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• Vichy French government broke off diplomatic relations with the United States. ww2dbase [AC]
• Allied troops captured Sidi Barrani, Egypt. ww2dbase [Second Battle of El Alamein | CPC]
• American troops continued to attack the French fort of Kasbah, French Morocco. Meanwhile, in French Algeria, the French garrison at Oran surrendered in the face of overwhelming British naval power and American airborne attack in its rear. French Admiral Darlan signed an armistice with American General Dwight Eisenhower, but fighting would continue for two more days. ww2dbase [Operation Torch | CPC]
• Lieutenant General Kenneth Anderson was named the commanding officer of the British First Army in North Africa. ww2dbase [CPC]
• HMS Gardenia (Lieutenant M. M. Firth) sank in a collision with the minesweeping trawler HMS Fluellen off Oran, Algeria. ww2dbase [AC]
• The US 7th Marine Regiment and the 2nd Brigade of the US Army 164th Infantry Regiment began an attack on the Japanese troops at Gavaga Creek, Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. ww2dbase [Guadalcanal Campaign | CPC]
• Adolf Hitler informed Italy, via Galeazzo Ciano, that he intended to occupy Vichy France soon. ww2dbase [Scuttling of the French Fleet | CPC]

• Leonardo da Vinci sighted American freighter Marcus Whitman, en route from Cape Town, South Africa to Dutch Guyana, in the Atlantic Ocean at 0931 hours. ww2dbase [Leonardo da Vinci | CPC]
• Alpino Bagnolini sighted a freighter in the Atlantic Ocean at 0535 hours; she identified the target as a Spanish ship and thus did not pursue. At 1426 hours, she sighted the conning tower of a submarine and she turned away to avoid detection. ww2dbase [Alpino Bagnolini | CPC]

• Gato-class submarine USS Silversides made a torpedo attack on a large patrol vessel west of New Hanover Island, Bismarck Archipelago. The commanding officer of the Silversides believed the ship had been sunk but the submarine was not credited with the sinking due to a lack of confirmation. ww2dbase [Silversides | DS]

• Tenryu arrived at Shortland Island, Solomon Islands. ww2dbase [Tenryu | Shortland Island | CPC]

• German Abwehr spy, Werner Janowsky, landed from a submarine on the Gaspé peninsula in Quebec, Canada. Janowsky, a thirty-eight-year-old former French Foreign Legionaire had a wife living in Canada and knew the country well. He was swiftly apprehended by the Canadian police after arousing suspicion by trying to pay a New Carlisle hotel bill with time-expired Canadian currency. Janowsky would survive the war in British captivity. ww2dbase [Quebec | AC]

• Repair ship Akashi began repairing destroyer Ariake at Truk, Caroline Islands. ww2dbase [Akashi | Truk | CPC]

• The USAAF 306th Bomb Group flying from RAF Thurleigh launched a bombing raid against the German submarine facilities at Saint Nazaire, France. ww2dbase [Bombing of Cities in France and Low Countries | RAF Thurleigh | Saint Nazaire | DS]

• Workers at Dock No. 4 at Pearl Harbor Navy Yard, US Territory of Hawaii began placing rocks, mostly 3-inch quarry waste, at the bottom of the dock. ww2dbase [Pearl Harbor Navy Base and Ford Island Naval Air Station | Honolulu, Oahu | CPC]

• Zuikaku, Myoko, Hatsukaze, and Tokitsukaze arrived at Kure, Japan. ww2dbase [Myoko | Zuikaku | Kure, Hiroshima | CPC]

• Destroyer USS Shaw departed Nouméa, New Caledonia bound for Guadalcanal. ww2dbase [Shaw | Dunbea Bay, Nouméa | DS]

• German Luftwaffe combat aircraft consisting of 27 Bf 109G fighters from 1/JG53 and 24 Ju 87D Stuka dive bombers of II.StG 3 were transferred to Tunisia from Sicily, Italy. The Tunis airfields were found to be in good condition with concrete runways and revetments. Once a ground organisation had been created, relays of Ju 52/3m aircraft would commence the movement of ground troops into the region. On the front lines, Axis troops under Walter Nehring attacked Vichy French positions as Vichy French forces in North Africa were apparently switching sides to aide the Allies. ww2dbase [Operation Torch | CPC, AC]

• Battleship USS Indiana, cruiser USS Columbia, and destroyers USS Saufley, USS DeHaven, and USS Champlin departed Norfolk, Virginia, United States bound for the Panama Canal. ww2dbase [Indiana | Saufley | Columbia | Norfolk, Virginia | CPC]

9 Nov 1942 Interactive Map