Word: dakar
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Answer to Franco. Engineers labored to perfect airdromes and dock facilities at Casablanca and Dakar, to provide alternate points of entry for planes, men and equipment in case Gibraltar falls and the Mediterranean ports of Algeria are immobilized. Gibraltar is now the principal way station for bombers flown from Britain to North Africa, and perhaps for long-range U.S. fighters. Casablanca (1,200 miles from southern Britain) can serve as a substitute, and as a depot for planes flown from the U.S. via Natal and Dakar; men and equipment can be hauled by rail from Casablanca to upper Morocco, Algeria...
These were the reasons-if any did-which came nearest to justifying the deal with Admiral Jean Francois Darlan. By peaceful arrangement with Dakar's Governor General Pierre Boisson, U.S. troops last week entered that disputed port, and the Allies' African communications improved...
...building major bases around the world. New ones now at Casablanca, at Oran, and soon, I hope, at Bizerte. Right now we are preparing to establish air and naval facilities at Dakar. We have a tremendous installation in the Persian Gulf. We have built bases along the shores of the Red Sea area, initially to support the British Middle Eastern operations and now for our own air force in that theater. We have run a double track across equatorial Africa. We have established, with the cooperation of Brazil, air facilities in the bulge of Brazil. We have lookouts strung clear...
...week's end there was no agreement on use of the fleet units at Dakar. But Allied navies were given permission to use the port. Neighboring airfields were thrown open as transit points. There was evidence that the status quo in Morocco and Algeria was stabilized. The price: recognition of Darlan as head of the French State and his new "imperial council" as the repository of French sovereignty...
...opportunist in an opportunists' market, Darlan had emerged as more than a "temporary expedient" useful to Allied invasion forces. Fortnight ago Washington diplomats were hinting that he was on his way out (after the "delivering" of Dakar and the scuttling of the French Fleet). But as "Chief of State," Darlan has control of 300,000 native troops-commanded by French officers and a firm grasp on civil administration...