Late on schedule, according to the French War Office, and still without any positive results for what the French termed a "tremendous sacrifice of men and materials," the German High Command was said to have thrown everything it had in reserve in northern France into the battle.
With the single exception of the tank column, which last night was somewhere in Normandy, east of the Seine River, the entire French line held off the terrific German attacks which continued all day long, the War Office said. Only minor French withdrawals were carried out, it was said.
The War Office said German troops were thrown time and again at the French line, and, as each wave was beaten off, another rose up to attack.
General Weygand's tactics were unchanged. By massing his forces at commanding positions and taking ad. vantage of every ruined farm and shattered village for cover, the Generalissimo's forces were said to have held every main defence position on the badly-battered line from the sea to the Chemin-des-Dames.
At dusk last night the battle front ran inland from the sea, down the Bresle Valley, across the hilly terrain to Ham, on the Somme River, and irom there, across the high wooded plateau north-west of Soissons, to the banks of the Aisne, east of Soissons. The French front is not entrenched, but consists of massed strong points hastily organized essentially as defences against armoured attacks. the 300 German tapks into the French lines was said fb have been lessened by the success of French troops in preventing the Germans' massed, mobile infantry from getting through the gap to follow the tanks. In that sector there have been many British troops, and they like the French, are Reported to have held all their defence positions intact against the terrific might of massed infantry.
An official analysis last night described the position of these advanced German tanks as "very adventurous. They are menaced with almost cer-lain destruction because they are deprived of infantry support", the analysis said.
The same source reported that the heavy destruction of tanks continued throughout the day. Anti-tank guns of 25 and 47 min. calibre proved deadly against the German armoured cars, which are merely heavy trucks thickly plated with sheets of steel, on which are mounted one or more machine-guns, according to the analysis. These trucks are much more vulnerable than tanks, because the French fire at the wheels and at the driver's peep-hole, the analysis said.—United Press,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.