A very busy day on all fronts for October 9, 1942.
More than 100 United States bombers attacked the industrial Lille region of Northern France today in the biggest American bomber and fighter force ever to take the air in the European war theater. Four of the United States bombers were lost but the crew of one was safe. Five enemy planes were shot down, The focus of the attack was the Fives-Lille steel and locomotive works. Fliers of the high-altitude bombers said they could see many bursts on the target and a huge spout of flame and smoke rising from it as they wheeled away.
Many squadrons of Allied fighters, including United States units flying United States planes, made supporting and diversionary sweeps’ during this operation and fulfilled their mission without a loss. United • States Army Air Forces headquarters, promising a more detailed announcement later, issued this terse communique: “More than 100 USAAF bombers attacked targets in the Lille area this morning. “Many squadrons of fighters took part in this operation.” A big part of the bombing force, an extraordinary number for a daylight raid, was made up of great, four motored flying Fortresses, and the Americans were joined in the assault by the RAF and many squadrons of Allied fighters.
From the Eastern Front: The Germans, grinding slowly forward in an industrial district of Stalingrad but with victory still denied them there, were reported today to have started anew on a wide flanking invasion further south, obviously calculated to through the Kalmyck territory the Volga delta on the Caspian sea. A dispatch to the government newspaper Izvestia from Astrakhan, at the mouth of the Volga, contained the first Russian admission that the Germans had entered the Kalmyck area which lies west of the lower Volga and south of Stalingrad. This indicated a developing activity on the German right flank across the steppes between the Don and the lower Volga concurrent with the desperate seesaw struggle for Stalingrad. Izvestia’s dispatch said representatives of the Kalmyck people, Asiatic descendants of Mongolian Nomads who long ago settled Southern Russia, had held a council of war at the village of Kanukovo, heard reports that the Germans were burning and killing their territory, and vowed resistance.
And from the Pacific: Following announcement of a U. S. carrier task force raid in the northern Solomons, the navy disclosed today that American Army planes rained 15 tons of bombs. on Japanese positions on Kiska Island in the Aleutians.
Two cargo ships in Kiska Harbor were attacked and one was left on fire and sinking. The raid on Kiska appeared to be one of the heaviest yet carried out in America’s determined campaign the Nipponese from toe-hold in the Western Aleutians. Seven tons of bombs were dropped on the seaplane hangar and eight more on camp area where fires were observed. The attack boosted to 39 the number of Nipponese vessels sunk and damaged to date in the Aleutian area. The smashing raid on Kiska also resulted in damage by strafing to the Japanese radio station there.
And that’s a little of what happened on this very busy day of War, October 9, 1942 as reported by NBC’s News Of The World – morning and night editions
