PROBABLY UPSET

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 September 1942, Page 3

PROBABLY UPSET

THE GERMAN TIMETABLE BY EXTRAORDINARY RUSSIAN RESISTANCE. FIERCE FIGHTING REPORTED _ IN CAUCASUS. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 9.45 a.m.) RUGBY, September 16. Despite appalling casualties, the Germans are now .engaged in an all-out effort to capture what remains of Stalingrad and are making gradual progress, according to the latest Russian despatches. However it is thought that the German timetable may well have been upset by the extraordinary Russian resistance, which might well not have been expected to equal that of a fortress like Sebastopol. According to one Moscow message, the Germans have over twenty divisions massed in the Stalingrad area. They are reinforced constantly to maintain numerical superiority over the defence, whose reinforcements are not nearly on the same scale. According to the “Red Star,” however, the Luftwaffe is the main driving force. Where their tanks fail, German bombers sometimes succeed in effecting a break in the Soviet lines. The Germans are not taking a step without aircraft.

South of Novorossisk the Russian resistance appears to be considerable and also in the Mosdok area, where the Germans are in some strength. The Moscow radio reports fierce fighting for roads, passes and mountain heights in the North Caucasus. Throughout the mountain range Soviet engineers meanwhile are building obstructions and traps and fortifying roads, paths and bridges. They are also boring tunnels and deepening mountain rivers to a depth of ten feet so that when bridges are blown up lorries will be unable to ford the rivers. The mountains are said to be infested with engineers, all of whom are in addition .marksmen, _ snip'ers, submachine gunners or anti-tank riflemen, capable of breaking through in case of encirclement.