British Prime Minister Churchill ordered General Wavell to prioritize the campaign in Greece over that in North Africa. Prime Minister Winston Churchill formally instructs General Sir Archibald Wavell, Commander in Chief Middle East Command, to regard help for Greece as having a higher priority than exploiting the success in North Africa. He mentions the important effect on American opinion of being seen to fulfill promises to smaller nations. Colonel William J. “Wild Bill” Donovan, the U.S. Coordinator of Information (COI), has recently been on a tour of the Balkans on President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s behalf and is known to value the idea of fighting the Germans there. The British also hope to make a good impression on Turkey and perhaps even establish a Balkan coalition against Hitler.
Having stopped at Palermo, Sicily, the convoy carrying the very first elements of what will become the Afrikakorps (DAK) departs for the final leg to Tripoli. This is by far the most hazardous portion of the convoy route, both due to the presence of the Royal Navy but also because of mines and RAF aerial surveillance. The transports carrying the 5th Light Division troops should dock in Tripolitania on the 11th.
Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies, whose troops have been a key component in the victories achieved over the Italians in the recent Operation Compass, has lunch with British Middle East Commander General Archibald Wavell. He records the following conclusions in his private diary:
(a) Tripoli probably not worthwhile;
(b) Aggregation principle for AIF good, but must not be too rigid — e.g., guarding Canal or tackling Dodecanese. Difficult to find a front which will occupy entire Corps.
(c) Victory at Keren and Massawa would end East African campaign;
(d) Thinks we should consider forming a Second Corps Headquarters.
The mention of Tripoli is significant, because, if Wavell knew that the Germans were on the verge of landing there, he might not think it was “not worthwhile.”
In Libya, General O’Connor’s XIII Corps continues clearing the region from Benghazi to El Agheila. O’Connor is seeking permission to proceed further west and south to Tripolitania and has sent a liaison officer to Cairo to get permission from Wavell.
The Italians made desperate counter-attacks on Greek lines in Albania in the last 24 hours but were repulsed every time, leaving the field strewn with dead and wounded, a government spokesman said tonight. The thrusts were concentrated west of the Drinos River, on the central Albanian front, where fierce fighting has been raging for the past 10 days.
1st Punjab Regiment of Indian 3rd Battalion captured Brig’s Peak near Keren, Eritrea, Italian East Africa. After a one-day pause, the British Indian troops at Keren resume their attacks. Today, they focus on the left side of the Dongolaas Gorge and don’t attack the right side at all. The 3/1st Punjab Regiment attacks Brig’s Peak and Sanchil Peak next to it. As on their previous attack, the Indian troops are vulnerable to artillery and small-arms fire both at the mountain and on the approaches from the Cameron Ridge. 4th Indian Division had launched a two-battalion attack on the heights east of the gorge. Both sides fought with stubborn gallantry; Brig’s Peak was taken twice and lost twice; two other fiercely-held features were taken and given up. Subadar Richpal Ram, of the 4/6 Rajputana Rifles, was awarded a posthumous VC; his battalion suffered 123 casualties and the other 4/11 Sikhs, lost more than 100 men.
To the south, British General Cunningham launched Operation CANVAS against Italian positions on the Juba River in Italian Somaliland. British forces smashing southward through Eritrea in a massive nutcracker offensive have occupied the Red sea port of Mersa Taclal, the Middle East command announced today. The new drive against Eritrea, oldest colony of Italy’s East African empire, was launched from the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan on the north. It is designed to join forces with the one which already has penetrated 110 miles from the west to the rail town of Cheren. Besides Mersa Taclal, 40 miles down the coast from the Sudan frontier, the British announced the capture of Kakora, rail frontier town 40 miles northwest of the seized port. In North Africa, where the British are reported to have negotiated 200 miles of the 600-mlle stretch between them and Tripoli, today’s war bulletin said British mopping-up operations were “proceeding satisfactorily” up to El Aghelia, little barracks outpost 180 miles southwest of Benghazi.
At Kismayo, Somalia, the Axis authorities can see the writing on the wall regarding the approaching British troops. Eight ships make a break for it after dark, trying to escape to more secure ports. The Royal Navy, however, is patrolling offshore with improvised Force T. Heavy cruiser HMS Hawkins captures:
3809-ton Italian freighter Adria,
5490-ton Italian freighter Savoia,
5644-ton Italian freighter Erminia Mazzella,
5594-ton Italian freighter Manon, and
7515-ton Italian freighter Leonardo da Vinci.
German 7201-ton freighter Uckermark is approached by the aircraft carrier HMS Eagle of Force T and its crew scuttle it.
2315-ton Italian freighter Duca Degli Abruzzi and 2699 ton Italian freighter Somalia are the only two of the eight ships that make good their escapes. They make it to Diego Suarez.
Operation COLOSSUS: A British paratrooper raid destroyed an aqueduct in Calitri, Italy. The operation had negligible impact on the war and 35 paratroopers were captured, but lessons learned from it helped to improve the effectiveness of later airborne operations.
While the action at the front remains quiet on 10 February 1941, the Allied capitals are buzzing with discussions about how to meet the expected German invasion of Greece via Bulgaria. According to today’s Defence Committee minutes in London, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill remains determined to help the Greeks. He is less impressed with the Turks, who, according to the Defence Committee minutes, he feels is “shirking her responsibilities.” However, a neutral Turkey on the right of the line would be useful, and a spirited defense in Greece might induce the Turks “and possibly the Yugoslavs” to fight the Germans as well. The meeting reaches a somewhat uncertain conclusion, with it being “generally expressed that it was essential for us to come to the assistance of the Greeks if they would have us.”
Great Britain broke off relations today with Rumania, which has become a base for the German air force and hundreds of thousands of Nazi troops moving steadily into southeastern Europe. Sir Reginald Hoare, Britain’s aged, invalid minister, went to the office of Premier General Ion Antonescu at noon, informed him that the parting of the ways had come, and prepared to sail from Constanta- with his diplomatic mission for Istanbul. United States Minister Franklin Mott Gunther arranged to take over Britain’s remaining interests in this country. Sir Reginald’s meeting with Antonescu was described by intimates as “exceedingly painful.” A walking stick in his hand and a flower in his buttonhole, the British minister stepped from his automobile in front of the premier’s office. He had to walk around a long line of parked gray German military automobiles to reach the curb. Most of Germany’s oil supplies come from Rumania, and German engineers have for some time been running the country’s oil wells. When German troops began arriving, Antonescu said that they were to train the Rumanian army. The British told him that a full expeditionary force was not needed to train a few Rumanians.
Deliveries of the first 20 home-grown IAR 80 fighters begin today to operational units of the 8th Fighter Group. The aircraft uses a licensed Gnome-Rhône 14K II Mistral Major engine (870 hp (650 kW) IAR K14-III C32 engine, switched to the 960 hp (716 kW) K14-IV C32 engine for the 21st through 50th versions).
Coincidentally, a Bf 109 arrives at Brasov today for purposes of testing a DB 601 1175hp engine on the IAR 80. Romanian pilots have complained that the engine in the plane is underpowered, and it also is in short supply. However, ultimately the DB 601 engine (removed from the Messerschmitt and transplanted into the IAR 80) is found to cause vibrations in flight and is not used.
With German troops poised on her northern frontier, little Bulgaria has been informed by Soviet Russia not to expect the Red Army’s aid if Germany should swing into this country, reliable diplomatic quarters reported tonight.
President Roosevelt’s personal envoy to London Harry Hopkins boards a plane to fly back to Washington.
In occupied Amsterdam, tensions are brewing. There are street clashes between SA street thugs and Jewish supporters. The Amsterdam-based daily resistance newspaper resistance paper “Nieuwsbrief van Pieter’t Hoen,” which was founded on July 25, 1940 became “Het Parool” (meaning “The Password” or “The Motto”.)
RAF Bomber Command dispatches 6 Blenheims during daylight on a CIRCUS raid to Dunkirk — all bombed — and 6 other Blenheims on cloud-cover raids; 4 of these bombed various targets. No losses.
RAF Bomber Command dispatches 222 aircraft overnight — 112 Wellingtons, 46 Hampdens, 34 Blenheims, 30 Whitleys — to industrial targets in Hanover. 4 aircraft — 2 Wellingtons, 1 Blenheim, 1 Hampden — were lost and 3 more aircraft were shot down in England by German Intruders. 183 aircraft claimed to have bombed their primary targets; 32 aircraft bombed alternative targets. Crews reported good visibility, large explosions and many fires started. Hanover is the location of a major manufacturer of U-boats. No report is available from Hanover.
RAF Bomber Command dispatches 43 aircraft overnight to oil-storage tanks at Rotterdam. Included in this force were 3 Stirlings, of 7 Squadron, making the first operational flights of this new type of aircraft. There were no losses. The 119 Wellingtons provided by 3 Group on this night represented the first time a group had dispatched more than 100 aircraft. The Short Stirling heavy bombers makes its operational debut as bombers of No. 7 Squadron RAF bomb oil storage facilities at Rotterdam, the Netherlands, overnight. Three Stirlings, led by Sqn. Ldr. Griffith-Jones, DFC, carry out the first RAF four-engined bomber attack against oil installations and docks in Rotterdam.
Six Whitley bombers of No. 91 Squadron RAF delivered 38 paratroopers of British No. 11 Special Air Service Battalion to the Tragino aqueduct in southern Italy at 2200 hours in what was codenamed Operation COLOSSUS. They were to plant explosives on one of the columns to stop supplies of fresh water to nearby military and civilian centers. Operation COLOSSUS however ends in fiasco. Eight officers and 31 soldiers took off from Malta in Whitley V bombers of Nos. 51 and 78 Squadrons and make a parachute landing onto a virtually uninhabited area. After they had fulfilled their mission and were marching toward the coast where a submarine was waiting for them, they were spotted and taken captive.
The mysterious British troops that landed on Malta on the 9th in six converted Whitley bombers, a complete mystery to the British forces there, fly off again as mysteriously as they arrived at 18:30. This is Operation COLOSSUS, an operation by 38 paratroopers of No. 2 Commando, No. 11 Special Air Service Battalion who are designated as X Force. They head north, where they drop near the town of Calitri in southern Italy. The objective is an aqueduct crossing the Tragino River in Campania near Monte Vulture. This carries the water supply for the Italian naval base at Taranto at the southern tip of Italy.
The British troops of Operation COLOSSUS arrive over the Italian drop zone at 21:42. The paratroopers from the first five planes land quite near or in the drop zone. However, the sixth plane for some reason misses the drop zone completely and ultimately drops its six paratroopers in a valley two miles from the aqueduct about two hours later. Ordinarily, this might not have been a problem, given planned redundancy; however, this final plane just happens to be carrying Royal Engineer sappers and their demolition equipment. The commander of the force, Major T.A.G. Pritchard, forms a hedgehog around the bridge, but at first determines that he has insufficient explosions to demolish the aqueduct (which is found to be constructed, not of brick, but of reinforced concrete). However, he picks a particularly vulnerable spot around the western pier and manages to blow up both the aqueduct and another nearby bridge over the Ginestra River.
At this point, the Commandos split up into three groups and head for pickup on the coast. A local farmer spots the Pritchard group, and local carabinieri (police) soon arrives and arrests them. Another commando group tries to bluff their way out by claiming to be Germans, but the carabinieri round them up, too. All of the groups wind up as POWs, and the Italian translator with them is given to the Blackshirts, tortured, and executed. To add to the mission’s later reputation as a fiasco, the submarine sent to pick the commandos up, HMS Triumph, must rescue the crew of a crashed Whitley (conducting a diversionary raid at Foggia airport) and would have been unavailable for the pick-up anyway because of security concerns that its location had been identified.
The operation is a technical success and a strategic failure. The aqueduct is repaired quickly, and the Italian base is unaffected because it has other short-term water supplies. The best result of Operation Colossus for the British is that the military learns that more planning is necessary for the troops after they are on the ground, not just on how to get them to the target.
There are reports of a Luftwaffe air raid on Iceland. The only slight activity takes place over England, with a few bombs dropped on East Anglia.
Werner Mölders claims his 56th victory.
The RAF raids Colato, Rhodes.
Today marks Malta’s 300th air raid of the war. It is a minor raid by one bomber at 18:40, with the aircraft dropping bombs at Hal Far airfield and Kalafrana.
U-37 sank British steamer Brandenburg (1473grt) from convoy HG.53 in 36-10N, 15-38W. At 0633 hours on 10 February 1941, U-37 fired two G7e torpedoes at a big tanker in convoy HG-53 west of Gibraltar but missed and heard later two detonations. Clausen thought that he had hit two other ships in the convoy. In fact, the Brandenburg (Master William Henderson) was hit by both torpedoes and sank immediately. The master, 21 crew members and one gunner were lost. The day before, the ship had picked up 31 survivors from Courland and all except one were lost in the second sinking. The sole survivor was picked up by HMS Velox (D 34) (LtCdr E.G. Roper, DSC, RN) and landed at Gibraltar. The 1,473-ton Brandenburg was carrying pyrites and sulfur was bound for Leith, England.
U-52 sank British steamer Canford Chine (3364grt), which was straggling behind convoy OG.52, in 55N, 15W. At 1435 hours on 10 Feb 1941 the unescorted Canford Chine (Master Neil Macdougall), a straggler from convoy OG-52 since 8 February, was hit underneath the bridge by one G7e torpedo from U-52 about 165 miles southwest of Rockall. The ship broke in two and sank after being hit amidships by a coup de grâce at 1535 hours. The Germans later observed a lifeboat under sails at the sinking position, but the survivors were never seen again. The master, 33 crew members and two gunners were lost. The 3,364-ton Canford Chine was carrying coal and was bound for Uriburu, Argentina.
Naval drifter HMS Boy Alan (109grt, Skipper E. H. Crowe DSC RNR) was sunk in a collision in the Thames Estuary.
British steamer Benmacdhui (6869grt) was damaged by German bombing in 52-42N, 2-00E. The steamer arrived at Tees on the 12th under her own power.
Destroyer HMS Diamond at Tobruk reported her stern glands were leaking seriously on the 10th. Destroyer HMS Hereward was sent immediately from Alexandria to relieve her. Destroyer Diamond departed Tobruk on the 12th escorting tug St Issey and damaged steamers Crista and Rodi for Alexandria. These ships arrived at Alexandria on the 16th.
Submarine HMS Regent departed Alexandria to relieve submarine HMS Truant on patrol off Tripoli. Submarine Truant proceeded to Malta, arriving on the 13th.
Submarine HMS Rover unsuccessfully attacked an Italian submarine off Calabria.
During the night of 10/11 February, eight Italian and two German ships escaped from Kismaya. Italian steamers Adria (3809grt), Savoia (5490grt), Erminia Mazzella (5644grt), Manon (5594grt), and Leonardo Da Vinci (7515grt) were captured by heavy cruiser HMS Hawkins. Steamer Savoia was later used by the British as Empire Arun. Steamer Erminia Mazzella was used as Impala and later as Agulhas. Steamer Leonardo Da Vinci was later used by the British as Empire Clyde. German steamer Uckermark (7021grt) scuttled herself on the 12th off Italian Somaliland when intercepted by Aircraft carrier HMS Eagle aircraft and light cruiser HMS Ceres. Italian steamer Pensilvania (6861grt) was sunk on the 13th by Aircraft carrier Eagle aircraft and heavy cruiser Hawkins. German steamer Askari (590grt) was sunk on the 13th by Aircraft carrier Eagle aircraft. Of the ten ships from Kismaya, only Italian steamers Duca Degli Abruzzi (2315grt) and Somalia (2699grt) escaped and arrived at Diego Suarez.
Convoy BS.15 departed Suez, escorted by sloops HMS Clive and HMIS Hindustan. The convoy was dispersed on the 16th.
Convoy SL.65 departed Freetown escorted by armed merchant cruiser HMS Bulolo to 2 March, sloop HMS Milford to 13 February, corvettes HMS Asphodel and HMS Calendula to 13 February.
Convoy SLS.65 also departed Freetown on the 10th. The convoy rendezvoused with convoy SL.65/13th.
Light cruiser HMS Kenya joined on the 13th to protect convoys SL.65 and SLS.65. The light cruiser was relieved on the 20th by light cruiser HMS Sheffield, which departed Gibraltar on the 18th, to 1 March. Light cruiser Kenya arrived at Gibraltar on the 22nd. On 2 March, anti-aircraft cruiser HMS Dido joined and continued to 7 March. Destroyers HMS Brighton, HMS Broadway, HMS Caldwell, HMS Rockingham, HMS Vanoc, HMS Volunteer, and HMS Walker, sloop HMS Fleetwood, corvettes HMS Dianella and HMS Tulip, anti-submarine yacht HMS Philante, and catapult ship HMS Pegasus joined the escort on 4 March. Destroyers HMS Mansfield and HMS Woolston joined on 5 March. Cruiser HMS Dido, destroyers HMS Mansfield and HMS Woolston, and anti-submarine yacht HMS Philante were detached on 7 March, and arrived on 8 March.
This day in Washington, President Roosevelt conferred with Congressional leaders on the legislative program, discussed National Youth Administration appropriations with a group of House members, and conferred on the world situation with Secretaries Hull, Knox, and Stimson, General George C. Marshall, and Admiral Harold R. Stark.
The Senate completed Congressional action on the bill appropriating $175,000,000 for Army clothing and personal equipment, passed the bill for establishment of Coast Guard military reserves, confirmed the nomination of John G. Winant to be Ambassador to Great Britain, received the Truman resolution for an investigation of the awarding of defense contracts and adjourned at 2:44 PM until noon on Thursday. The Foreign Relations Committee heard further opposition to the Lend-Lease bill.
The House passed the bill raising the national debt limit to $65,000,000,000, received a Presidential request for $680,118,000 for Army cantonments, airfields and Panama Canal defenses, received the $388,140,000 Deficiency Relief Appropriation Bill and the $1,146,394,496 Treasury-Post office Appropriation Bill and adjourned at 5:27 PM until noon tomorrow.
Preparing to conclude its hearings on the Lend-Lease bill with the testimony of Wendell L. Willkie, the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee today heard Joseph Curran, president of the National Maritime Union (C.I.O.), denounce the bill as “a war measure” and as “downright fascist.” After hearing Willkie tomorrow, the committee will begin considering amendments and, by the end of the week, is expected to send the measure to the Senate for debate. Curran, a leading C.I.O. official, was one of a series of witnesses who said the bill was likely to lead to war or dictatorship or worse. He spoke at a session which found few committee members present and virtually none of these disposed to ask questions. Six witnesses concluded the opposition cases against the lease-lend bill before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee today as that body planned to close its hearings tomorrow by hearing Wendell L. Willkie, President Conant of Harvard and possibly Mayor La Guardia in final testimony supporting the measure. President Conant is booked for the morning session and Mr. Willkie will appear in the afternoon.
As the committee sat, Senator Lodge, in a Senate speech, voiced some of the same criticisms of the bill on the Senate floor. Mr. Lodge said the measure would establish an “internal dictatorship” and weaken the nation’s power to defend itself. Mr. Lodge conceded that British defeat would bring reduced living standards, increased unemployment and a substantial increase in government control of individual activities in this country, but insisted that it would “not be fatal to our national existence.” “Not only does this bill increase the danger of foreign war and the danger of totalitarian control at home,” Mr. Lodge said, “but it enables the President at his discretion to enter into such alliances with such foreign nations as suits him.”
Merwin K. Hart, a founder of the New York State Economic Council, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the Lend-Lease bill would probably lead the country into the war and eventually result in the establishment of a fascist or communist dictatorship in the United States.
Senator Harry S. Truman, Missouri Democrat, called upon the Senate today to investigate financial aspects of the entire defense program through a special committee that would police all transactions. Citing “rumors rife in this city” that there have been irregularities in the award of defense contracts, he introduced a resolution that would authorize a broad inquiry. Truman, one of the new deal’s most persistent legislative supporters, said all defense contract recipients “should be subject to a full accounting of every nickel spent and the profit accrued on every task.” Truman charged that awards of arms contracts violate “ethics and common sense.” He told the Senate that certain members of the war department’s construction advisory board have friends whose firms have received defense contracts. Recalling “what a tremendous fuss was raised when it was discovered that ‘Chip’ Robert (Lawrence W. Robert, former secretary of the Democratic National Committee) and his engineering firm in Atlanta, Georgia, had received engineering and architectural contracts to the sum of $376,000,000,” Truman said: “It looks as if Chip has been a piker.” He named F. Blossom, P. Harvey, and F. Dresser in his analysis of work and business connections of members of the War Department’s construction advisory board.
The House voted today to increase the maximum limit on the national debt from $49,000,000,000 to $65,000,000,000 and declined, because of the urgencies of the world situation, to give any promise that the “ceiling” would not be moved even higher.
The U.S. Supreme Court refused to take a hand today in controversy between the Ford Motor Co. and the labor board, with the result that the company apparently must reinstate 23 employees allegedly discharged for union activity. The court, in two decisions, also clarified the legality of anti-picketing injunctions. It held that picketing activities may be enjoined if attended by violence, but that they may not be enjoined merely because the pickets were not employed at the place they were picketing. Although the court, as usual in such matters, gave no reason for its refusal to review the Ford case, it has said in several decisions that the courts may not substitute their judgment for that of administrative agencies and that labor orders must be upheld so long as they are based on substantial evidence.
The body of General Walter G. Krivitsky, who had identified himself to congressional investigators as a one-time high official of the Soviet secret police, was found in a hotel room today, a gun in his hand and a note at his side that said “I want to live very badly but it is impossible.” The contents of that note, written in Russian to his wife and son together with two others in English and German were made public by police after they had issued a certificate of suicide. But, after hearing Louis Waldman, attorney for Krivitsky, insist the Russian had lived in deadly fear of Russia’s OGPU agents, police announced that the case would be held open and they would “run down all leads.”
Secretary Morgenthau, back from a holiday in Arizona, told his press conference today that he was still optimistic regarding the chances for realization of the Treasury plan to extend to all belligerents the present freezing order against the funds of conquered countries.
Important changes in the Federal farm program are being worked out in the Department of Agriculture, with the encouragement of President and Mrs. Roosevelt, in an effort to cope with the price and market disturbances due to the war and to ease the economic and social effects of the war emergency on low-income farm groups, high officials said today.
A sweeping reorganization of the Japanese Embassy staff in Washington has been directed by Tokyo to set up a “new order” in diplomatic representation under Admiral Kichisaburo Nomura, the new Ambassador, who will arrived in Washington tomorrow.
Secretary of War Stimson told an American Youth Congress delegation, which picketed the War Department today in protest against alleged discriminatory treatment of Blacks, that equality of opportunity for Blacks in the Army was a part of his defense program.
White-haired Los Angeles Municipal Judge Ida May Adams tonight said she had no apology to make for burning a Nazi party flag in her courtroom after she was informed that the State Department had asked the governor of California for a report on the incident. Secretary of State Cordell Hull Informed Governor Culbert L. Olson that he had received a protest from Charge d’Affaires Hans Thomsen of the German embassy. Secretary Hull quoted Thomsen as saying than “the act of public burning of the flag in itself represents an act of contempt toward the German flag by an American judge at a public sitting of a court.”
A sharp, jolting earthquake was felt in Santa Barbara, California, at 10:43 tonight. A preliminary check indicated no damage. The quake was confined to the immediate area and was not felt in nearby cities. Police, fire and newspaper switchboards were jammed with calls from excited residents, many of them recalling the disastrous shock on the San Andreas fault in 1925 which killed 11 persons and did terrific property damage.
Floods threatened large areas of northern California tonight as the Sacramento River and other streams, fed by heavy rains and melting snow, rose above the danger point and menaced homes, residents and crops. One thousand persons were reported directly endangered by flood waters in the lowlands of Tehama County. The town of Tehama was virtually cut off by water spilling over the banks of the Sacramento.
The 104th AAA Automatic Weapons Battalion (Mobile) is activated at Birmingham, Alabama as Sep CA Bn AA-AW.
The U.S. 133rd Infantry Regiment, an Iowa National Guard unit, was inducted into Federal Service as part of the 34th Infantry Division.
The Japanese 11th Army completes its return to its base at Hsinyang, watched by the Chinese 5th War Area. This ends the Battle of Southern Honan.
Chinese sources assert that the Japanese have suffered reverses near Tamshui in their attempt to take Waichow and cut into the interior north of Hong Kong. The invaders hold Tamshui only precariously. The absence of Japanese contrary reports appears to confirm the Chinese assertion that the invasion has met a check. The Chinese also report that they are already resuming the goods traffic with Hong Kong by way of the longer mountainous route between Shluchow and points on the southern Kwangtung coast.
Considerable quantities of war supplies are reaching the interior of China through secret routes from the east coast, thereby lessening China’s dependence on the Burma Road, informed foreign sources said today. A large-scale trade is moving both ways, exports of Chinese products reaching the outside to help pay for imports, it was said. The informants declined to outline the routes. It is known, however, that the drive launched last week by the Japanese north of Hong Kong was aimed at one of the most important, running through Waichow, in Northern Kwangtung Province.
The Imperial Japanese Navy “S” Operation continued. The heavy cruisers HIJMS Suzuya, HIJMS Mikuma, HIJMS Mogami, and HIJMS Kumano made a port call at Bangkok, Thailand. The operation was designed to put pressure on the Vichy French colonial government in the wake of the naval Battle of Ko Chang between the Vichy French and Thailand.
“Powerful” formations of Royal Air Force bombers left Singapore today to reinforce advanced air bases in Northern Malaya. The movement was taken as evidence of the formidable strength developed in recent months by the combined efforts of the British and Australian Air Forces.
The U.S. Army Transport USAT Etolin docked at Manila with 24 personnel for the 17th and 20th Pursuit Squadrons.
Philippine Commissioner to the U.S. House of Representatives and Philippine Army Major Joaquín Elizalde informs Philippine President Quezon that he had attempted, and failed, to get the Philippines included under Lend-Lease.
Nineteen thousand men will be drafted for service with New Zealand’s expeditionary force under the compulsory service law when the fourth ballot is held shortly, National Service Minister Robert Semple announced today.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 124.19 (-0.52)
Born:
Michael Apted, film and television director (“7 Up”, “The World is Not Enough”), in Aylesbury, England, United Kingdom (d. 2021).
Naval Construction:
The Royal Navy LCT (Mk 2)-class landing craft, tank HMS LCT 129 is laid down by General Steam Navigation (Deptford, U.K.).
The U.S. Navy SC-497-class (110-foot wooden hull) submarine chaser USS PC-508 (later SC-508) is laid down by the Mathis Yacht Building Co. (Camden, New Jersey, U.S.A.).
The Kriegsmarine (German Navy) Type VIIC U-boats U-443 and U-444 are laid down by F Schichau GmbH, Danzig (werk 1498 and 1499).
The Kriegsmarine (German Navy) Type VIIC U-boat U-601 is laid down by Blohm & Voss, Hamburg (werk 577).
The U.S. Navy Gato-class submarine USS Growler (SS-215) is laid down by Electric Boat Co. (Groton, Connecticut, U.S.A.).
The Royal Navy Flower-class corvette HMS Tamarisk (K 216) is laid down by Fleming & Ferguson Ltd. (Paisley, Scotland). In 1943 she is transferred to the Royal Hellenic Navy, becoming RHS Tompazis (K 216).
The Royal Navy Hunt-class (Type II) escort destroyer HMS Blackmore (L 43) is laid down by A. Stephen & Sons Ltd. (Glasgow, Scotland).
The Kriegsmarine (German Navy) Type VIIC U-boat U-202 is launched by F. Krupp Germaniawerft AG, Kiel (werk 631).
The Royal Navy Fairmile B-class motor launch HMS ML 183 is commissioned.
The Royal Navy Fairmile B-class motor launch HMS ML 184 is commissioned.
The Royal Navy harbor defence motor launch HMS HDML 1012 is commissioned.
The Royal Navy harbor defence motor launch HMS HDML 1048 is commissioned.
The Royal Navy harbor defence motor launch HMS HDML 1051 is commissioned.
The Royal Navy British Power Boat 70 foot-type (ex-French) motor gunboat HMS MGB 63 is commissioned.
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