Fantasque Time Line (France Fights On) - English Translation

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535
July 29th, 1940

Libya (Tripolitania)
- Fall of Fortino. The French mobile elements continue immediately in the direction of Pilastrino.
On the coast, the French forces take Misrata without any real opposition. The Italians, knowing that they were being outflanked from the interior, continue to retreat with much haste.
 
536
July 29th, 1940

Libya (Cyrenaica)
- A series of reconnaissance attacks and artillery bombardments mark the beginning of the preparation of the British offensive on this front.
At the same time, the Royal Navy increases its activity, shelling the coastal road towards Tobruk.
 
537
July 29th, 1940

Haifa (Palestine) and Tripoli (Lebanon)
- During the night of the 29th to the 30th, the oil terminals located at the ends of the two branches of the pipeline coming from Iraq, are bombed by some SM.81 coming from Rhodes. The Italians, warned of the arrival of French MS-406s in Haifa at the end of June, preferred to avoid a daytime attack, at least as long as the much faster SM.79 were not available.
If in Tripoli the damage is moderate, in Haifa the bombs set fire to an oil tank. The fire lasts two days - no more, but this did not prevent the Headquarters of the Italian Armed Forces from stating on August 3rd, in its Bulletin No. 55: "From a reliable source, it appears that the fire caused in Haifa by our recent bombardment was still active three days later".
 
538
July 29th, 1940

Southwestern France
- The last French troops on the Atlantic are defending a front from Bayonne to Cambo-les-Bains; the resistance has no other objective than to allow the evacuation by sea of all the specialists useful for the war effort... In the evening, the Germans reach Pau and Tarbes.

Provence - This time, the battle of Vitrolles is over and the Wehrmacht is in Marseille.
In the nearby Port-de-Bouc shipyard, there are only the remains of light units under construction, scuttled in the drydocks.

Mediterranean coast - In the last French-held ports, ships from all the Allied navies are frantically trying to evacuate all that can be evacuated and all those who wish to do so. Every hour or so, a group of stragglers from one of the units of the GA 3 or the Army of the Alps arrives, ready to do anything to make their way to a ship, that is, to freedom and revenge.

Toulon - Encouraged by the sharp decline in French fighter activity, the Regia Aeronautica launches a raid against the last major port held by the French. It thus obtains its greatest success of the campaign: the large cargo ship Aveyron (CGAM), surprised at the quay, is hit and catches fire; it cannot be saved.
 
539
July 29th, 1940

Western Mediterranean
- During the night, the Italian submarine Scirè intercepts a French convoy off the Balearic Islands. Successfully penetrating the convoy discreetly, it sinks two freighters with torpedoes and damages another with its gun, as well as the aviso Annamite, before escaping unharmed.
This feat is the greatest success of the campaign conducted by the Italian submarine fleet against the Grand Déménagement.
Despite its imposing strength on paper (116 submersibles), Admiral Falangola's force is dispersed over many areas of operation and handicapped by technical problems and the lack of training of its crews, and is thus unable to align more than 12 to 14 submarines at the same time against the French convoys. It loses five ships in six weeks (the Provana, Angelo Emo, Neghelli, Ondina and Medusa), but it obtains significant results: 15 Allied merchant ships and 2 auxiliary patrol boats are sunk, 6 other ships damaged (not to mention the torpedoing of the battleship HMS Resolution by the Marconi, outside the operations of the Déménagement). Moreover, the Italian submarines proved to be a constant threat to the activity of the Allied merchant marine in the Mediterranean, forcing the Allies to allocate many patrol boats and escorts to ASW combat rather than to evacuate personnel.
 
540
July 29th, 1940

Rome
- Dutch oil assets in Italy are put in receivership. This is the logical but late step of a development that began on June 12th, with the rupture of diplomatic relations between Italy and the Netherlands decided by Mussolini. The Dutch government in exile had authorized the Koninklijke Marine (Royal Dutch Navy) to take part in actions against Italian ships and had Italian ships seized in the ports of the Dutch colonies. Nevertheless, on June 27th, the Dutch, under the influence of De Geer, had refused to accede to the request of the British Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax, who wished to see the Dutch East Indies declare war on Italy and seize Italian assets. De Geer had alleged constitutional considerations, but in fact feared Italian reprisals against the Dutch assets.
Here he was, in quite a pickle.
 
541
July 30th, 1940

Port-Vendres
- In the middle of a crowd of anonymous people, ministers Mandel and Dautry, surrounded by their collaborators, embark in the middle of the night on board the destroyer Le Fantasque, apparently subscribed to ministerial transport.
 
542
July 30th, 1940

Aden
- Aviso HMAS Parramatta and submarine HMS Perseus are released, after having searched unsuccessfully for the German raider Atlantis in the Indian Ocean.

Djibouti - The air defense is strongly reinforced by the arrival of the GAM II/551: five D-501 (from Dakar!), four Po-63.11 and especially ten MS-406.
 
543
July 30th, 1940

Libya (Tripolitania)
- The French vanguards are approaching Pilastrino, along the banks of the oued Bei-el-Chebir. Resistance is sporadic. The French motorized horsemen do not hesitate to bypass the defenders to rush forward as quickly as possible. The components of the 16th BLM and the Brigade de Chars de Tunisie (1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th RCA, 61st, 62nd and 65th BCC) even (unofficially...) organize a real stage race. Are we not in July, the season of the Tour de France!
.........
On the coast, the few Breguet 693/5 moved in mid-July join the fray.
- Solitaire 6 to everyone, possible target at 11 o'clock, a column of soldiers with trucks.
- From Solitaire 1, I see it. To everyone, we descend to 100 meters, echelon refused by the left, for 90° turn on target at my signal, with formation in line.

An approach that has become classic at the 54th, whose two groups now form a single one, even reinforced by the men and planes of GBA II/35! The eleven other pilots confirm the order placidly, and the whole formation approaches the ground. They could go even lower, if the heat of this month of July in the middle of the Libyan coastal desert did not obstruct the view. But it is not too necessary either: the enemy flak is almost absent, quite a change compared to the French Campaign. While giving the signal for the turn, Captain Desclerc is busy observing the Italian column retreating eastward. He stares at the trucks and the men. Suddenly an expletive resounds in the cabin, while his finger pushes the radio button to contact the eleven planes which were now heading straight for their target, bomb hatches open. "Solitaire 1 to all, hold your fire! There are plenty of civilians, target discrimination impossible!"
The twelve twin-engines whiz by over the congested road, where pedestrians throw themselves to the ground in despair at the terrifying sight. The worst for them does not happen, however, and they get up one by one...
- Captain, they are Italians!
- So what? We have all seen or experienced the atrocities of the Stuka on our own columns of refugees, we are not going to do the same!
- Well said, captain!
- Solitaire 1 to everyone, we take the initial course again, echelon refused on the right, altitude 300 meters.

It is not long before a new shout is heard in the headphones: "Solitaire 3 to everyone, motorized military column at 2 o'clock!" In fact, another detachment appears, driving in the opposite direction to the first one, so more likely reinforcements than refugees! Desclerc then resumes his instructions, adding a fire order at his signal. The ballet of the planes starts again, a graceful figure in the sky, if it were not synonymous with death.
Through his armored windshield, Desclerc sees the vehicles and the uniforms of the men coming out of them, some of them getting into firing position. The signal to fire instinctively comes out of his mouth, and on the ground, it is hell. Except for the planes with anti-aircraft equipment in front of them, only the machine guns are spitting, the 20 mm guns are normally kept in reserve for another occasion, the bombs should be enough. But the habit acquired in France, where there was always Flak, is tenacious, and the shells are fired before the bombs.
This time, the planes are not content to spread fear. Men are mowed down by machine guns, trucks and rare light armoured vehicles explode under the shells, then the crash of explosions of 50 kg bombs... In a few seconds, the group of reinforcements is annihilated, or almost! Contrary to the habits acquired since three months, Desclerc turns his
squadron to 180° for a new pass with his guns, the anti-aircraft pieces on the ground being not very numerous and not very effective, if they were not destroyed. Joy fromthe pilots who can observe their work well done and put another layer on top!

Nevertheless, the small arms of the infantry and some machine guns are able to do some damage, and two of the planes leave with difficulty, not to mention a slightly wounded pilot, who is able to bring his whole plane back to El Aouïna.
On the ground, it is the silence after the battles, punctuated by cries and tears of the wounded. Smells of cordite, blood, urine, guts and vomit. The few survivors look at this spectacle of desolation, stunned. The driver of the only truck that remained intact clutches his steering wheel with both both hands, unable to move, probably unable to believe in his luck.
Soon the long line of refugees approaches, preceded by some soldiers. They are going to lend a hand to the dazed men. At the head of the convoy, a few civilian vehicles, including a Lancia Lambda. At the back of the overloaded car, two teenagers are indignant, next to an imperturbable grandfather with a sad look in his eyes.
- It's awful, the French have massacred everyone!
- It's despicable, you murderers!
- Calm down, children. They are soldiers who have done their duty to kill other soldiers... They are not murderers, because they spared us on their first pass.
- Oh, don't you think they missed us instead?
- Missed? Look what they did to the Camicie Nere! [The old man spits on the ground towards towards the remains of the column, whose uniforms he recognized]. Not one standing! No, they know their job, those Frenchmen, and believe me, you can thank them for having let us keep our lives!
- But they are enemies, after all!
- Enemies? Santa Madonna, I think that our worst enemy is in Rome!
 
544
July 30th, 1940

Southwestern France
- The front line now runs north of Biarritz, passes through Orthez and Oloron, and then reaches the Spanish border, which the Germans reached in the region of Bagnères. The last French forces in the South-West are isolated in a pocket between the front line, the Atlantic and the the border. For five days, this pocket is heroically defended, both on the ground and in the air.

Biarritz - Since three days, the GC II/8 operates from its new ground.
Each day, it launches several attacks: groups of two to six planes went to strafe the German forces on the N-117 or on the N-10. Pilots and mechanics are exhausted, but they try hard to delay the inevitable. Every time they see the sea, the pilots see wakes heading west. They know they are not fighting for nothing.
(Excerpts from " Le Groupe de Chasse II/8 dans la défense de l’Ouest – D’après le journal de marche de l’unité ", Editions Ouest-France, 1990)

Mediterranean ports - The large convoys are cancelled: the air threat is too strong on the French coast. The general staff simply assigns each ship to a loading and unloading port, giving it some instructions on the route to follow: Sète - Oran, Port-Vendres - Casablanca... The captain then knows in which port he must go to load, and where he must unload. The main routes used are Toulon-Alger (TA), Toulon-Oran (TO), Sète-Oran (SO), Sète-Casablanca (SC), Port-Vendres-Alger (PA), Port-Vendres-Oran (PO) and Port-Vendres-Casablanca (PC). The use of Casablanca as an unloading port is made inevitable to avoid congestion of the ports of Algeria, in spite of the lengthening of the journey which results from it.
Moreover, in view of the need to reinforce the transatlantic traffic to transport military equipment to Africa, the government decides to withdraw more than 75% of the freighters operating in the Mediterranean to convoys in the North and South Atlantic.
From then on, urgency is the rule. As there is not enough time to organize the remaining ships into escorted convoys, the Grand Déménagement becomes "a vast chaos full of good wills", according to the words of an American journalist... The transports are content to form small groups of similar speed and destination. At the end, each one will take to the sea individually, as soon as loaded, to get away as soon as possible from the coasts where enemy bombers are prowling, and to sail alone towards the south, eventually seeking the company of the other ships that chance will put on its way...
However, the ships of the French Navy do their best to keep the submarines away from the vicinity of the ports of embarkation and disembarkation. This is not without danger for them, sometimes: on the 30th, the aviso La Surprise is bombed and sunk by German planes off Toulon.

Sète - Since the port of Marseille became unusable, Sète is, after Toulon, the largest French port still in operation on the Mediterranean. Aware of their responsibilities, the sailors and the workers of the port show a magnificent devotion under the bombings which intensify and compete with ingenuity to keep the port facilities in working order.
The Belgian flotilla evacuates another 11,000 recruits, and even some refugee families who could not resign themselves to separate themselves from their sons.
 
545
July 31st, 1940

London and Alger
- A week after the Carlton Gardens meeting, the British and French Admiralty have made good progress in planning the movement of the ships necessary for the three operations Ravenne, Marigna and Cordite (following the chronological order in which they are to be launched).
On the British side, it is intended to take advantage of Operation Hats in the first half of August to transfer a large number of the promised destroyers to the Mediterranean. The others will be able to escort some of the large ships provided as reinforcements for Operation Marignan: the aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal, the heavy cruiser HMAS Australia and the light cruiser HMS Delhi. The cruiser HMS Sheffield will join the Mediterranean at the end of August after a patrol in the Atlantic. As for the ships involved in Ravenne, the old cruiser HMS Dragon, which is undergoing a short overhaul in Lagos will go to the Mediterranean at the end of it, on August 4th. The heavy cruiser HMS Cumberland, which arrived on July 29th in Trincomalee (Ceylon) with her sister-ship HMS Kent after escorting convoys in the Indian Ocean, will both reach Alexandria, the latter of which is to rejoin the Mediterranean Fleet. Cumberland's transfer to the Western Mediterranean will then be settled.
In addition, the Allied Admiralty adds a secondary aspect to Operation Hats, called "Caps": the constitution in Alexandria of a small reserve of aircraft and crews for the squadrons of the Fleet Air Arm and the Aéronavale. There were indeed some losses in July and others are expected during the "Judgment" operation, which must be compensated before the next effort, "Cordite". None of the aircraft deployed by the Allied naval air forces having a sufficient autonomy to reach Egypt from the bases available to the Allies, it is decided to use the old HMS Argus to transport these reinforcements. These amounted to 18 aircraft: 12 for the Aéronavale (6 Brewster B-339 and as many Curtiss SBC-4s) and 6 for the FAA (Swordfish - all the available Fulmars were loaded on the HMS Illustrious!). Their crews being relatively inexperienced, it is not planned to use them for the first operation (with the exception of one SBC-4, the AB4 having lost a plane at the beginning of July).
.........
On the French side, the move from Toulouse to Algiers does not totally prevent the work from progressing. Ravenne and Marignan pose relatively few problems, since all the movements are going to be made in the Western Mediterranean. On the other hand, the French Navy will have to move more than twenty warships (three light cruisers, seven destroyers, half a dozen avisos and as many auxiliary minesweeprs), plus a dozen troop transports and five freighters. The choice is made for a majority of ships with experience from the Norwegian campaign: the British are asked to make the cargos Enseigne Maurice Préchac, Paul-Emile Javary and Vulcain available for use.
It will be difficult to hide this massive transfer from the Italians. At most, we can hope that they will believe (thanks to some well-orchestrated leaks) that it is a shipment of reinforcements for East Africa. A circumnavigation of Africa would have been more discreet, but its cost in fuel oil or coal, the wear and tear on the equipment and the fatigue of the crews makes it impossible.
With two exceptions: two of the four auxiliary cruisers selected for Cordite and based in Dakar, the El-Djézaïr and Ville d'Oran, have just carried out an escort mission which led them to Cape Town. They are ordered to reach Alexandria via the Red Sea and Suez.
The French plan to use the large naval forces engaged in the operations Hats and Caps to pass in their shadow two convoys: a fast convoy (15 knots) including most of the troop transports, escorted by the destroyers and a large part of the avisos; a slow convoy (8 to 9 knots) made up of the other troop transports and cargo ships, protected by the rest of the avisos and the auxiliary minesweepers. Contemporary to the Hats and Caps, this double movement is naturally named Operation Chapeaux (Grand and Petit Chapeau). The cruisers and destroyers are to be transferred later, on the occasion of Operation Judgment.
 
546
July 31st, 1940

Sardinia
- Since June 10th, the number of personnel of the Aeronautics of Sardinia melted under the raids of the Armée de l'Air coming from Corsica or North Africa. Also, generals Vespignani and Cagna, who could not obtain any reinforcement except for two Cant Z-501 decided to reserve the survivors to counter a probable French invasion attempt. For the past two weeks, only the activity of seaplanes for maritime reconnaissance still attests to the existence of an Italian air force in Sardinia.
The personnel who are now in excess were sent back to the Peninsula. This is the case of the crews of the 19th Autonomous Combat Group: deprived of aircraft, they have the prospect of being trained to use the Stukas acquired by Italy. Reduced to half of its initial strength, the 31st Stormo BM keeps only one of its groups on the island, the 93rd: the personnel of the 94th leave to be converted on Cant Z-1007bis. As for the surviving land bombers, they are regrouped in the 8th Stormo, the 32nd leaving to be re-equipped as soon as possible with SM.79s. But no return to Sardinia is planned. After the destruction of one of its aircraft on the Elmas seaplane base during the French bombardment of July 4th, even the 613th search and rescue squadron, initially withdrawn to Olbia, was sent to Sicily.

On the evening of July 31st, the situation of the Sardinian Aeronautics is as follows (in brackets, the number of combat aircraft remaining on June 29th; the aircraft present at the end of July are not all immediately operational):
Fighter (Fiat CR.32) 0 (0)
Ground attack (Breda 88) 0 (3)
Ground bombardment (SM.79) 16 (34)
Maritime bombardment (Cant Z.506bis) 10 (19)
Maritime reconnaissance (Cant Z.501) 10 (13)
Maritime reconnaissance (Cant Z.506bis) 3 (4)
Aerial observation (Ro.37) 4 (6)
A total of 43 aircraft, compared to 79 on June 29.
 
547
July 31st, 1940

Central Mediterranean
- The Italian submarine Nani is reported missing. It has most probably hit a mine while crossing the Strait of Messina to return to Naples, while returning from a patrol between Crete and Egypt.
 
549
July 31st, 1940

Libya (Cyrenaica)
- The 2nd Division of CC.NN. XXVIII Ottobre is sent back to Tripolitania. Slowed down by the lack of transportation, continuous air harassment and its own disorganization due to the fact that it had just crossed Libya from west to east, and then hastily engaged against Fort Capuzzo before going back in the other direction, it will not go further than Solluch.
 
550
July 31st, 1940

Biarritz
- What remains of the GC II/8, eight planes, half of them flying only by miracle (like their exhausted pilots!), has to support the ultimate French counter-attack launched from a rear base located between Saint-Jean Pied-de-Port and Oloron. This baroud d'honneur aims at the the flank and the rear of the German troops who are advancing on the N-117 from Pau to Orthez.
Launched at dawn, the French attack falls at the exit of the village of Lacq on the German troops who did not expect a counter-attack. They are swept away and the village is occupied for a few hours, cutting off supplies to the German troops who were already in the outskirts of Orthez. Warned, the defenders of this city also launch a counter-attack. The German troops are caught in between two groups and machine-gunned by the Bloch 152 all along the road between Lacq and Orthez. Sgt. Dietrich takes advantage of the situation to obtain his fourth victory: "We made a real carnage among the German troops and vehicles. I used up my 20 mm shells and was about to return when I saw a high-wing monoplane, a Henschel reconnaissance plane, probably coming to see what was going on. No mercy for this dirty snitch! Aiming carefully, I fire a long burst of my machine guns.
The plane was hit many times, went into a spin and crashed. No parachute."

The ground troops are then ordered to withdraw towards Peyrehorade, to the west, and towards Oloron to the south. This withdrawal takes place during the night. This action, well carried out, interrupts the German advance for two days.
The GC II/8 loses two Bloch in this action; one pilot was killed, the other one was seriously wounded. But captain de Vaublanc shot down a 109 on the side of Navarrenx, his third personal victory.
(Excerpts from "Le Groupe de Chasse II/8 dans la défense de l'Ouest - D'après le journal de marche de l'unité", Editions Ouest-France, 1990)
 
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551
August 1st, 1940

German Embassy, Paris
- Otto Abetz would like to have precise instructions, for once! Since his arrival, in mid-June, in the historic French capital (it seems that the political capital of the Republic is from now on in Algiers), he does not stop looking for interlocutors. He had been told of a "peace camp" that was to bring down Reynaud's government - but the day after his arrival in Paris, he learned that Marshal Pétain had been arrested and several speeches by French ministers announced the continuation of the struggle! A month and a half later, when not a single piece of land in metropolitan land escaped Axis control, the Reynaud cabinet did not give in! In these conditions, , what happened to Otto Abetz, the French specialist in Foreign Affairs?
Would he be recalled to Berlin, for lack of a post in Paris?
This is why he struggles to defend the territory of the Foreign Affairs against the Wehrmacht, which had already appointed a "military leader" in Paris, General Alfred Streccius, Militärbefehlshaber Frankreich (and would like to make him a full governor). Or in front of the SS, which would obviously like to install a gauleiter in this lawless zone (although the Wehrmacht has forbidden it... for the moment!). In the absence of a legal interlocutor the diplomat takes the pulse of occupied France by meeting with representatives of various groups of influence that had remained north of the Mediterranean: the pacifists, the anti-parliamentarians, some trade unionists, the Doriotists, the Breton independentists (or autonomists?), Alsatian and Lorraine autonomists (for which the Reich has great projects!) and even the communists put down by the repression of Daladier.
Finally, Abetz does not forget the monarchists. While waiting for instructions from Berlin, he receives a very strange character, who does not seem to really know what he wants: Henri, count of Paris and dauphin of Orleans!
This one, undoubtedly come to probe the diplomat of the Reich, seems to have very clear ideas on the renewal of France, in particular on the social and societal level. Listening distractedly to the presentation of the one he considered to be a very green interlocutor (even though he was only five years older), Abetz thinks of the prophecies of his Führer (prophecies that had seduced him to the point that he took out his NSDAP card in 1931): "Everywhere, in the middle of enemy territory, we will find men who will help us. I will choose people who are too old to look into the distance and discern my goals. They will not necessarily be traitors and rascals. I will exploit weakness, senility and ambition. Such men, we shall find them everywhere. We will not even need to buy them. They will come find us by themselves!"
His summer in Paris confirmed these words - Nature abhors a vacuum. But for Abetz, the Chancellery would have to decide quickly what to do with the French metropole, or else an independent Brittany and an autonomous Alsace would soon flourish, framing a People's Republic of the French Soviets and a new Kingdom of France slitting each other's throats! Certainly, we are not there, the beaten French government refuses to lay down its arms, it will be necessary to find a solution to administer the metropole. While waiting for his Minister to decide - under the inspiration of the Führer, of course! - it is up to Abetz to find out what is going on and to propose solutions adapted to the specific French situation. He therefore dismisses Henri "of France" while promising him future news.
Certainly, the Count of Paris did not make as bad an impression on him as Jacques Doriot, also a soldier who had somehow escaped from the clutches of the German army and who had been in the same office a few days before. But he received it only on the insistence of some dreamers of the Ministry (not all different from those who had warmly recommended the leader of the PPF to him), dreaming of a French monarchic restoration which they are persuaded that it would provoke a fatal split in the ranks of what remains of this French Army that refused to surrender. Abetz, who had been a social democrat in his younger days does not have the medieval fantasies of other national socialists.
Especially since granting the crown to the pretender of the Orleanists (largely in the majority in the ranks of the French monarchists) would be the best way to alienate the supporters of the two other monarchist currents in France! Indeed, there is also the pretender of the legitimists, the Bourbons, who happens to be currently... Alfonso XIII of Spain, in exile in Italy! To imagine a double Franco-Spanish crown as a customer of the Reich may make some people fantasize, but in reality it would still cause more problems than it would solve. And then, it is also necessary to count with the Bonapartists, even if their candidate Louis Bonaparte (Napoleon VI), who usually resides in Switzerland, is actually engaged in the Foreign Legion [1] and is thus not available for the German diplomatic corps. No, really, the crowned card is not the most interesting to play for occupied France, which, according to the Führer's wishes, must be docile and available for requests.
It is therefore with unfeigned pleasure that Abetz prepares to receive the socialist deputy Alexandre Rauzy, who has recently arrived in Paris following a recent demobilization in the Ariège canton of which he is a general councillor, after having found himself behind the German lines (another one!). It is for the diplomat a friend of the time when he worked in France for the betterment of relations between his host country and his country of origin. He even went to Germany in mid-August 1939 to meet Ribbentrop. Better still: Rauzy would have news from Spain, where a common and promising friend resides, a former President of the Council, none other than Pierre Laval

[1] Enlisted voluntarily for the duration of the war under the name of Louis Blanchard, Prince Napoleon is stationed in Algeria in the company of passage n° 2 in the common depot of the foreign regiments, his recent demand to be affected to the Narvik contingent having been refused.
 
552
August 1st, 1940

Western Mediterranean
- In spite of the wise resolutions of July, General Cagna obtains from his superior the authorization to try something against a worthwhile target.
This morning, at 07:59 (Italian time), the submarine Barbarigo sights, from too far away to attack, a British light cruiser, Caledon-class or similar, leaving the Gulf of Ajaccio escorted by two small French torpedo boats. It is in fact CLAA HMS Carlisle, leaving Corsican waters to join the French squadron at Mers-el-Kébir, accompanied by the La Melpomène-class torpedo boats La Bayonnaise and La Poursuivante.
As the transmission between Supermarina and Superaereo is not too slow this time, the information arrives in Cagliari at 09:17 (GMT+2). The aerial reconnaissance immediately ordered is successful. One of the last three Cant Z.506b of the 199th RM Squadron of Santa Giusta spots the three ships and tracks them for a while before handing over to a Z.501 from the 146th RM Squadron from Elmas.
At 13:06 (GMT+2), General Cagna takes off from Elmas on board one of the seven Cant Z.506b that the 31st Stormo BM can put in the air out of the ten that remain. Twenty minutes later, five SM.79s from the 8th Stormo BT take off from Villacidro. At 14:11 (GMT+2), the Italian bombers arrive in sight of the Carlisle and its escorts. During the engagement that follows, if the Franco-British ships have to manoeuvre to avoid the bombs, the Italian planes have the unpleasant surprise of discovering that they were flying too low to avoid the AA firepower (unusual for the time) of the anti-aircraft cruiser and too high to carry out a precise bombing in horizontal flight. When all is over, if the three Allied ships are intact (with the exception of two shrapnel wounds on La Bayonnaise), on the Italian side, two Cant Z.506b are missing, including the one where General Stefano Cagna had taken place. While La Poursuivante takes on four of the five crew members of the second bomber, the general's bomber disappeared. Since the declaration of war, Cagna is the second senior officer of the Regia Aeronautica to disappear, after Italo Balbo, and he is the first to be killed by the enemy.
 
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