PAGE SIX
THE BEND BULLETIN. BEND, OREGON, TUESDAY. MAY 8, 1945
Undersea War
Grim, Costly;
ermans Lose
G
(By United Prow)
Nazi Adm. Karl Doenit.'s U
boats opened the battle of the At
lantic directly after the invasion
of Britain failed to come off. The
Island that would not bow to
threats or bombs now was to be
starved out of the war.
From the beginning the under
seas war was a grim one, with no
quarter given. The newly-won
French Atlantic ports Brest,
Lorient St. Nazalre gave Donicz
an initial advantage by providing
Ideal U-boat bases within easy
reach of his prey. From these
protected ports, the German raid
ers slipped through the British
blockade almost nightly during J
the summer and fall of 1940 to'
lurk along allied shipping routes.
Far more deadly than the pig
boats of World War I, they ex
acted a toll surpassing the worst
allied fear. The British, unable
to find immediate reply, suffered
severe and steadily mounting loss
es to their vitally needed imported
goods. By the end of August, her
shipping losses had reached an
average of 70,000 tons each week.
Then the admiralty stopped pub
lishing the figures, forewarning
of still worse to come.
Surface Raiders Assist
Enemy surface raiders also
ranged the ocean, attacking mer
chant vessels and avoiding action
with allied warcraft. They were
not always successful in this lat
ter: witness the fate of the pocket-
battleship Admiral Graf Spee, run
to cover by the British cruisers
Exeter and AJax and scuttled off
Montevideo harbor in December,
1940. But still the assault devel
oped month after month, and
eacli month added an estimated 10
brand new U-boats to Adm. Doen
itz's fleet.
In America, a determination
took shape to smash the menace
and give Britain ail help short of
war to make it stick. Passage of
; the lend lease bill in late 1940 and
i ttie swapping of 50 overage de
'stroyers for new Atlantic bases
i gave concrete evidence oi tms re
solve. There was no doubt Amcr
I ica actively was taking sides.
This American feeling was stiff
ened further in May, 1941, with
the sinking of the U. S. merchant
man Robin Moor. To assure bet
ter urotection for our ships. Amer
ican troops occupied Greenland
the next montn anu iceiana snort'
lv afterward.
Jn September, the nation was
DUt only one step away from ac
I tual war wnen rresiueni noose-
velt ordered the U. S. navy to
shoot on sight any vessel interfer
ing with American ships. The or
der was prompted by the sinking
of the destroyer ureer on iceiana
that month.
Switch to V. S. Shores
But even this threat had little
Influence on the Germans. A U
boat torpedoed the U. S. destroyer
Kearny on Oct. 15 and another
sank the destroyer Reuben James
two weeks later.
Surprisingly, when America
finally did enter the war In De-
Here's The Ship
to Scuttle Hirohito
the ship that Mussed Mussolini
and Harpooned Hitler!
Crewmen of this gallant ship, and their fighting buddies
are still on the job, eager to get in the last telling blow.
And we're for 'em, every man! We want them to win -QUICKLY
and return to a life of freedom.
Let's help them, home quicker by working harder, con- ,
serving more . . . and by buying more War Bonds.
Buy a Bond for Victory Today!
' Symons Bros. Jewelers
"The House of Beauty"
947 Wall Street
Phone 175
V DAY 1 is here. -Hop let
us aim at V-DflY 2
Germany has been defeated.
Europe is free.
All Americans have waited long to be able to say that.
Most Americans have worked hard to be able to say it
Many Americans have sacrificed much to say it
Many Americans have sacrificed all.
To these, let us give thanks.
But more than that let us promise them that "they
have not died in vain".
They fought and died not for a peaceful Europe but
for a peaceful world.
Let us renew our pledge to give all we have to hasten
ing the day when we can say:
"Japan has been defeated.
All the world is free."
SHI'S WR Y
S6viet Russia
Ruins Hitlers ;
Empire Dream
(By United Vrtm)
Soviet Russia had been stag
gered by the initial German on
slaught in June, 1941. By Novem
ber, the nazi tide had swept 1,000
miles to the east. Russia's fore
most cities were either encircled
or already in German hands.
Then, Just as the outside world
expected the Soviets to crumble,
something happened. Unsuspected
Russian reserves of men and
arms combined with the bitterest
winter in 150 years to upset Hit
ler's plans.
It had been no mean feat of lo-
cember, 1941, the submarine situ
ation took a drastic turn for' the
worse. U. S. warships were drawn
to the Pacific and the U-boats,
seeing their chance, switched
their attack to this end of the At
lantic routes. With growing bold
ness and frightening success,
they began to attack the allied
convoys at their ports of origin.
tiy this time, the u-Doat war,
started as an offensive tactic, had
become more than that for the
Germans. The United Nations
were organizing now and were
marshaling their forces to smash
the axis. The Atlantic had become
the main artery for a flood of
men. and supplies not only for
Britain but for her fighting allies
there. In Russia, and in the Med
iterranean theater. Even the Far
Eastern land front was supported
via the south Atlantic routes.
Thua Hitler's U-boat assault
had turned into a desperate de
fensive light for survival. He had
to win It to stave off Germany's
doom.
Hunt In 'Wolf-Packs'
By the spring of 1942, he seem
ed to be doing just that. His un
derseas raiders, hunting in "wolf-
packs " of from 10 to 15, were dis
rupting convoys and sinking
freighters without effective oppo
sition from the foggy coast of
Newfoundland to the Bulge of
Brazil. Armed with the latest
lethal torpedoes and able to stay
out for six weeks without refuel
ing, an estimated 400 U-boats
cruised the Atlantic lanes. All
summer and fall they blasted an
average of two' allied merchant
vessels every day. Often first
word of a sinking would come
from a pathetic handful of sur
vivors picked up after tossing for
weeks on a lifeboat or raft.
As a counter-measure, Wash
ington dimmed out the U. S. At
lantic coast, including New York
City, where night lights had sil
houetted coastwise shipping, but
the move seemed to have little
effect. By November, shipping
losses were exceeding the com
bined replacement capacity of the
allies. Then there was a lull for a
few months, but by February,
1943, America's lines to the war
zones were so nearly severed, she
was threatened with losing the
war without even opening a fight
ing front.
In March and April, the situa
tion was no better with hints of
darker prospects. The allies, It
appeared, had no effective answer
to the submarine.
Then, in May, without fanfare
or warning, the break came. The
balance swung and then tipped
altogether in favor of the allies.
Sinkings dropped off sharply and
then almost ceased. At the time
there was no official explanation.
Then the general facts leaked out.
What had happened was that the
allied commands, particularly the
U. S. navy, quietly had developed
highly-secret, vastly-i m p r o v e d
anti-submarine techniques.
Step Up Plane Protection
These techniques, It appeared,
comprised a number of closely
synchronized measures. Tightly
knit convoys and dozens of small
aircraft carriers were involved,
along with the new destroyer
escorts, fast enough to catch the
subs and heavily enough gunned
to destroy them. Radar played a
significant role, it was reported,
and a r.ewly-developed long-range
aerial patrol from both shores
and mid ocean stepping stone
bases completed the picture.
In any event, from Mav to Aug
ust, 1943, more than 4.000 allied
vessels crossed the Atlantic with
a total loss of only one-half of
one per cent. The raiders, armed
with more and better anti-aircraft
guns, made a final brief come
back late In August, but from
then on their attacks were in
creasingly feeble and more often
than not fatal for the undcrsoas
crait. As Doenltz's first-line crews
and commanders were lost, the re
mainder of the U-boat fleet seem
ed to lose both its boldness and Its
skill. By October, 1943, British
Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden
felt able to announce that the U
boat menace was not only held,
but whipped for good.
The British home fleet, mean
while, had won its battle of con
stant vigilance to keep the ene
my's surface warcraft in port. Its
unfailing alertness never permit
ted the German battleships to be
come a factor In the war. The
few who managed to slip out to
sea met fates reminiscent of the
Graf Spee. The German battle
ship Bismarck got out in May,
1941, but was surprised off Green
land and sunk off the coast of
r ranee after a four-day running
battle. Then Scharnhorst was
caught and sunk off the North
Cape in December, 1943, 22
months after she escaped up the
English channel with her sister
ship the Gneisenau.
gistics for der fuehrer to hurl
some 20 panzer divisions into the
far-flung fray In June. In Decem
ber, with the roads clogging with
ice and snow, to move up the in
fantry needed for the clinching
blow was more than he could
swing. And now he faced a re
vived and confident foe to boot.
The Russians seized the offen
sive abruptly early In DecemberJ
ineir impact rivaled that of the
opening German drive. All along
the 2,000-mile front their resurg
ent forces met success.
From east of Rostov, Marshal
S e m y o n Timoshenko's anny
slammed back into the Sea of
Azov city less than a week after
the nazis entered its streets.
Hitler Takes Commund
On the Crimea, Sevastopol's
long-beleaguered garrison mount
ed a counter-thrust that re-took
Balaklava, where the storied
Light Brigade rode Into the jaws
of death. Russian parachutists
landed behind the Germans' pen
insular lines.
In the central Ukraine, red col
umns encircled ruined Kharkov
and swept back to the skeleton
city of Dnepropetrovsk on the
great Dnepr bend.'
Before Moscow, Marshal Sem
yon Budenny's armies rolled back
the enemy on both flanks, seized
Mozhaisk starting point of Hit
ler's abortive October drive and
probed on toward the Latvian bor
der. Even the miles-thick rine of
steel about Leningrad was par
tially cut by. a Soviet SDearhead
pushing deep into the Valdai hills
! below the ancient capital.
laciuy admitting the setback,
Hitler assumed personal com
mand of the German army. Offi
cially, Berlin complained of the
"fearful cold." It had reason.
Everywhere the Russians were
making the most of the Germans'
Inexperience at, waging war over
freezing snow-covered terrain.
Russians Sweep Westward
Mounting their troops on skis,
their artillery on sleighs and
painting their tanks white, the
Russians outflanked and annihi
lated the stranded nazis by the
thousands. The rutted snow be
came littered, with the battered
hulks of abandoned materiel.
By March, the' serried front
showed soviet pockets thrown
about a score of German bases,
while the main red armies swept
westward to menace the main
nazl supply lines from the reich.
Towns and rail junctions as far
as 150 miles west of the maxi
mum nazl penetration were fall
ing to the flying red troops.
Then, late in April, the offen
sive ended as suddenly as it had
begun. An ominous lull descended
on the battle lines while the earth
hardened ' and dried under the
warm spring sun. Rumors spread
that the armies of the reich were
massing once more. Hitler was re
ported marshaling his armor for
a decisive all-out summer cam
paign. The attack lived up to advance
billing when it came, late in June.
It soon was apparent Hitler was
throwing the major part of his
forces into his 1942 bid for vic
tory. But this time he made no
attempt to strike on all fronts si
multaneously. This time the ma
jor blow was to the south, and
the objective was oil.
Between the jaws of -a giant
pincers drive, the nazis aimed to
obtain oil for themselves and to
keen Oil fmm Pnssia rina nniuAr.
ful force was to strike east, seize
me vpiga river city of Stalingrad
and block that great river high
way -over which four-fifths of
Russia's oil flowed north from
the Caucasus to soviet armies,
factories and farms.
Strike for Oil Fields
The other was to drive south
into the Caucasus itself, the huge
fertile isthmus linking middle
Europe-with eastern Asia. Its ob
jectives were the . Maikop oil
fields; 150 miles below Rostov,
and '. the 'much, richer Grozny,
Batum and Baku fields on the
niw side of the 20.000-foot Cau
casus mountains.
umph of the summer, though
striking, had little direct bearing
on the main goal. It came on
July 2, when Gen. Erich von
Mannstein's troops, finally sue
(Continued on Page 8)
I
f
V
1
ON THE MOVE ...
. From the green fields of France we ere ordered to a new front. Yes, we're going
to join our buddies just halfway around the world to put the finishing touches
on this global war. We don't think that we have any easy task . . . boys who
have met and fought the Japs tell us that they are plenty tough. ,
But then, this is a job that can't be left half-done and we want to get it over
and quickly. And that's where you .folks at home can help us. You keep up
the home front and we will do our part. Keep on buying BONDS . . .. keep on
. the job everyday . . . you do these things and we will make the landings where
the JAPS live!
1 1
This Month, Have You . .
BOUGHT WAR BONDS
Souh of Postoffice
Phone 193
We've Got The
PLANS
vis ;r:
if 1
, A .A-
7 w :im.
, A '
-Ml
Now Let's Make It
Post-War!
Let's get it over and get
things humming get
ready, to build and to
buy. To do that then
BUY WAR
BONDS NOW
ST ff PIES
oprcai
934 Waliystreet
BEND - OREGON