TESTING A WATERPROOFED SHERMAN TANK on an African beach. These tanks were intended to go, during an assault, onto the beach with the infantry whenever possible. The main body of tanks would follow on LST’s as soon as the beachhead had been secured. The follow-up tanks, landed from the ship via ponton piers directly to shore, were not normally waterproofed. (Sherman tank M4A1.)] [Illustration: ALGERIA LEND-LEASE EQUIPMENT FOR THE FRENCH ARMY. Lockheed fighter plane (top) and Sherman tank (bottom). In January 1943, it was agreed that the United States would equip the French divisions formed from units then in North Africa, but comparatively little modern equipment became available for them in Tunisia until the summer of 1943. (P-38; Sherman tank M4.)] [Illustration] [Illustration: ALGERIA FRENCH TROOPS RECEIVING INSTRUCTIONS ON U. S. EQUIPMENT, in this case on the 105-mm. high-explosive shell. During the summer of 1943 shipments of arms and equipment for the French arrived in North African ports in increasing volume. Training was accelerated and by the end of the year two fully equipped French divisions were fighting side by side with the Americans and British in Italy. As more equipment became available, additional French divisions were sent to the front.] [Illustration: ALGERIA QUARTERMASTER DUMP AT ORAN. Foodstuffs, stored in the open sometimes for months, suffered very little in spite of the hot African sun.] [Illustration: ALGERIA FREIGHTER BURNING IN THE HARBOR OF ALGIERS. The cause of the fire was not determined. While air raids on Algiers caused little damage to shipping and military installations, serious accidents and fires, some of which aroused suspicion of sabotage, were not infrequent.] [Illustration: ALGERIA WAACS WITH FULL FIELD EQUIPMENT arriving at a North African port. The bill establishing the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) became effective on 14 May 1942 and on 1 July 1943 a bill changing the status of the corps from an auxiliary serving with the Army to a component of the Army, Women’s Army Corps (WAC), became law. Most WAC duties in North Africa were of an administrative nature in offices of the various headquarters. Members of the Corps also worked in communications or other activities that could be handled as efficiently by women as by men.] [Illustration] [Illustration: ALGERIA AIR FORCE MEN AT BREAKFAST IN THE DESERT. The mornings were often cold even in the summer and the men wore their heavy leather jackets.] [Illustration: ALGERIA REPAIRING MOTOR OF A HEAVY BOMBER, the Boeing Flying Fortress. The sand and dust of the desert were hard on engines of all kinds. On the nose of the plane, swastikas indicate number of enemy aircraft shot down and bombs show number of bombing missions flown. (B-17.)] [Illustration: ALGERIA