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• US President Franklin Roosevelt requested US Congress to allocate US$1,500,000,000 for the Lend-Lease program. ww2dbase [Franklin Roosevelt | CPC]
• The Soviet Union announced conscription for all men aged 16-50. ww2dbase [TH]
• Change of German strategy against Leningrad, Russia, switching from assault to besieging, led to the tanks of the German 4th Panzer Army were loaded onto trains at for Moscow, Russia. This shift in strategy partially resulted from Adolf Hitler's order earlier on this date that Leningrad was to be razed to the ground. ww2dbase [Siege of Leningrad | CPC]
• British aircraft located a convoy of three Italian troopships escorted by four destroyers from Taranto, Italy, sailing for Tripoli, Libya. Submarines HMS Upholder, HMS Upright, HMS Ursula, and HMS Unbeaten were dispatched to attack. HMS Upholder sank troopships Neptunia and Oceania over a four hour period about 70 miles east of Tripoli (384 killed, 6,500 survived), while HMS Ursula attacked troopship Vulcania unsuccessfully. ww2dbase [CPC]
• After dark, minelaying cruiser HMS Latona and destroyers HMAS Napier, HMS Havock, and HMAS Nizam sailed from Alexandria, Egypt and delivered supplies to the besieged garrison at Tobruk, Libya. They would return to Alexandria in the morning of the next day. HMAS Nizam was damaged on the return trip when she hit the wreck of Italian ship Serenitas at Tobruk. ww2dbase [Siege of Tobruk | CPC]

• Morosini used her hydrophone and concluded there were no ships on the surface in the Atlantic Ocean, and rose from a fully submerged position to periscope depth at 1750 hours. She was surprised to see a destroyer at only 1,000 meters in range. She dove very quickly and avoided detection. Her officers began to suspect the hydrophone was not working properly. At 1900 hours, she was ordered to move to a new patrol area to intercept an Allied convoy. ww2dbase [Morosini | CPC]

• Admiral Soemu Toyoda was named the commanding officer of Kure Naval District, Japan. ww2dbase [Soemu Toyoda | CPC]

• German troops captured Poltava, Ukraine. ww2dbase [Operation Barbarossa | Poltava | TH]

18 Sep 1941 Interactive Map