'Boats in the Caribbean

A new battlefront was opened by the Axis last week. Its most active sector was the Caribbean. Its offensive weapon (to date) was the submarine. Its objective was to cut off the United Nations from a major source of high-octane aviation gas.

Already attacks off the Venezuelan coast had temporarily stopped the flow of oil from Venezuelan fields to the refineries at Aruba and Curagao. This in itself was an Axis victory, for Venezuelan oil furnishes from one-half to two-thirds of all the aviation gasoline that the United Nations use. The continuing threat of Axis submarines could slow this traffic almost to a standstill, until an effective convoy system was put into effect.

For this kind of warfare, submarines were the only craft that could hope to avoid the Caribbean's watchful air patrols. Where they were based, no one but the enemy yet knew. French bases were suspiciously near: Dakar, 3,150 miles; German-occupied Brest, 4,300 miles from the Caribbean. Small, unguarded islands off Central America might have been fitted out as refueling bases.

Wherever the bases were, the week's action proved that the Axis had embarked on more than a hit-&-run transatlantic raid, had won the first round of the battle of the Caribbean. Aruba was shelled twice (without material damage to the refinery). The raiders had accounted for seven of the shallow-draft tankers that carry oil from the Lake of Maracaibo to the islands. They had sunk four big ocean tankers, had put torpedoes into two freighters anchored off Trinidad. Total Axis casualties: three submarines, probably (but not positively) sunk by depth charges off Aruba.

Beyond the Caribbean the Axis carried the battle. While the President was speaking to the U.S., (see p. 9) an enemy submarine fired two dozen badly aimed shells at an oil refinery on California's coast. Mexico rushed extra troops to guard her oil port of Tampico. The Americas were fighting for their oil.

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