The Daily Alaska empire Newspaper, December 23, 1943, Page 1

VOL. XLIL, NO. 9531. " THE DAILY ALASKA EN[PIRE “ALL THE NEWS ALL THE TIME” S()(Mll l)l’RkS% PRICETENCENTS '_I] JUNEAU, ALASKA, THURSD:AQ’ , DECEMBER 23, 1943 ROCKET GUN COAST OF FRANCE BOMBED Battle Rages on Streets of Adriatic Port EIGHTHARMY | FIGHT NALIS, ORTONA AREA Germans Turning City Into, Miniature Stalingrad- Parachuters Land ALLIED HEADQUARTERS IN | — The Eighth infantry, are the streets of day, the ALGIERS, Dec. Army, tonks and fighting bitterly in Ortona for the third straight meeting the savage attacks of German forces who are turning this tiny Adriatic port into a miniature Stalingrad. The Germans are throwing parachute troops into Ortona in a desperate attempt to bolster the German infantry to hold out. On the Fifth Army front in the west, American troops have cap- tured the snow-covered 3,000 foot Mount Cavallo, three and one half miles northwest of Nevafro nea Viticuso. The French forces advanced the mountain pass where the strug- gle has mn(.,\’d for several days. AMERICANS ADVANCING AT ARAWE Frist DispakTDirect from Scene Sent by AP Newsman By ll()BFRT L( NSON Associated Press War Correspondent WITH THE AMERICAN SIXTH ARMY AT ARAWE, Dec. 23-—Or- ganized ground resistance in Arawe sector has been smashed by the American patrols who are now eniarging the outer perimeter on the eight-day-old invasion front vir- tually unmolested. The main beachhead consists of the Arawe Peninsula on the south- west end of New Britain Island from Cape Merkus to Posiuion, a few miles inland beyond Umitingalu village, which was captured several days 23. new in ago. The American patrols are digging into the coral caves along the beaches, killing a few Jap stragglers. (This is the first dispatch directly ' from the beachhead since the Am- erican landings on December 15. Eunson rode in on the first wave. Fliers Listed AsMissingNow War Prisoners WASHINGTON, Dec. War Department announced that of 581 air crew members reported missing when 60 Flying Fortresses were lost in the heavy bombing of industrial plants at Schweinfurt, 346 are alive and prisoners of war. Eighteen crew members at first listed as missing are how reported officially as killed. Reports are still being received and it is expected that more may be listed as prison- ers. The Most Fortresses lost on any mission was the attack on October 14 when bombers shot down 186 fighter planes and probably destroy- | ed 27, and damaged 89. Revised fi- gures show that the fighter escorts destroyed 13 enemy fighters, one probable, and damaged five. We lost five fighters when vital plants which made at least half the ball bearings manufactured in Europe were wrecked, the ' | 23. — The! \ | | | a ELOPEMENT—Blues Singer Dinah Shore is pictured with her new the U ried. Dinah telephoned the South and subsequent elopement. Creek and the USO headquarters Corporal Montgomery to Las Vegas, Ne news to her father in Nashville, Tenn. Montgomery was in Juneau for sev hushand, Corperal George Monteomery, former sereen actor, now in Air Force. The famed radio and screen songbird eloped with , where the couple was mar- 1 weeks, just prior He made his headquarters at Duck ile in June to his, trip Flai- Tops Now Point BIG BOMBER 'NOW BEING Super-craft that Will ”Sur- prise and Hurt” En- emy Constructed WASHINGTON, Dec. 23.—A new super-bomber is disclesed by Con- gressman John J. Sparkman of Al- abama, Chairman of the House Military and Aviation subcommittee, on his return from a 10,000 mile inspection tour of aviation plants and Army Airforce installations in eight states and this new air in- strument will “surprise and hurt” the enemy and will soon be in large !scale production. Sparkman said he could disclose no details because the Army has not yet announced details. He did say that probably the new super- | bo! omber will be used on the Pacific i because of its long flying range. In answer to a question, Spark- !man said he is not talking about the new B-29 sky giant development (recently announced by Gen. H. H. yAxnuld COLUMBIA, S. C—A want-ad in {this war-crowded “Big cheif staff sgt. and working squaw want {urnished 3-room tepee. No papoose. Plenty wampum and references. Unusual Indians, no war |dancing or war paint.” - HERE FROM WRANGELL Miss Birdie McNeill, Bureau of ~ DEVELOPED for the aircraft carrier, military| | experts, eyes on the budding Paci-| fic campaign, are convinced the| aircraft carrier has arrived. ‘ In the 1 60 days in the Paci-| fic, the flat-tops deait the Japs some of the most damaging blo -~ ToTokye; Carrier of Aircraft Has Arrived BY JACK STINNETT WASHINGTON, Dec. 23. — Well,| anyway, they're not “floating egg- shells.” After months of hoots and hails they've felt. Last summer, car- rier-based planes blasted far-flung Marcus Island. A little later they “neutralized” Nips have rebuilt on Wake Island, and 61 enemy planes were destroyed to our loss of 13. Carrier critics still held out, de- claring that these “surpri: suc- cesses proved nothing. In some circles here, there was hooting when Secretary of the Navy Knox an- nounced we were starting construc- tion of three super-carriers. Oppon- ents pointed out that we had lost four of our seven pre-war carriers,| and called them “floating eggshells,” so vulnerable to attack that they never could prove effective. But all the time the navy, men were developing a new technique, building task forces around carriers, with perhaps a battleship and 15 or | 20 other fighting ships protecting a couple of flat-tops. Early in November a task force| struck Rabaul. Carrier based dive bombers, torpedo planes and fight- | (ers knocked out six eruisers (Japan | Indian Affairs teacher at Wrangell,| is in Juneau‘for a few day’s visit. was supposed to have had less than | three times that number in its en- tire navy when war started), two; light cruisers and two destroyers.| A week later in another raid on Rabaul, one light cruiser and two destroyers were sunk and 11 other destroyers damaged. In both in- stances, land-based bombers from| General MacArthur’s forces on New Guinea, followed up the raids or joined in, but correspondents at MacArthur's headquarters described (Continued on PagveV Two) the strong base the| Dinah- (orp Monlgomery Wed REDS SMASH NAZI LINES AT VITEBSK | EG igantic Nan Last leh Offensive Stopped by Soviet Artillery | MOSCOW, Dec. 23.—Massed Rus- sian heavy artillery and big mobile guns blazed away against gigantic ;nov\ German tank offensives de- scribed as one of the war's heaviest iuxmuled ssaults. The- large scale enemy attack was | sprung yesterday along the 400-inile | front stretching from White Russia to the Dnieper bend. | Frontline reports Army forces | sectors, and their artillery fire de- | stroyed at least 148 of the attacking | tanks. | The new counterattack came as |an eleventh-hour effort as Russian | pressure increased in the Nazi | Vitebsk and Polotsk defense wall, Further north, Gen. Bagramian's | First Baltic Army is driving stead- ily ahead, and a Moscow radio com- mentator said the main defense line at Vitebsk is cracked and tanks and guns are pouring through the breach “like an avalanche JAPS 1OSE 16 PLANES IN ATTACK Americans Make Gains at Arawe Despite Air Blows said the Red ADVANCED ALLIED HEAD- |QUARTERS, NEW GUINEA, Dec. 23.—American ground forces have extended and consolidated their po- sitions at Arawe, New Britain, in the face of stubborn night and day {air attacks by the Japanese, it was 1eported today. | The air attacks cost the enemy at least 16 planes. Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. George C. Kenney's Fifth Air Force dropped 205 tons of bombs on Japanese air- (dromes and supply dumps in the ‘Cape Gloucester area, hiking the | total of explosives laid in this vital enemy center to more than 2,000 tons since December 1. | Nearly 100 enemy dive-bombers |and fighters participated in the at- | tacks. At Arawe, commanders on The and the attacking enemy aircraft. Japs were met by Lightning Thunderbolt fighters. By the attacks, the Japanese sig- |naled a possible resumption of their air assaults which became negligible a few days after the American army | invaded the island on December 15. n'ivan holdings, but said one patrol reported receiving light fire on De- cember 19 from Awang, island west |of Arawe peninsula. | Nearly 100 American |medium bombers, with dive-bombers %|and fighters staged the attack on‘Jolni commi"ee Repons fo \lhe Gloucester area in two separate | |forays. Many fires were started. ‘ At the same time, American Navy | |Catalina planes bombed enemy cargo vessels off Kavieng, New Ire- |land sinking one 6,000 ton ship iand scoring a direct hit on another. | Heavy bombers of the South Pa-| |cific Command damaged an enemy ‘aesuoyer in this area and Libera- Itor bombers attacked Madang, leav- [ing 21 tons of bombs, causing fires tand explosions of supply dumps. e MISS SUBLETTE BACK Miss Mary Jo Sublette, Bureau of Indian Affairs Clerk, has returned from a few days leave in Anchor- age. J are holding firm in all | the | |spot reported only slight damage by | Dispatches in extending the Am-| heavy and | "Fighting 69th’" Advances on Butaritari Beach SECRET NAZI k ‘ | B WEAPON GETS BIG BOMBING Tremendous Atfacks Being I Made on Targets-Gun Is “No Bluff” LONDON, Dec. 23.—Both Amer- ican and British bomber forces have been thrown intc attacks on the rocket gun coast of France. This is the disclosure made today and for the first time the Royal Air Force's fleet has been diverted from such targets as Berlin to the rocket gun emplacements on the French coast. Attacks were again made last night and it is evident that the targets of great importance have been spotted and marked for de- struction. A big force of high-flying bombers streaked out for northern France this morning and others were bound for targets in the Pas de Calais re- gion, nearest to England, in daylight raids. It is revealed that these areas have been blasted incessantly since Monday. Mines have also been laid in enemy waters. 5 4 2 oo ~| It is believed that the boasted : German rocket gun emplacements in the past three days for oha " American Flag Flies AboveMakinlsland < ¥ § F‘?_\ lng Fortresses and Liberators, | | [ W Vot Troops of the 165th U Infantry Butaritari Beach, Makin Atoll, Gilbert Islands, Mediam tanks aiready were on the beach cleaning out | (AP Wirephoto from Signal Corps) advance through the surf on y a4 naval bombard- “Fighting 69th,” iously set to bla New York's former which was p mac! nests as the troops ment. moved in. 000 or moré planes have been used s with escorts, have been striking un- disclosed locations not only on the French coast but in narthwest Ger- many, Thirty-eight CGerman fighters were shot down yesterday over northwest Germany. Twenty-one Allied bomb- crs have been lost during the past 24 hours and also four fighters. Crewmen of one United States bomber ore reported to have downed 21 German planes during one raid. ROCKET IS “NO BLUFF” NEW YORK, Dec. 23.—Allied of- ficials regard CGermany’s rocket weapon as “no bluff,” says Allan Mitchie, of Readers Digest Maga- | zine, arriving here on a trans-At- lantic clipper. ‘ Mitchie ~says “information has | been gathered from refugees and se- | cret agents for five months and the weapon is no bluff. The Allies are reasonably sure that approximately ! 50 tons can be shot from the French | coast from a rocket gun into Eng- land and 40 tons is propulsion mamrhl ¥ W ROOSEVELT IS ON AIR TOMORROW WASHINGTON, Dec. 23.—Presi- |dent Roosevelt’s address- tomorrow {noon, Pacific War Time, to the Nation’s fighting forces, .will be can‘iud on a worldwide radio hook An hour after the 165th U. S. Infantry, the former “ Jighting 65th” of New York, landed on Makin Atoll in the Gilbert Islands, the American flag was flying fro 2 a palm tree. The atoll was quickly wrested from (AP pholu from Signal Corps) | CONFERENCE DRASTICORER'S MacARTHUR ON STRIKE ‘ez vucostavia. NOTCOMING is FM“NGKlnl?eze;?rfiael?nemzsbi;up! BACK HOME Marshal Broz ' 'lhh hookup will include all Am- erican networks, the entire British | Broadcasting Corporation, Austra- }lmn and New Zealand networks, stations in Algiers, Palermo, Naples N |2nd India. ! The President will speak from ALLIED HEADQUARTERS NEW GUINEA, Dec. 23.—Published < i K reports in the United States that Hyde Park. He set aside most of | Presldem No Agree- LONDON, Dec 3.5‘ Denouncing | qen pouglas MacArthur would go | today to work on his address. |the “hostile attitude” and acts of | 4o Washington next March—reports | — 4 | linked with the MacArthur for Presi- dent movement — are characteriz d; by the General’s spokesman as with- | out foundation. | sman said MacArthur | King Peter's Yugoslav government- in-exile, Marshal Broz, of the Coun cil of Liberation, has ordered Pete) regime deprived of “all of its right: ment Reached | WASHINGTON, Dec. The joint committee of railway manage- ment and representatives of the op- | 23. The spc | erating brotherhoods, with the strike | 204 f0rbidden‘young King Peter t0 | hag no plans to return to the United | deadline a week away, reported to|return home until Yugoslavia '*"sln.: s in the nea: future. ithe President today that so far entirely liberated. B — 1 The strongly-worded declaration | DILEMMA CAMP ROBERTS, Calif. — One smber of a training battalien has ceived a gaily wrapped bundie agreement has been reached on the i i is broadcasted by the Free Yugoslav One spokesman said the “confer- | radio and came as the Allies were ence has terminated.” | giving military aid to Broz and at- ‘The spokesman of the other said tempting to settle the difference be- the conference is “a failure.’ | tween the two Yugoslav factions e s".”‘n‘ D.v daterads. Tates: this. afternoay | - Do Bos.open unkll Obslsmasy L] Till CHRISTMAS went to the White House, | m_vy WAR BONDS 1 Perishable. L ) . jare the objectives and perhaps du-- i "o ! 4 % 1