US 2nd Armored Division Enters Palermo, Sicily, 22 July 1943

Air Operations, Aleutians

28th Composite Bomb Group bombers and US Navy warships open a preinvasion bombardment of Kiska Island. 17 B-24s, 26 B-25s, 20 343rd Fighter Group P-38s, and 13 P-40s attack the island and Little Kiska. 1 B-25 is downed by antiaircraft fire, but its crew is rescued, and 18 B-25s are damaged of which 1 crashes upon landing.

Air Operations, East Indies

• 380th Heavy Bomb Group B-24s attack oil-producing facilities at Soerabaja, Java.
• B-25s attack Selaroe Island in the Moluccas.

Air Operations, New Guinea

More than 50 V Bomber Command B-24s, B-25s, and B-26s attack Japanese Army ground positions and antiaircraft batteries in the Komiatum battle area and Salamaua.

Air Operations, Pacific

B-24s raid Surabaya.

Air Operations, Solomons

In 2 afternoon strikes, 12 US Navy PB4Ys, 6 XIII Bomber Command B-24s, 18 AirSols TBFs, and 18 AirSols SBDs, escorted by a total of 134 AirSols fighters and fighter-bombers, attack a troop-laden Japanese seaplane tender and other shipping in the Buin area. The seaplane tender is sunk by the light bombers with great loss of life and several other vessels are damaged. VF-21 F4Fs down 5 A6M Zeros over southern Bougainville and the Shortland Islands at about 1535 hours.

Aleutians

Major US naval forces bombard Kiska which the Japanese Imperial Staff has already decided to evacuate. 2 battleships, 5 cruisers and 9 destroyers as well as fighter forces are involved.

Eastern Front

The Russians take Mtsensk and Bolkhov and in the northern sector launch a limited offensive south of Lake Ladoga.

The Leningrad Front's 67th Army, situated on the Neva east of the city, and Volkhov Front's 8th Army deployed on the west bank of the Volkhov north of Tosno launch the Mga Offensive Operation, employing a combined total of 253,300 men. The aim of the offensive is to force the Germans away from Leningrad and strengthen the precarious corridor south of Lake Ladoga.

Hitler has given the commander of the 9th Army, Model, permission to conduct a mobile defense in the Orel salient. The general is thus fortifying the Desna River at the base of the salient.

Bolkhov falls to the 61st Army and Mtsensk to the 3rd Army as the slow advance into the Orel salient continues.

New Georgia

Gen Griswold, the new commander of the occupation force, plans an offensive on a huge scale against the Munda air base for the 25th. Units of the 25th Div reach the island. They will be attached to the 37th Div which will carry out the operation with the 43rd Div. American land forces on New Georgia, Rendova and the smaller islands now amount to 32,000 army personnel and 1,700 Marines.

Medics Assist an Injured American Soldier on the Sicilian Front, July 22, 1943

Sicily

The Americans enter Palermo and have now cut off 50,000 Italian troops in the west of the island. It now only remains to take the extreme western strip of the island before turning the American forces east, towards Messina. The mobile Axis forces,however, including most of the Germans are escaping to the northeast corner.

Gen Vittorio Ambrosio, Chief of the Italian General Staff, following the directives put out from the meeting at Feltre on July 19, asks for 2 German divisions to be sent to Italy and for the German 29th Motorized Div to be transferred from Calabria to Sicily. But he requires

and he makes the point specifically

'that the Italian Supreme Command should be able to dispose freely of the troops put at its dispostion.'

The Canadian 2nd Infantry Brigade after Capturing the Town of Assoro, Sicily

Solomons

In the Bougainville sector the small Japanese seaplane carrier Nisshin, escorted by 3 destroyers, tries to reach New Georgia but is intercepted and sunk by American aircraft near Bougainville.