The RoadsAre Mined

General Sir Harold Alexander entered the wardroom at headquarters for his first press conference since the beginning of the Italian campaign. Three dozen correspondents jumped to their feet. The commander of Allied ground forces in Italy promptly waved them down, seated himself on a desk corner.

A 15-ft. map of Italy hung on the wall behind him. Sir Harold wore a freshly washed khaki bush jacket, dark grey riding breeches, brown boots. The purple-red decoration of the American Legion of Merit was pinned above his breast pocket. Crisply he asked for questions, crisply he answered:

> The Italian campaign? Going quite well, though differently and more slowly than expected. The German was tough, the terrain tougher. "All roads lead to Rome. I won't argue that. But unfortunately all the roads are mined."

> What had been Allied expectations? The General stepped up to the map with a wooden pointer. The plan was a bold one. It called for the Fifth Army to cut across Italy from Salerno and thereby cut off the Germans facing the Eighth Army in the south. The German, a very good soldier who takes a little time to make up his mind but then acts quickly, whipped two divisions from the Eighth's front and threw them in, with two other divisions, at Salerno. For a time the situation was very dangerous. The Allies turned on the whole of their air force and all of their naval gunfire. Then the German swung back, as expected, from the Eighth's front to a line farther back.

> Was the Italian campaign helping the Russians? The General quoted from Germany's Propaganda Minister Paul Joseph Goebbels: "Our diminishing strength on the Russian front is due to attacks on the Italian front. We have had to send divisions to Italy."

One hour after the questions began, the General donned his red-ribboned service cap, offered a final comment: the first problem was to take Rome--"He who holds Rome holds the hearts of the Italian people."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.