The New York Times Book of World War II, 1939-1945

by The New York Times

  Finally, the high quality of Russian tanks, which counter-attacked effectively, proved, according to all reports, that the KV tank is more than equal to the Tiger.

  In the Kursk-Orel sector the Germans, who had not made any real progress, gave up hope of achieving anything some days ago. In the Belgorod sector they are still attempting to press forward and enlarge their ten- to fifteen-mile penetrations, but still without success, and above all without that “conviction” with which the Germans started their July 5 offensive, which in the words of Adolf Hitler’s order to his troops, was to become the battle that would decide the war’s outcome.

  The moral effect of the failure of the biggest German armored attack ever launched along a relatively narrow front was immense in Moscow. Here, more even than in the Stalingrad battle, was a demonstration of a fundamental improvement in Russian defense tactics immensely greater than the perfection in German attack tactics.

  JULY 21, 1943

  ROME BOMBED: FIRST PHOTOGRAPHIC REPORT OF ALLIED RAID

  By The Associated Press.

  ALLIED HEADQUARTERS IN NORTH AFRICA, July 20—Reconnaissance photographs today showed vast sections of Rome’s great railway yards in twisted, smoking ruins from the terrific blasting inflicted yesterday by hundreds of American bombers. The initial raid on the Italian capital was officially labeled an “outstandingly successful operation.”

  While more than 500 heavy and medium bombers, escorted by fighters, struck the city in wave after wave beneath a bright midday sun, Allied communiqués disclosed today, the entire two-and-a-half-hour assault was carried out with the loss of five planes. All the losses were suffered by Maj. Gen. James H. Doolittle’s Strategic Air Force. Ninth United States Air Force headquarters in Cairo announced that all the Liberator bombers participating in the raid had returned safely to bases in the Middle East.

  The Ninth Air Force formations alone dumped nearly 330 tons of high explosives on Rome, the Cairo communiqué said, declaring that the Littoria railway yards had been “completely destroyed.”

  “String after string of bombs crisscrossed the yards, and photographs indicate that an area 400 yards by two miles long is a mass of twisted steel rails, gaping bomb craters and wreckage of rolling stock and buildings,” the bulletin said. “An ammunition train moving through the yards received several direct hits and exploded, contributing to the destruction.”

  An Allied headquarters communiqué said that “very severe damage” had been caused to all the targets, including the Littoria and San Lorenzo rail yards, both within the limits of the city, and near-by airdromes and industrial plants.

  Allied aerial chieftains, apparently pleased that the outcome of the attack had surpassed expectations, were lavish in their praise of the airmen responsible for its execution. Lieut. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, commander of the Northwest African Air Forces, sent congratulations to General Doolittle, saying: “It is one of the many accurate attacks which your forces have carried on during the present battle, all of which had a marked significance in their successful outcome.”

  The Tabonelli steel plant and a large chemical works were battered by the raiders, which met what was described officially as only “slight opposition” from enemy fighter planes. Two enemy interceptors were shot down by Lightning fighters.

  The official pictures of the havoc created by the bombers showed that the Ciampino airport had been severely damaged. A number of hangars were blasted or set afire and a large number of parked aircraft near by were hit by fragmentation bombs. The Littoria airport, near the railway yards, also was hit hard.

  Vatican apartment of Pope Pius XII after one of the later raids on Rome.

  JULY 21, 1943

  TIMES CORRESPONDENT BROADCASTS TO ITALY

  Matthews Explains Why Allies Had to Raid Capital

  LONDON, July 20 (AP)—Herbert L. Matthews, Rome correspondent of The New York Times from 1939 to 1941, said in an Algiers broadcast to Italy today that “it was hard to have to bomb Rome but war is like that.”

  Mr. Matthews, who accompanied the Allied bombers, told Italy:

  “Neither as an American citizen nor as an individual did I feel any satisfaction when I flew over Rome yesterday. Believe me, this raid was undertaken after long and careful consideration and preparation. There are more than 25,000,000 Catholics in America whose opinion we have to take into account.

  “The San Lorenzo marshaling yards are of greatest strategic importance and had to be considered a military target. It was hard to have to bomb it—but war is like that.

  “It is the Duce and the Fuehrer whom you have to blame for that.

  “Rome’s anti-aircraft defense was feeble and ineffective. Was that all Musso and Hitler could do for you?”

  JULY 24, 1943

  LUFTWAFFE’S LACK SEEN AS STRATEGIC

  British Experts Say Faults Basic in its Creation Are Now Showing Up

  NUMERICAL POWER FAILING

  Udet’s ‘Second-Rate Planes’ at Loss—Flying Fortress Gets New Praise In London

  By FREDERICK GRAHAM

  By Cable to THE NEW YORK TIMES.

  LONDON, July 23—A study of one phase of military air power is offered in the present position of the Luftwaffe. Reich Marshal Hermann Goering’s once awe-inspiring warbirds now seem to be perched on the edge of the nest uncertain what to do.

  The fact that the vaunted Nazi Air Force, which started the war as the most powerful aerial armada in the world, was unable to halt or even to hinder the Allied seaborne invasion of Sicily over 100 miles of open ocean and that the Germans with vaster aerial might proportionally could not beat down the Royal Air Force in 1940 for a Nazi invasion of Britain across twenty miles of water must contain a meaningful lesson for future strategists. Although the full answer belongs to the future, at least a partial solution seems indicated now.

  To the frequently asked question, “Where is the Luftwaffe?” the often implied reply, either that it is “stretched too thin” to be really efficient or that it is awaiting the proper moment for a bold counterstroke, is thought here not to be the full, real answer. Even now the Luftwaffe is undoubtedly stronger in both planes and personnel than the RAF was during the Battle of Britain.

  Some experts here believe the truth of the matter is that the builders of the Luftwaffe never grasped the real meaning and function of air power. Basically, the Luftwaffe was created to cooperate with the German Army, supporting it in ground operations with hard-hitting, highly mobile units striking a concentrated blow against a single point.

  FAILURE IN CONCEPTION

  Against defenseless cities and untried troops and without real aerial opposition, it worked out almost exactly as Marshal Goering, Col. Gen. Ernst Udet, technical chief of the Luftwaffe who was killed in 1941, and the others planned. But as a strategic bombing weapon and as a fighter destroyer it must be considered a failure.

  Another related reason that is believed to contribute to the comparatively poor showing of the Luftwaffe now was the German idea that quantity was more important in aerial warfare than quality, as remarked in the latest edition of Jane’s “All the World’s Aircraft,” by J. M. Spaight, former Assistant Secretary of the British Air Ministry.

  Col. Gen. Udet, who had a large role in building up the Luftwaffe, once told friends in the United States that he did not want the best planes in the world; he wanted overwhelming numerical superiority of the second best. Germany surely had them during 1940 and part of 1941, but they did not achieve Colonel General Udet’s aims.

  The current Issue of The Aeroplane, British aeronautical journal, scathingly declares one of the Luftwaffe’s most serious blunders is in the use of fighters, noting that the Germans are no weaker in fighter strength in Sicily or at Orel than the RAF was over southeast Britain in 1940. The RAF, in 1940, fortunately had superior fighters in the Spit-fire and the Hurricane.

  THE B-17’S ABILITIES HAILED

  The big Flying Fortress of the United States Eighth Air Force here and Twelfth Air Force in
North Africa, in which American air officials believed as a powerful weapon even when some British experts shook their heads and wrote sour articles for aviation magazines about, is also revealing the weakness of the Luftwaffe’s foundation.

  In the first place, the B-17 Fortress is showing its ability to hit important targets from a high altitude and, second, it is proving it can more than hold its own with enemy fighters trying to intercept it. One of the biggest boosters of the Fortress now is the RAF, which has seen and marveled at its precision bombing and its toughness against fighters and anti-aircraft fire.

  German plane plants are known to have shifted production from bombers to fighters to meet the battering Allied aerial assaults, but it is probably too late for the Nazis to correct their original mistakes in conception of air-power to win this war or even to stave off defeat.

  As to the Flying Fortress, The Aeroplane, whose co-founder and former editor, C. G. Grey, once dubbed the Boeing bomber “the Flying Baloney,” pays high tribute to it in the issue dated tomorrow.

  In an article entitled “Bomber Self-Defense,” the magazine states that the Fortress has “reduced the enemy’s fighter attacks to snap-shooting,” and adds that “no bomber could be treated with greater respect” than the B-17 is now by German fighters.

  Praising the heavy firepower and the gun turrets of the four-motored Boeing, the article concludes:

  “We will gladly offer our thanks to those Fortress crews who showed us what a little more weight and a little more range in turret armament might mean.”

  As war wore on, the Luftwaffe was stretched thin.

  JULY 25, 1943

  LETTERS TO THE TIMES

  Rome Bombing Upheld

  Attack Regarded As Regrettable But Highly Necessary

  To The Editor of the New York Times:

  The letter from Pope Pius XII to his Vicar General for the District of Rome is interesting and a worthy document. As always, it again shows his yearning for peace and his noble humility. It deserves careful study by those who are inclined to advocate a ruthless treatment for the Axis nations when the conflict is over.

  As could be expected, his message has given Nazi and Fascist leaders the opportunity to make a feature of the Pope’s expressed anxiety for the preservation of ancient works of art and of historic value—not overlooking even Christian civilization, which during four long years they have done everything to destroy.

  The high esteem in which His Holiness is held throughout the world has led not a few good people among us to indicate their approval of his declaration. However, all such well-meaning people should be reminded that the greatest and the most precious “work of art and of ancient historic value” is man, who, as the Holy Writ has told us “God created in His own image—in the image of God He created him.”

  GREAT CARE USED

  Again, the great philosopher and Apostle St. Paul declared that “Man is the Temple of God.” Then note with what scrupulous care our armed forces have carried their attack on the Eternal City, which has been an important Axis base for action against the Allies!

  Bearing all this in mind, if some great art objects—the handiwork of man—must be destroyed in order to save the lives of our men, the attack on Rome is fully justified. While millions of Allied soldiers are battling for human rights in a war for which they are in no way responsible the method and conduct of war must be left in the control of our humane military leaders and not to the judgment of spiritual advisers, whose turn will come—let us hope soon.

  When mankind is freed from the ravages of war, and the great leaders of the present generation establish a lasting peace founded on justice and righteousness, there will in time arise great men and women in all walks of life, in all lands and among all nations, to more than make up the terrific losses of every nature sustained in this war. The greatest leaders of the future, however, will be those who will render real service to their peoples—a situation quite different from what the great mass of humanity has been accustomed to in the past.

  S. KENT COSTIKYAN.

  Montclair, N.J., July 23, 1943.

  JULY 26, 1943

  MUSSOLINI OUSTED WITH FASCIST CABINET; ARRESTS REPORTED

  Berne Hears the Fascist Leaders Are Being Held in Homes

  ‘PEACE’ CRY IN ROME

  Nazis in Milan Said to Have Fired on Mob of Demonstrators

  By DANIEL T. BRIGHAM

  By Telephone to The New York Times

  BERNE, Switzerland, July 25—King Victor Emmanuel announced to Italy tonight that he had accepted the “resignations” of Premier Benito Mussolini and his entire Cabinet. He ordered Marshal Pietro Badoglio to form a military government “to continue the conduct of the war.”

  The announcement was made in a proclamation that was broadcast to the people of Italy from Rome at 11 P. M. Rome time. The Rome radio then signed off for twenty minutes, resuming its broadcast at 11:20 to carry a proclamation by Marshal Badoglio. Before giving this, however, the announcer said:

  “With the fall of Mussolini and his band, Italy has taken the first step toward peace. Finished is the shame of fascism! Long live peace! Long live the King!”

  BADOGLIO SAYS HE’LL FIGHT

  Marshal Badoglio’s proclamation was then read. It appealed to the nation for “calm” in this hour of trial, saying:

  “Italians! On the demand of His Majesty the King-Emperor, I have assumed the military government of the country with full powers. The war will continue. Italy bruised, her provinces invaded, and her cities ruined, will retain her faith in her given word, jealous of her ancient traditions.

  “We must tighten our ranks behind the King-Emperor, the living image of the country, who stands as an example for all today. The task I have been charged with is clear and precise. It will be executed scrupulously, and whoever believes he can interrupt the normal progress of events or whoever seeks to disturb internal order will be struck down without mercy.

  “Long live Ita1y! Long live the King! PIETRO BADOGLIO.”

  For the first time in twenty-one years the Italian radio signed off a nation-wide program by playing only the royal march. “Giovinezza,” the fascist anthem, like fascism, is dead.

  Italians in Rome, celebrated the downfall of Benito Mussolini with pictures of King Victor Emmanuel, July 1943.

  [Field Marshal General Albert Kesselring. German Commander in Chief in Italy, and Hans-Georg I Viktor von Mackensen, the German Ambassador, negotiated with Marshal Badoglio in Rome last night, according to a Rome radio bulletin picked up in Stockholm, Sweden, by Reuter.]

  Following the proclamation broadcast demonstrations broke out in many parts of the country as Italians went to the streets to celebrate the end of fascism. A Milan report, received here by telephone just before telephone communications were cut at 11 o’clock, told of bloodshed there when German anti-aircraft units had apparently fired on a mob. No further details were given.

  With half of the Italian population fleeing in an evacuation greater than that in France and those still at home “looking for Blackshirts,” the situation inside Italy is developing rapidly. Frontier reports tell of a state of “latent revolution,” leaving the country still looking for a Government with which to sue for peace. Marshal Enrico Caviglia may be the spokesman, but Marshal Badoglio will be the leader-and the King will remain as long as he can.

  As troubles spread in Rome, more than an hour before the rest of Italy, fears were expressed for the safety of Signor Mussolini, Carlo Scorza, the Fascist party secretary, and the entire Cabinet, which was being detained under house arrest. They were therefore transferred to a place outside the capital, the approaches to which are being guarded by the army.

  The first details received here of the origin of the Cabinet Crisis—heavily censored, for the movement was still in full swing—say it began in this morning’s special Cabinet session of the key Defense Ministries.

  Premier Mussolini outlined “propositions” Adolf Hitler had made for the “salvation of t
he new European order” during their last meeting. They called for such great Italian sacrifices that the Under-Secretaries of War, Air and Navy refused to accept the responsibility for their execution without consultation with the full Cabinet.

  When the Cabinet met the debate was lively until it was decided to submit the entire problem to the King and his councilors, who in the last analysis would be alone responsible to the nation.

  The principal “proposition” was said to be the immediate withdrawal of all possible manpower and materiel from the Sicilian front, accepting enormous losses during that operation as inevitable. The Catania front, defended by the Hermann Goering Division, was to be taken over by “sufficient Italian rear guard” to enable its withdrawal first.

  Italian forces would then be called upon to fight a “retiring rear-guard operation up the entire length of the Italian mainland from Naples, Calabria and Puglia to a line running approximately east-west through the southern limits of Tuscany, which would leave the Axis nations “a line of elastic defense while final preparations were being completed in the Apennines.”

  This operation would be entirely Italian, aided only by German matériel. It was suggested the operation should be exclusively in the hands of the Italian military, while the slightly more trained Blackshirt militia formations would be reserved for “advanced line defense” in front of the Apennine positions.

  Rome would be abandoned, while such matériel as could not be moved northward would be destroyed, mainly ammunition and explosives, several very big shipments of which are believed to have just arrived for the Germans.