working on the salvaging of USS Lafayette in New York, in conjunction with Navy divers. Others received their training at the Harbor Clearance School, run by the Corps of Engineers at Fort Screven, Georgia.
Among the first troops entering Cherbourg will be engineer port construction and port repair groups. These units will approach their objective, the harbor installations, by land. At the same time, engineer port repair shop companies, protected by our naval guns, will be using a water route to enter the harbor.