Evening star., 1940-08-18
EnqIish Front


of war over England is the story OF the
week.
The Germans apparently set five
fold task for their air and sea forces
with respect to England. Business No.
was clearing sea lane between the
Continent and England
Germon for the transport of in
Obiectives vading troops; No. 2,
blasting path ashore
to land these ground troops; 3, destroy
ing air fields and ground planes to lessen
the force of the British resistance againsr
the invaders; 4, destroying factories
which are the industrial heart of the
British resistance; S, destroying dock
sides where land ships carrying food and
supplies from abroad to keep England
economically alive during her time OF
crisis
The ground troops selected for inva-
sion today still camp in France, Bel
gium and Holland
Five waves of German planes, about
80 in each wave, visited England Mon
day. Principal objectives were Ports
mouth, navy center and shipping base
on English Channel, and Dover, port
closest to France, % miles by sea,
three minutes by bomber from Calais.
In Portsmouth brewery was fired,
bomb hit railroad station and num-
Der of civilians were killed, according
to the British. The Germans described
the attack on Portsmouth as the work
of 40 planes, divided, just before the
city was reached. into three groups.
Each group had an assignment. One
had bombs intended for munitions and
mine depot, another for docks and ways
the third for an oil tank yard.
The planes held close to the coast.
The Germans reported bombing an
armed convoy off Margate, sinking four
British merchantmen of 10000 tons total.
They destroyed, they said,
Openino an airport at Mansion, In
Assault Dorset, a Channel county.
They shot down, they said,
four barrier balloons assisting in guard
ing England At one southeastern town,
1t was stated, IL Germans bailed out
and landed by parachute, only to be cap
tured by townspeople. Two hundred
planes went at Dover. the English report
ed, but Englands air defenders drove back
all but IS of them. Monday and Sum-
days raids cost England 1854 planes Ger
many, A, according to Berlin.
The Germans widened their scope
Tuesday. Their tactics looked familiar
to Louis P Lochner, the Associated Press
Pulitzer winning correspondent IN
Berlin. He saw in the raids duplica-
ton of what had gone on as prelude
to German victories in Poland, Norway
and France. Twentyfour Dornier
bombers started up the Thames River
from the estuary but Spitfires threw
them back. In all 400 to 600 Nazi planes
visited the air above their enenys island.
They bombed almost half of England's
coast line.
Big objective was Southampton, up the
port. On the way to Southampton, the
raiders bombed the Isle of Wight and
its airdromes. The sky invaders hit the
Jackpot in raiding East Church Airport,
in Notwithstanding hangers, crew
barracks, 10 Spitfires on ground, silenced
anti-aircraft batteries, ignited gas tanks,
shot down IL barrage balloons.
Portsmouth had new visit. British
planes dog-fought with Germans, who
got as far inland as Aldershot, in North
en Hampshire, 40 miles above Ports
mouth and on the way
Effects from Portsmouth to Lon
Tuesday don. Far to the north,
bombers raided the harbor
of Walsend, on the River Tyne, rather
close to the Scottish border, where they
fired storehouses and warehouses. Nine
ty miles south, the Germans went after
Humbermouth. Along the Channel coast
far west of Southampton they raided
Plymouth. Up the west side of the is
land, they carried their bombs to drop
on shipping in Swansea and Cardiff.
On the Channel, force of German
ships was beaten off by British motor
torpedo boats. The British, who time
all their attacks for the hours between
midnight and dawn, flew against the
continent, whose western coast is all
Germany's down to Spain, bombing Aal-
borg, in Denmark, and II Nazi airdromes
as far south as the Bay of Biscay. The
English said they lost 16 planes in this
excursion. The Germans put the Eng
lish loss also at Is. The German esti-
mate of British loss for Sunday. Mon
day and Tuesday was 231 planes.
Wednesday was a day of poor weather
for t1vinp fighting, and the German as
sault was relaxed. British Navy found
six Nazi minesweepers in the North Sea-
who aroused suspicion in London that
they were cleaning the way for the Hitler
legions to England.
The extent of the German bombing
was widened even If the intensity was
lessened. No more were the Nazis con-
tent with bombing the coast or creeping
few miles inland. They went right into
the great English Midlands, the indus