EVACUATED BY NAZIS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 March 1943, Page 3

EVACUATED BY NAZIS

FORMIDABLE RZHEV “HEDGEHOG” ON CENTRAL FRONT Evidence of Increasing Russian Pressure FURIOUS BATTLE RAGING IN DONETZ BASIN RED ARMY ADVANCING FURTHER NORTH LONDON, March 3. Today’s big news from Russia is of the German evacuation of Rzhev, a strongly-fortified enemy base on the central front. The news comes from the Germans themselves. So far the Russians have made no mention of the capture of Rzhev. The Germans say the evacuation is part of a plan to shorten their front. Possibly the movement became necessary after Marshal Timoshenko’s liquidation of the Demyansk area in the.-north-west. Rzhev is 130 miles west of Moscow. The Germans captured it in the autumn of 1941.. It is one of the most formid- ' able positions along the whole front, a “hedgehog” which withstood three big Russian drives. Now it has fallen, it opens up big possibilities of a fresh Russian advance on the central ffiont. Its loss weakens the main German defence line, as it guards the city of Smolensk, 140 miles to the south-west and its capture gives the Russians full use of the main strategic railway between Moscow and Velikiye Luki. In Southern Russia the battle of the Donetz Basin is still raging bitterly and the Germans claim to have reached the River Donetz again, on a wide front. The Red Army is still advancing west of Kharkov and Kursk and is pressing nearer to Orel.