Stockport, Cheshire: The first Fairey built Bristol Beaufighter makes its maiden flight.

GERMANY: U-564 and U-652 launched.

ALBANIA: Weather has held up operations successfully started by Greek 5 Division with capture of Zrebeshinj Mountain. Floods had against swept away bridges, Greek II Corps having to be supplied from Koritsa instead of Janinna. When weather improves further advance of 5 Division westward should secure fall of Tepelene. Italians now have equivalent of 30 Divisions in Albania.

U.S.S.R.: Soviet submarine K-55 launched.

LIBYA: Agedaba falls to the British.

Beda Fomm: At 11 am the Italian Chief of Staff surrenders to the HQ of 4th Armoured Brigade. Later General Annibale Bergonzoli surrenders along with the rest of 10th Army. 20,000 men, 6 generals and a vast horde of weapons, transport and supplies along with a shower caravan and mobile brothel with a dozen women. The cost of the battle to 7 Armoured Div. was nine men killed and 15 wounded.

It was a brilliantly orchestrated attack, which took the Italian defenders entirely by surprise when British armour - traversing barren and waterless tracks from Tobruk - suddenly appeared at Beda Fomm cutting any chance of Italian retreat. Australian infantry and tanks then swept in from the north to join the British from the south and west. With Benghazi taken O'Connor's men continue westwards - advanced units have arrived at Sirte, with Tripoli itself now under threat.

Free French troops under General Leclerc besiege the Italian garrison at Koufra.

CHINA: Sinyang: After 13 days of bitter fighting, Chinese forces have crushed a major Japanese offensive in central China intended to make Japan's garrison at Wuhan safer. By this morning Chinese troops had re-occupied Sinyang and all points north. The strategically crucial city along the Wuhan-Peking railway had fallen on 25 January when three Japanese divisions broke through Chinese lines before advancing and taking the town.

The turning-point in the battle for southern Henan came when Japanese forces suffered heavy losses as they attempted to take Fangcheng to the north-west of Sinyang and were forced to retreat.

JAPAN: Tokyo: Peace talks between Vichy French Indochina and Thailand open under the auspices of Japan, a week after an armistice was signed.