December 6th, 1940 (FRIDAY)
UNITED KINGDOM: The War Cabinet refuses to allow relief measures in Metropolitan France.The Canadian Upper Lakes and St. Lawrence Shipping Co. merchantman Watkins F Nisbet (1,747 GRT) ran aground and was wrecked in the Bristol Channel. She was later salvaged and her engines were used in the construction of a new ship. The remainder of the hulk was scrapped. There is no record of casualties in this incident.
GERMANY: U-166 laid down.
AUSTRIA: One of the thousands of victims of the
Nazi programme of killing the mentally ill known only as Aloisia V (aged 49),
was gassed today. She was a relative of Adolf Hitler. (Julian Gomez)
ITALY:
Marshal Pietro Badoglio resigns (although it is rumoured that Mussolini forced him) as
Chief of the Italian General Staff - a post he has held since 1925. He is succeeded by Ugo
Cavallero.
ALBANIA:
Greek forces occupy Sarande (Porto Edda) on the Adriatic, pushing north along the coast.
MEDITERRANEAN SEA: The submarine HMS/S Regulus (N 88) is sunk. Believed lost in the Straits of Otranto with all 53 of her crew. It is presumed that she must have been mined or suffered an accident after leaving Alexandria. (Alex Gordon)(108)
Submarine HMS Triton is lost in the lower Adriatic with all 62 crew. Her
loss remains a mystery but it is believed that she might have been mined or
suffered an accident. Her last action took place when she successfully
attacked and sank the freighter Olimpia on this date. (Alex Gordon)(108)
LIBYA:
Operation Compass:
25,000 British and Commonwealth troops advance more than 40 miles into the Italian
occupied desert, before hiding themselves and their equipment from the Italian Air Force.
JAPAN: The Japanese-Thai friendship pact is
signed "as a result of Thailand's proposal for a nonaggression pact."
AUSTRALIA: Minesweeper
HMAS Bathurst commissioned.
PACIFIC OCEAN: German auxiliary cruisers KM Komet and KM Orion
sink the British merchantman SS Triona (4,410 ton), with gunfire and
torpedoes, near the phosphate island of Nauru. (Mark Horan)
CANADA: Corvette HMS Spikenard commissioned Quebec City, Province of Quebec.
Corvette HMS Windflower departed Halifax with Convoy HX-94 to UK.
U.S.A.: Submarine USS Flying Fish laid down.
ATLANTIC OCEAN:
U-43 sank SS Skrim.