Cautious Return

U-boats have come back to the Atlantic, First Lord of the Admiralty Albert V. Alexander warned last week. Running out of new weapons, Hitler has tried to resharpen this old and blunted one.

But the tone of Alexander's report was not alarming. He hinted that new shark fleets may have fresh tactics and technical equipment aimed to offset the deadly Allied location devices and methods which ruined the U-boats in 1942-43. But the sub commanders are more "shy, cautious and nervous" than they used to be. The "largest ocean supply convoy of all time" --167 ships spread over 26 square miles of seaway and carrying 1,000,000 tons of cargo--recently arrived in Britain without meeting a single U-boat attack on the way. Like most Atlantic convoys these days, this one was protected by an all-Canadian escort.

Alexander also disclosed that a big British fleet was on its way to the Orient--a fleet powerful enough to cope with the whole Japanese Navy, if the latter should happen to get in the way. Almost as he spoke, the Jap radio at Singapore squeaked that 24 British warships had arrived in the Indian Ocean--a force which included four carriers and ten battleships.

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