Shavetails in Eritrea

Last week the campaign in Eritrea began to look like another Italo-British speed contest (see above). From Kassala, a few miles inside Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, the British pursued Italians 68 miles to Biscia, head of a railway running down to the Red Sea port of Massaua. Operating here in rough foothills covered with dry six-foot scrub where lions and elephants are more at home than tanks, the British, although forced for the most part to hug the roads, kept so hot after the retreating Italians that the latter scarcely fought even rear-guard actions, until they were within 15 miles of the railhead. The British, in independent little bands of armored cars and Bren carriers commanded by nothing loftier than shavetail lieutenants, flanked two successive defense lines, captured 1,100 men and 200 mules, and got the railway terminus. They pressed on, trying to catch as many Italians as possible before they got into really rough terrain near Eritrea's capital, Asmara.

Far south in Kenya, British patrols had similar success. At week's end the Kenya spearheads were well into Italian Somaliland and southern Ethiopia.

The Negus Goes Back. No one can be so persuasive with the noble savage as the sophisticated Briton. Instead of whipping him into line as the Italian does, he convinces the native that his own profit is at stake with the British cause. Ever since the Italians took Ethiopia, Britons have nursed the Negus, Haile Selassie, with convincing tenderness. Not long ago, when the British began to resurge in Africa, he flew from Britain toward his native land to start beating his war drum (his drum, he says, has a different tone from that of all other Ethiop chiefs; the blacks know it well). At the same time the British sent "military missions" among their would-be allies, to persuade them to rise up against the Italians. But there is no persuasion like apparent success. The campaigns in Eritrea and Kenya were the final signal for action. From the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan the British struck into Ethiopia, near Metemmeh.

Haile Selassie issued a call to action, and native bands began to harass the Italian rear. The Negus meant business. Said he: "When I enter Addis Ababa, I shall lead my victorious troops into the Capital, mounted on a white horse, just as Badoglio did. I will tear down the figure of the wolf erected by the Italians in Addis Ababa Square and in its place will reinstate the white marble statue of the Lion of Judah." In London, his roly-poly, good-natured Empress Waizeru Menen collected her daughters, packed her crown jewels for the big entry, climbed aboard a crowded troop train, and disappeared in the direction of Africa.

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