ZAPOROZHE FALLS

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 18, 16 October 1943, Page 5

ZAPOROZHE FALLS

Germans Lose Bastion On Southern Dnieper (By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright.) LONDON, October 14. The capture of Zaporozhe, regional centre of the Ukraine, is announced by Marshal Stalin in an order of the day which describes the town as a major industrial centre, an important railways and waterways communication centre and one of the Germans most important defence points on the southern reaches of the Dnieper River.

Tonight's Soviet communique says that, the Russians overcame fierce resistance and took Zaporozhe by assault, thus liquidating the enemy bridgehead on the left bank of the Dnieper. It adds that Russian troops were engaged in stubborn street battles in Melitopol, where the Germans were suffering enormous losses in manpower and equipment. * The railway line linking Melitopol with the Crimea was cut in two places, isolating Melitopol from the Crimea. The Russians on the right bank the Middle Dnieper, north and south of Kiev, considerably improved their positions. Extensive operations for an extension of the bridgeheads on the right bank of the river Sozh, north and south of Gomel, were continued. Great Prospect.

Never since Germany attacked Russia has the Red Army had. such a series of potential successes in prospect. Reuter’s correspondent in Moscow says the battle for the Dnieper, from its confluence with the Pripet to the Melitopol area, is being maintained with intensity. The Red Army is ferrying troops across the Dnieper at a greater daily rate than ever. The Russians now have dozens of strongly-built pontoon bridges across the Dnieper capable of carrying the heaviest tanks to the west bank north and south of Kiev. The Germans are rushing reinforcements to Kiev in a desperate attempt to hold up the Russian advance long enough to evacuate the city. The fighting outside the town is reported to be the fiercest since the battles for Orel and Byelgorod. The roads from Kiev are jammed with German lorries carrying away everything moveable. The surrounding villages inhabited by so-called German colonizers are now deserted.

Moscow correspondents give no further details, but Captain Sertorius admits that the Russians have made "local breaches” in the Kiev area. “The Russians are hurling in masses of men southeast and north of Kiev,” he says. Reuter’s correspondent says the Russians on the White Russian front are fighting among the flames and ruins of Gomel’s biggest buildings. General Ppnoy’s troops hold the city in a scmi-

circular vice. The Germans have determinedly defended Gomel throughout the | campaign. The Russians penetrated tha outskirts during last month, but this time the Germans’ position is stated to be desperate. Russians who got out of the town say that the Germans are systematically re- \ ducing it to rubble, blowing up block after block. Melitopol Struggle. Reuter's Moscow correspondent says that Melitopol’s vital railway station is astride the main escape route from the Crimea, and is being cleared street by ( street in house-to-house fighting. Vicious battles are still swaying in the centre of Melitopol, but the Germans are being wrenched from their last positions. The Russians are throwing in everything to liquidate Melitopol because the capture of the city would not only destroy the main rail escape route from the Crimea, but would enable the Red Army tanks to sweep unhampered across the Nogaisk Steppe between Melitopol and the Sea of Azov to close up the Crimea by land from the north. The Germans are resisting desperately and counter-at-tacking as many as 17 times a day. Melitopol is a living inferno with hundreds of buildings aflame.