ENCOURAGING SIGNS

Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 17, 15 October 1942, Page 5

ENCOURAGING SIGNS

Germans Prepare For Defensive In East STALINGRAD DANGER (By Telegraph.—Press Assu.—Copyright.) (Received October 14, 8.20 p.m.) LONDON, October 13. Signs are accumulating that the Russians are beginning to reap the fruits of the heroic defence of Stalingrad, in which they have destroyed much of the German striking power and deducted invaluable weeks from Hitler’s campaigning season. It is now almost two months since the Germans began to develop the pincer movement against Stalingrad from the north-west and from Kotelnikovo.

The Germans are now bombing the Grozny oilfields with incendiaries, which is a sign that they consider it at present cannot be captured. Winter snows are appearing in the Caucasus, while Berlin reports that torrential autumn rains have set in on all tlie Russian fronts, transforming roads into mud-tracks on which motorized movement is most difficult.

The Stockholm correspondent of “The Times” says the latest news indicates that the Germans are preparing for what they believe or hope will be really the final assault, against Stalingrad, which remains a threatening bridgehead against the German winter line.

Even if Stalingrad is eventually eliminated, it is questionable now whether the Germans could undertake the prodigious task they originally intended of pressing the 200 miles’ front down the Volga to Astrakhan to secure the winter flank. Russian Attacks. Berlin radio today described the operations at Stalingrad as the repulse of Russian attempts to break out of the iron pincers in -which the Germans have gripped the city. The radio added that Russian reinforcements are constantly arriving at Stalingrad across the Volga, indicating that more attacks can be expected. The Berlin spokesman announces that the chief activity is German raids, specially opposite Moscow, to ascertain the intentions of the Russians. This new tone runs through most of the official and unofficial German reports, admitting, in effect, that the turn has come for the Russians to take the initiative generally. The Germans have only 10 days or a fortnight in which to take Stalingrad before the weather makes full-scale operations impossible, says Reuter’s correspondent at Stockholm. Snow has fallen already on the northern and central fronts and in the Mosdok area, where the snowline is creeping quickly from the .peaks to the valleys. There is a growing feeling, says the corresponent, that the chances of saving Stalingrad were never better.