Air Operations, Pacific

Australian-based US bombers attack Japanese positions in the Philippines.

Battle of the Atlantic

• The unarmed US tanker Australia (11,628t) is torpedoed, shelled, and damaged beyond repair the U-332 off Diamond Shoals. Survivors are rescued by the US freighter William J. Salman.
• U-404 torpedoes and sinks the British tanker San Demetrio (8073t) northwest of Cape Charles, Virginia.

Diplomatic Relations

The Soviet ambassador in London calls on the British to begin diversionary military opertions in Europe to draw off German strength from the Russian front.

Eastern Front

Due to constant pressure by the Russian forces, since the beginning of the year the Germans have been compelled to withdraw all along the line. The greatest advances have been made by the Russian horse cavalry between the northern and central sectors, in the area of Kalinin, and Kaluga and south of Lake Ilmen, where huge German forces have been trapped in pockets in the Demyansk and Kholm regions, and in the southern sector in front of Izyum.

From Leningrad the front now runs to Novgorod, Staraya Russa and Velikiye Luki which is being held by Army Group North with the 18th and 16th Armies.

From Velikiye Luki, in Army Group Center's sector, the front line is uneven because of the Russian salients and German counter-salients. It goes up to Nevel, turns east towards Velizh, near Vitebsk, Demidov and Dorogobuzh. From there the line goes north again with the Vyazma and Rzhev salient, finally turning southeast to pass through Kirov and north of Bryansk and Orel. The German 3rd Panzer Army, 9th Army, 4th Panzer Army, 4th Army and 2nd Panzer Army are all operating in this area.

Army Group South, whose front extends from Orel to the Caucasus by way of Kursk, Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Stalino, Taganrog and the center of the Caucasus, includes 2nd Army and 6th Army, the Kleist and Manstein Army Groups and the 11th Army, the last being in the Crimea.

According to OKH statistics the Germans on the Eastern Front have lost about 240,000 men between January 1 and mid-March, including 52,000 killed and 15,000 missing. Since the beginning of Barbarossa the Wehrmacht has lost over a million men. Gen Halder's figures reported in the entry for March 1 talks of 1.5 million. Russian losses are presumably even higher, though the data here is uncertain and controversial.

New Guinea

Over the next couple of days, combined US and Australian air units attack Japanese shipping and shore installations around Lae and Salamaue. 2 Japanese heavy cruisers are sunk and 10 other ships are either sunk or damaged. Allied losses are light, only 1 aircraft being shot down.

Philippines

Gen MacArthur, his family and staff are flown from the southern Philippines to Australia in a B-17.

United States, Home Front

Francis Du Pont, research chemist and industrialist, dies at the age of 68.