Threat of New Russian Drive in South

Manawatu Times, Volume 69, Issue 54, 7 March 1944, Page 5

Threat of New Russian Drive in South

flinging Germans Back Into Rumania United Press Assn. —By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright. Received Monday, 11.50 p.m. LONDON, March 6, General Zhukov’s troops on the first Ukrainian front to-day are fighting a battle which may prove among the most decisive of the whole war, says Reuter’s Moscow correspondent. It is difficult to over-estimate the importance of this offensive which has already driven a huge wedge into the German positions in the West Ukraine and brought the Russians within 70 miles of the Bessarabian border. Zhukov is reaching out for the vital Odessa-Lwow railway, the enemy’s last remaining escape route north from the Rumanian frontier. Unless von Mannstein can stage a rapid and tremendously powerful counter-blow all the German troops east of the line from the 1939 Polish border to Odessa will be cut off except for the railways leading back to Rumania. The loss of the Odessa railway would threaten von Mannstein’s armies with imminent disaster and with the Red Army fighting on the approaches to Volochysk, which lies on the railway, it is probably already out of action. The Moscow correspondent of the British United Press says all the German forces west of the Lower Dnieper are threatened with an encirclement far greater than Stalingrad. Zhukov’s main object at present is apparently to gain control of the long stretch of the Odessa-Lwow railway before undertaking a general clean-up of the German fortified positions in the Carpathians. The Soviet Command for weeks has been accumulating reserves and material on this front in preparation for the sequel to General Vatutin’s brilliant but exhausting drive from the Dnieper. The new offensive is served by perhaps the best system of communications any attacking Russian army has enjoyed for the whole war.

A Berlin military spokesman quoted by tbc Stockholm Telegraph Bureau said: “Exceedingly heavy battles are expected in the Polish border districts lollowing the new Russian drive. The Russians are driving southwest and south in the Shepetovka region and are also pushing out from Rovno. Southwest of Krivoi-rog the Russians have thrown in all the forces they have been able to muster and have pierced the new German defence lines. The pressure is also increasing at Pskov, Vitebsk and Narva.” A Russian supplementary communique states: “Massed artillery fire preparing the way for the offensive in the Ukraine flattened the defensive positions and silenced the enemy weapons. Particularly heavy fighting occurred at Byelogorodka which the Germans attempted to hold at all costs. The Germans when driven out left 38 burned out tanks and more than 2000 dead. “The Russians in another sector killed about 4000 Germans, destroyed over sixty tanks and captured many prisoners. The enemy in all sectors suffered enormous losses in men and material. “Russian torpedo-carrying planes in the Barents Sea attacked an enemy convoy, sinking three ships and setting one on fire.” The Moscow radio announced that Lieutenant - General Chernyakovsky, whose troops distinguished themselves in the new breakthrough in the West Ukraine, received immediate promo ticn to Colonel-General.

a seven-mile front in the Ostrov sectci is closing in on Ostrov from the north, east and south. Nevertheless, the reduction of Ostrov will not be easy. The Germans have erected a labyrinth of fortifications around the town. Reuter’s Moscow correspondent declares that Narva has replaced Pskov at the moment in the focus of the heaviest fighting in the Baltic battle. He adds that the enemy resistance is exceptionally stubborn. For the first time since the Russians forced a bridgehead across the Narva River heavy German tanks are being used in counterattacks. The enemy is also using heavy artillery in an effort to prevent the Russians from fanning out above Lake Peipus. PSYCHOLOGICAL ATTACKS The Germans, in an attempt to make the Russians release their stranglehold on Narva, are reverting to tne “psychological” attacks winch were used at the beginning of the Russian war, nameiy, attacking in whole companies instead of dispersing. The German object in attacking en masse is to panic the Russians, but the Red Army, including the Esthonians, whose families are awaiting the liberation of Narva, are fighting with equal ferocity. Major von Hammer, the German News Agency’s commentator, says the Russians are making a tremendous thrust from the Shepetovka area and south of Lutsk. “Twelve or fourteen Russian divisions and three tank corps participated in the new Russian attack,” he said. * * The Russians, after several hours ol violent fighting, penetrated the forward German position over a 21-mile front. We have seen the deployment of a strong Russian army in the Shepetovka area. Reconnaissance has shown the presence of the Third Russian Guards tank army and the Fourth, Seventh, and Eleventh Guards Tank Corps. “The Russians recently shifted the whole weight of their southern attacks to the Shepetovka area and the country south of Lutsk.” Paris radio reports that in the past 24 hours tho German High Command has withdrawn its advanced posts around Pskov to the main defence line. The radio also reported huge Russian troop concentrations in the Ukraine, ranging around Dubno and Lutsk and extending as far as Shepetovka. It is announced that Marshal Zukhov has replaced General Vatutin because of the illness of the latter.