FIRM DEFENCE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 18 March 1943, Page 3

FIRM DEFENCE

MAINTAINED BY RUSSIANS Against Enemy Efforts to Force Donetz EFFECTIVE USE OF MOBILE ANTI-TANK UNITS CONTINUED SOVIET PROGRESS ON CENTRAL FRONT LONDON, March 17. The battle for the Donetz River is again the main news from the Russian front. By massed attacks with tanks, infantry and aircraft the Germans are still making powerful and repeated attempts to cross the river at various points south of Kharkov. The most critical sector is in the deep bend of the river near Izyum. Other big battles are going on south-east of Kharkov. Mr Paul Winterton, the London “News-Chronicle s Moscow correspondent, says the Germans are massing their tanks into groups, sometimes 60 at a time, which make three or four attacks in a day. They are constantly probing the Russian positions in a search for weak spots in the defences and are switched rapidly from one sector to another, being moved sometimes as far as 60 miles in a day and then being brought back to try to achieve a surprise success at the original point of attack. The Russians are meeting these tactics with mobile anti-tank units. On the central front the three Russian drives in the direction of Smolensk from the west and north-east have made fur-, ther progress.