September 22nd, 1942 (TUESDAY)
NETHERLANDS: During the day, RAF Bomber Command Mosquitos bomb two targets: four bomb a steel factory at Ijmuiden and two hit a gas works at Haarlem.
FRANCE: VICHY FRANCE: The Nazi execution of 70 hostages in Bordeaux to avenge acts of sabotage is announced.
During the day, RAF Bomber Command sent 18 Boston in low-level pairs to attack power stations: three bombed the power station at Mazingarbe, two each attacked Choques and Comines, and one each bombed Lille and Pont a Vendin. Two aircraft is lost.
U.S.S.R.: Stalingrad: What began as a Blitzkrieg has become urban warfare, as the Russians defend this city street by street, building by building. Alongside the regular Red Army now are workers' units, determined to make the Germans battle for every factory and exploiting to the full the defensive capabilities of their shattered home town. Today, units of the German 6th Army (von Paulus) and 4th Panzerarmee (Hoth) split the Soviet 62nd Army (Yeremenko) in two and capture nearly the entire southern part of the Stalingrad, including the huge grain elevator defended by Soviet marines.
EGYPT: In the coastal sector west of El Alamein, the Australian 26th Brigade relieves the 20th Brigade.
LIBYA: US Army, Middle East Air Force B-24s bomb shipping in Bengasi, Libya harbor; direct hits are made on 1 large vessel while a smaller vessel and other targets receive lesser hits.
German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel hands over command of Panzerarmee Afrika to General Georg Stumme and proceeds to Germany on the 23rd. (Jack McKillop & Jeff Chrisman)
FRENCH EQUATORIAL AFRICA (CHAD):
French General Charles DeGaulle meets with General Jacques-Philippe LeClerc at
Fort Lamy and gives orders to begin the march into Libya with the objective of
seizing the Fezzan region for France and pressing on to Tripoli to join the
British Eighth Army for a move into Tunisia.
MADAGASCAR:
British East African troops close in on Tananarive, the island's capital. Vichy
French troops offer little resistance.
NEW GUINEA: The Australian 2/25th Battalion
moves forward on the Kokoda Track and does not encounter any Japanese. However,
a patrol from the 3d Battalion loses 4 men west of Ioribaiwa.
US Fifth Air Force
A-20 Havocs bomb and strafe occupied areas at Menari, Efogi, Nauro, Yodda, and
Kokoda; P-40s strafe AA positions, huts, and barges at Buna and Salamaua and
bomb and strafe Wairopi bridge, strafe buildings at Yodda, the airfield at Buna,
and AA positions and other targets along the Buna-Kokoda trail; 1 B-25 bombs the
north end of Buna Airfield and the coastal end of Sanananda track. B-17s bomb
the airfield and shipping at Rabaul, New Britain Island.
D’ENTRECASTEAUX ISLANDS: The Australian 2/10th Battalion lands on Normanby Island located about 10 miles (16 km) from the eastern tip of Papua New Guinea, in the Solomon Sea. The 400 square miles (1 036 kilometers) island will be used by Allied warships during the war.
PORTUGUESE TIMOR: Reinforcements for Sparrow force in the shape of the 2/4th Independent company AIF leave Darwin, Australian, aboard the destroyer HMAS Voyager with 15 tons of supplies, including 7000 dollars worth of silver coins, and 450 troops. (William L. Howard)(188, 189, 190, 191)
BISMARCK ARCHIPELAGO: Fifth Air Force B-17s bomb the airfield and shipping at Rabaul, New Britain Island.
TERRITORY OF ALASKA: ALEUTIANS: 9 US Eleventh Air Force B-24 and 1 LB-30 Liberators and 2 B-17 Flying Fortress, accompanied by 15 P-39Airacobras and 20 P-40s, abort a Kiska Island bombing mission due to weather; photo reconnaissance suggests that Chichagof Harbor, Attu Island is abandoned.
U.S.A.: The Combined Chiefs of Staff approve a plan drawn up in Washington by the U.S. Army’s Services of Supply, “The Plan for the Operation of Certain Iranian Communication Facilities between Persian Gulf Ports and Tehran by U.S. Army Forces." The plan gives the U.S. direct responsibility for moving supplies through Persian Corridor to the USSR.