Word: convoy
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...fact that if Britain is beaten the problem of defending the U. S. will grow many times more serious. They had gradually come to the conclusion that one of the weakest links in Britain's defenses might prove to be a shortage of destroyers. Destroyers are vital in convoy service, a sufficient number of British destroyers might be the difference between success and failure in repelling a German invasion of Britain by sea. But next to trawlers, destroyers have also suffered most from air bombings. Up to last week Britain had lost 23 of her pre-war fleet...
From Marseille the ships proceeded under French convoy to an unknown destination. Though one woman insisted on first-class accommodations and another searched vainly for the games deck, the passengers on the whole soon made the best of a situation that rapidly grew worse. "As we were short of water," Maugham continued, "little was available for washing...
...captain and ship's chandler were able to relieve the situation somewhat by increasing the stocks of food and tobacco in the town and that night they started for Gibraltar under another French convoy. But again they were unable to land. "Then many of us broke down. Women cried. It seemed too much to bear. An officer came on board and made us a speech explaining that Gibraltar was a fortress and that a large number of refugees had already passed through, that fifth-column activities were feared. . . ." Finally authorities relented, took off children, invalids and oldsters, allowed others...
...Italian scouts spied a British squadron steaming west below Crete. Italian airplanes flew out to meet this foe and (said the Italians) damaged a battleship and an aircraft carrier, sank a cruiser. Meantime, an Italian battle squadron put out to protect other Italian warships which were returning from a convoy trip to Libya and evidently were the target of the British raiders from the East. Next day, in an engagement in the Ionian Sea off Cape Spartivento (toe of the Italian "boot") lasting from mid-afternoon until nightfall, the Italian warships (said the Italians) "drove the British back from...
...last week in France, Germany may now have enough submarines to bring the Axis total up to 200. The total of Allied destroyers, including French, was not much more than 250, or a destroyer-submarine ratio of 1¼-to-1. The air arm now supplements destroyers and the convoy system makes their work easier, but during World War I a grand total of 781 Allied destroyers (in ratio more than 3-to-1) was none too many to ride herd on a total of 221 Austro-German submarines...