Evening star., 1943-10-31
BY Frank Carey,
Associated Press Science Writer.

ABERDEEN, Md.-American artillery
can crumble the Naz west wall-the
chain of German Notifications facing
the old French border-but to do it the
big guns must be right up front pitching
with the infantry, instead of hurhng
their shots from afar.
The reasons:
/. The series Of step-by-step units
which make up the west wall-it's not
a solid wall-are SO strong that shells
must travel at high velocities in order
to penetrate them. And the farther
shell has to travel, the less its velocity
upon impact-due, among other things,
to air resistance encountered in fight
2. The spread-out arrangement of the
units of the west wall makes them diff
cult targets to hit for gunners who are
out of sight of the objective and who
must be guided by information relayed
from the forward area.
This was demonstrated in recent tests
at the Army's Aberdeen proving ground,
where the fire power of various American
artillery pieces was tested against exact
and steel German bastions, built accord
ing to information obtained through
American intelligence.
Pitching Practice.
The trials may we'll have been the
pitching practice for what may soon
lie ahead in the war, because the guns
used-from 75-millimeter toughies to
155-millimeter Long Toms"-were of
the type that could be transported
across the English Channel in an in
vasicn of Western Europe.
The guns made short work of
crumbling the walls when fired at the
Notifications from battle range-a dis
tance undisclosed by Aberdeen officers,
but described as reasonably close up.
The tests said Col. George c. Ed
dy, director of the proving center, who
instituted the trials, "corroborate the
belief that artillerymen long have had
namely, that artillery must be well
forward, In support of the doughboy, to
make best use Of the tremendously ef-
fective fire power that the artillery has.
1t doesn't do much good If it is kept
back in the barn, as so often hap
pened during the First World War.
Furthermore, these tests have shown
that in the reduction of the real Nazi
west wall greater use of direct fire
would be required than has hitherto
been used in any campaign to date.
BY direct fire, mean artillery fire
from forward areas with the target In
sight, as opposed to indirect fire from
rear positions where the gunners fire
from information relayed from the
'front.'"
Devastating Power.
In the successful tests, he said, all the
guns spoke their thunder from dis.
tances we'll within their maximum
range.
Proof Of their devastating power car
be seen in the ruins of the miniatur,
west wall which lie in forest-rimmet
field in the heart Of Maryland's bot
tomlands.
Before the firing orders were given
the fortifications-whi presented tn
appearance Of eood-sized blockhouses-
stood menacingly in the sun.
The walls, several feet in thickness
were made of super concrete"-mucl
tougher than that used in ordinar
concrete building structures-and tn
concrete was reinforced with thic
rods of steel
Great heaps of dirt were piled in fror
Of the walls, according to the Nazi tech
nique.
But now the concrete is almost com
pletely crumbled, It's even pulverized
some places. The steel rods, twisted an