T has been constantly and rightly reiterated that the object
of the
NEWS OF THE WEEK
Eighth Army in Egypt and Libya was not to take territory but to destroy the armed forces of the enemy. Though that is a correct account of the military objectives it is evident that the occupation of territory may be a consequence of victory valuable from both a military and a moral point of view, and sometimes, though not to considerable extent in the case of Libya, from an economic point of view. The conquest of the whole Italian Empire in Africa, with its coast-lines in East Africa and North Africa, deprives the enemy of air and sea bases from which he could operate against us in the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, and interposes vast spaces between him and the once coveted goals of Alexandria and the Suez Canal. But more than that, the ejection of the Italians. from Abyssinia, Eritrea and Libya brings to an end the whole African Empire of the " reigning King of Italy and Emperor of Ethiopia," and the Fascist way of life imposed on it by Mussolini. There is symbolic significance in the fact that the dictator who challenged the League of Nations by his aggression against Abyssinia and opened the way to the usurpations of Hitler should now not only have had all of that conquest wrested from him, but have added to the gloom and despair of his countrymen through the latest conse- quence of his policy, the loss of Italy's North African Empire. It is some satisfaction to Great Britain that this is a result brought about by an army predominantly composed of British troops commanded by a British General, though acknowledgement is due for Lend- Lease supplies sent by America ; and though the Navy and the Air Force have made their indispensable contributions to victory, the African campaigns have given the Army an opportunity of showing that, with adequate equipment, it can give a brilliant account of itself against the best German troops—an earnest of future success when it challenges them on European soil.
