Today in World War II History—July 11, 1942: Allied Arctic convoy PQ-17 arrives in ports in northern Russia, having lost 22 of 33 cargo ships plus two auxiliary vessels, to German U-boats and aircraft.
As Sarah Sundin notes on her blog. The convoy, however, actually lost 24 ships.
The ships had started arriving in Archangel about two days prior. So few came in that Stalin thought that the Allies had lied about the size of the convoy in order to purposely send less than they promised. He later accuses the UK of lying about the convoy's troubles.
PQ 17 was the hardest hit convoy of the war.
On the same day, the Soviets sunk another Swedish freighter, this one the SS Lulea which was carrying iron ore to Germany.
The RAF bombed Danzig's submarine pens, with the loss of only two bombers. The raid took place at dusk. The route over the North Sea was the longest RAF raid up until that point in the war.
Australian troops advanced at El Alamein.
Japan cancelled planned invasions of Fiji, New Caledonia and Samoa, demonstrating that the Japaneses staff appreciated that the war was not going as well as it had been formerly.
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