Simms: Axis fears Mediterranean offensive (10-23-42)

The Pittsburgh Press (October 23, 1942)

Axis fears Mediterranean offensive

By William Philip Simms, Scripps-Howard staff writer

Washington –
A United Nations offensive to drive Germany and Italy out of North Africa and open up the Mediterranean to Allied shipping this winter is expected by Hitler, Mussolini, Laval and other Axisites.

London and Madrid report that American and Fighting French forces – larger, perhaps, than the entire British Eighth Army of the Nile – are already in the Lake Chad region, that is to say within 650 miles of the southern border of Italian Libya. The new army is said to be fully equipped for desert warfare.

To meet the menace, Hitler is tightening his hold on Italy, France and the Balkans. He is understood to have sent Himmler to Rome with a personal message to Il Duce warning him to be ready to meet attacks from entirely new directions, not only in Africa but in Italy as well. At the same time, the Vichy government has rushed Adm. Darlan by plane to Dakar to stiffen defenses there.

Meanwhile, grapevine reports – usually without official confirmation – continue to pour in concerning American and Allied troop movements all the way from Gambia, next door to Dakar, down the African west coast past Freetown, Monrovia, Lagos and Douala to Brazzaville in French Equatorial Africa. Fire or no fire, there is an amazing amount of smoke.

The impression that the Sahara is an impassable waste of flaming sand is, of course, a hangover from the days when there were neither airplanes nor tractors. The camel was the one means of getting from place to place, and that was slow and dangerous. A caravan that ran out of water or lost its way perished miserably of thirst.

Today it is perfectly feasible for an army to cross the desert and do it in double-quick time. Motor-driven vehicles and caterpillar treads have made this possible. There are even fairly well-established routes connecting Lake Chad with the Axis base at Tripoli, on the Mediterranean. In fact, the first white men to lay eyes on Lake Chad, in 1823, started out from Tripoli, as did the second party which explored the region in 1850. It may very well be, therefore, that Hitler and Mussolini are not just seeing things; their nightmares may come true.

Lake Chad is about 700 miles from Douala, which is at the very bottom of the Bight of Biafra, part of the Gulf of Guinea. It is fed by the Shari and other rivers and has no outlet. Yet it seems to be drying up. A town which the 1,850 explorers found on its edge is now some 20 miles distant.

Nevertheless, Lake Chad is strategically important – so much so, in fact, that Mussolini has never ceased trying to wangle it away from France. He contended – and events may prove him right – that it was a menace to Italy’s position in North Africa.

At one time, Germany, Britain and France all thought the Chad area so promising economically that they quarreled over it. Finally, however, in the 1890s, they divided its shores along themselves, and France fell heir to German’s share after World War I.

The country around Chad ranges from 850 to 1,000 feet above sea level. And while it has not lived up to original expectations as a producing colony, the French have found it an asset. Fort Lamy, now in the hands of the Free French, is one of the keystones of Equatorial Africa.

The terrain between Lake Chad and Tripoli is rough, and in places even mountainous, ranging from 1,000 to almost 9,000 feet high, and frost in winter is not uncommon. For a large part of the distance, boulders, rather than sand, make the going tough.

An offensive from the direction of Chad would be no picnic. To succeed, it would have to be organized down to the last ounce of materiel. Alone it would probably be impossible against a real defense based on Tripoli, Benghazi and other Libyan ports. But if the British Army of the Nile ripped Marshal Rommel’s forces to pieces from the east, an attack from the south, via Chad, might well finish them off. In any event, the French have proved time and again that the Sahara is negotiable.

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