Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, AUGUST 16, 1941. GAINS AND LOSSES IN RUSSIA.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 16 August 1941, Page 4

Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, AUGUST 16, 1941. GAINS AND LOSSES IN RUSSIA.

ALTHOUGH they have poured out an extraordinary mass of falsehoods on the subject, Nazi propagandists have at times told the simple, truth about the .Russian campaign. They did so a few weeks ago, for example, when their hopes of driving swiftly through to Leningrad and Moscow and reducing the Russian armies and people to helpless submission had visibly collapsed. Ignoring all their preceding and bombastic promises of an early attainment of decisive results, Hitler’s spokesman then declared that victory could not be achieved by gains of territory, but only by the destruction of the Russian fighting forces.

That was the truth and it is worth remembering at a time when, though their claims to have encircled Odessa, and Nikolaev, a port further east on the Black Sea coast, are denied in Moscow, the Germans are making some progress in their drive into the Ukraine. At what, stage the forces commanded by Marshal .Budenny will be able to stem this latest development of the German offensive is at the moment an open question. In any case, however, the conquest of even a considerable part of the Ukraine, and a foothold on. the Black Sea coast, -would represent only a comparatively small part of what Hitler and his accomplices hoped to achieve, and to achieve speedily, when they launched their attack on Russia eight weeks ago.

It is in fact not easy to envisage any territorial gains which would in themselves give the Germans prospects of victory in Russia and compensate them for the risks they have taken in opening war on a great scale on two fronts. It is as reasonably certain as anything well can be that Germany sooner or later will have to hear the full brunt of the Avar on two fronts unless she can put Russia completely out of action. There is no indication at present that she has even remote prospects of doing this, whether her present offensive in the Ukraine, and her attacks on other parts of the Eastern front, succeed or fail. On the contrary, all the evidence is that the Russians are fighting powerfully and in good heart and that they have the will and the means to continue doing so irrespective of any, territorial losses thev arc likely to suffer.

Against the extensive but inconclusive gains of territory Germany lias made, there are some very important factors to be set on the other side of the account. Whatever the precise figures may be, the German losses in men and in material certainly have been enormous and the extending communications of the German armies, harried ceaselessly as they are by the Red Air Force and by Russian guerillas behind the lines, are making heavy and increasing demands upon the German transport organisation and upon vital detail factors like that of oil fuel supplies.

Some of the disclosed details are of great importance and interest. About three weeks ago, for instance, it was stated that seven of Germany’s thirty armoured divisions had been put out of action ,by the Russians. Of this loss, an oversea authority observed that at lhe very least, the loss of seven armoured divisions was equal to a whole year’s output. Mechanised divisions, he added.

cannot be improvised. Infantry and artillery replacements constitute no problem for the enemy, but it has taken him two years of war time activity to add 18 armoured divisions to the 12 he possessed when war broke out. All of Hitler’s land conquests yielded him little mechanised equipment, because the over-ridden .countries had predominantly old-fashioned military supplies. The Russians certainly seem to have found a counter-strategy to the panzer units, and they possess sufficient reserves in this respect to continue the devastating toll already taken.

From the Russian standpoint, the immediate outlook in the Ukraine, and perhaps on some other sections of the front, leaves a good deal to be desired, but the total story of the campaign to date, with the northern winter not very far away, is that the Germans have achieved inconclusive gains at lhe cost of serious losses in strength and fighting power which to a considerable extent, they are incapable of replacing.