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Aviation History
1943
1943 - 2138.PDF
?46 WAR IN THE can be well pleased that its efforts havecontained from 50 to 60 per cent, of the existing German fighter strengthin the west to oppose its raids. The big raid on Berlin on Aug. 23rd wasmet almost entirely by fighters, and their success in shooting down 58 ofour bombers shows that on a clear moonlight night the fighter is growingever a more formidable opponent to the night bomber. That truth will,no doubt, be brought home to the German bombers if they ventureon another large-scale raid on London. By way of contrast, the Germanssucceeded in evacuating the majority of their troops from Sicily entirelythanks to a great concentration of heavy and accurate flak. The Luft-waffe kept well out of the picture, and there were complaints from our airmenthat while still over Sicily they were not infrequently fired at by our ownA.A. gunners. After the Germans had got most (orat least many) of their men out of Sicily, the next job for the R.A.F.Mediterranean Command was obvi- ously to attack all communications inSouthern-Italy, and the squadrons did this so successfully that in a few daysit was barely possible to get a train through between the northern and SEPTEMBER 21*D, 1943 FRENCH STEEL WORKS BOMBED. The Hautes Fourneaux. Forges et Acieries deDenain et Danzin being well plastered by Bostons, two of which may be seen flying , low over the target to ensure bombing accuracy. southern parts of the country. Many of the troops who had escaped from Sicily met their fate from the bombs and machine-guns of Allied aircraft. It is some time since the newspapers have been enlivened by any news of the Italian Navy, and so the British public was genu- inely surprised when it -was an- nounced last week that an Italian cruiser had been found off the southern coast of Italy. What was the poor misguided vessel doing there? She was far from the compara- tively snug har- bours in which her consorts took refuge a long time ago. The Mediterranean to the south of Italy is now ruled by Britannia, and the captain of that cruiser ought to have known it. It was fighter - bombers which tackled fncLthey hit ice and left es. FIRES DOWN BELOW. Bostons of the R.A.F. attack ths>/ works of the Societe Francaise de Constructions Mecanique's, near Valenciennes in daylight. Bombs can be seen fajfing. New Tactics TC*OGGIA, lying on the eastern side of the Appenines, is one of the most important railway junctions con- necting Northern and Southern Italy. It is some miles to the north-east of -Naples, and is surrounded by a num- ber of fighter airfields. It became a matter of importance to cripple both the railway junction and the fighter strength of the place. On August 25th Gen. Spaatz began a deter- mined offensive against the place, and he employed what were described as new tactics, which are reported to have proved highly satisfactory. Naturally, the new plan has not been*" made public, but some account of the raidings has come to hand. The first attacks were made by successive waves of very strong -for- mations of Lightnings, flying very low. They met with practically no opposition, and did a great deal of# damage. Hardly any enemy fighters were able to .get into the air. Then came a pause of half an hour, at the end of wliich Fortresses escorted by more Lightnings proceeded to bomb from heights of 20,000 to 25,000ft. The first raids had by no means de- stroyed all the enemy fighters on the* various airfields, and when the bombers arrived a force of from 60 to ioo^e»crrly~1figrlter1f"^4s waiting for trfem. \ It was not at once stated Vjiether the American machines suffereckany losses, but once again the cunpus result was reported tj^bt the Fortresses shot down more o^the enemy than their escort was ame to do. The score was given as 16 -\dciims of the guns af the bombers, wMtJthe escort only succeeded in bagging three. We may
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