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Aviation History
1944
1944 - 1884.PDF
278 WAR IN THE AIR convoys. In those days, the flak at Brest was considered to be the most intense in the world. Now Brest "is being bombed again by Bomber Command, and also by the U.S. 8th Air Force. But the conditions are very different from those when the German warships were there. An American force has been attacking the place from the land, and the German garrison has never had any chance of escape. No doubt there is flak there still (supposing that the garrison is still holding out when these words are published), but there has been no special mention of any great intensity. The Germans in Le Havre have also made a determined stand against the besieging Canadians, and here, too, the heavy bombers have been in action against the defences. Le Havre would be the more useful port of the two to Gen. Eisenhower as his armies move eastward. Antwerp fell into British hands last week, and will be the most useful of all when the mouths of the River Scheldt have been cleared of the enemy. Sea transport should do much to ease the supply problems of the racing mechanised armies. It has been amusing to read that some German detachments may have been «^templating an attempt to escape %v sea from Dunkerque. That wdVld he poetic justice; but we can larolJ^be harfll|"'"believe that such an attempt "^Hjabe made in the face of Allied and air supremacy. AN OUTSTANDING WEAPON : Loading a Typhoon with explosive-headed rocket projectiles. The R.P. Typhoon is one of the decisive weapons of the war. The technique of night-fighting has made amazing strides of late. When the R.A.F. began to send up night- fighters for the first time during the great blitz of 1940-41 not much was expected of them by the suffering Londoners. We were all told that if a raider was not shown up by search lights the fighters' chances were much like hunting for a needle in a stack of hay. But progress was swift, and when the defences (guns and fighters) brought down 30 Germans in the last great London raid on May 30th, 1941, everybody thought it a wonderful achievement; and it certainly was highly creditable. But there has been still more progress since then, and in the first 12 weeks after the landing on D-day, one base-defence Group of night-fighting Mosquitoes of the 2nd Tactical Air Force shot down no fewer than 174 enemy aircraft over the battle area. As the Germans were none too fond of show ing up in daylight, this con tribution was most wel come. In the meantime Gen. Spaatz's 15th Air Force, based in the Mediterranean, has been smoothing the path of the advancing Russians by bombing tar- TIME TO BE OFF: A Mosquito fighter - bomber crew go aboard. In case of necessity the fuselage door can be jettisoned and the orifice used as an escape hatch. gets round Belgrade and Budapest, as well as other places in the Balkans. In the fighting round Warsaw the Red Air Force has been taking heavy toll of men and vehicles as they tried to cross the River Narew. The V Weapons A S Field Marshal Montgomery's 21st •**• Army Group has pushed rapidly through the Pas de Calais and into Belgium, so many launching sites for air torpedoes have been overrun that war correspondents now hardly trouble to stop their jeeps and have a look at them. This push, naturally, greatly reduced the numbers which have arrived in the south of England. Some interest was aroused a few days ago when two enemy aircraft arrived which were supposed to be the lower components of the Me 109-Ju 8-5 composite aircraft. They did little damage and caused no casualties. One would hardly expect any other result, except by chance. The danger of any serious air attacks on Britain is now over, and black-out restrictions have accordingly been eased. That is not to say that there will be no more raids or no more loss of civilian life; but there is cer tainly now no chance of a deadly blow being struck from the air against the British war effort. In the Pursuit "DAD weather at the week-end ham- •*-* pered the Allies' air operations on many parts of the Western Front, and the troops were mostly drenched by rain and had a very uncomfortable time. Discomfort matters less to soldiers flushed with victory and press ing on their foes. The retreating and
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