SOVIET TROOPS IN SOUTHERN RUSSIA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 February 1943, Page 3

SOVIET TROOPS IN SOUTHERN RUSSIA

Following on Swift Victory at Kursk OREL AND KHARKOV NOW IMMEDIATELY THREATENED CONTINUED PROGRESS IN ENVELOPMENT OF DONETZ BASIN . r-r -K ■ _ LONDON, February 9. The Russian army, sweeping westward after its swift victory at Kursk, is now threatening the only remaining big north to south railway behind the German lines, the one linking Bryansk with Kharkov. Soviet troops, specially trained in Siberia last summer for winter fighting, are pouring through the breach in the German defences. Kursk was as vital to the whole German, defence system as its counterpart, Voronezh, was to the Russians. It is the pivot of the northern and southern halves of the whole battle line. The capture of Kursk has left the German positions 'at Orel in a narrow and dangerous salient, while in the south the enemy armies in Kharkov are increasingly threatened. The Germans made desperate efforts to hold Kursk. Even the wounded were given weapons and made to fight. Thousands of German, Hungarian and Italian troops who should have been defending Kursk had already been trapped and encircled 100 miles away, west of Voronezh. Further south the big Russian sweep to the rear of the whole German position in the Donetz Basinas still making swift progress. In front of Kharkov the Russians have cap- 1 tured several strongly fortified German positions. The Germans, in their latest communique, report that all alon gthe southern half of the front the Russian 1 onslaught is still increasing in strength.