GERMANS IN RUSSIA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 June 1943, Page 4

GERMANS IN RUSSIA

AVOIDING ACTION ON LARGE SCALE FIGHTING ROUND THE OREL SALIENT. RUSSIAN ATTACK FURTHER NORTH. (By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright) (Received This Day, 12.10 p.m.) LONDON, June 24. With the drawing to close of the week in which experts expressed the opinion that the Germans, if they mean business in Russia in 1943, must get started, there are still no signs of the Germans risking getting their troops involved in a full-scale engagement. The only land movement of any significance is a flare-up of fighting around Mtsensk and Sevsk, northwards and southwards of the Orel bulge. The Russians north-west of Mtsensk broke into the German lines and captured material. Red Army gunners in the Sevsk region smashed a German battalion headquarters and destroyed an enemy-held railway bridge. The Berlin radio tonight admitted that the Red Army south of Velikiye Luki had broken into main German defence lines. “The enemy was able to force a break through,” it was added, “but a counter-attack sealed off the breach.” The Red Army has been filling in the three months’ lull, concentrating on a new type of defence to hold any attempted German break through, Reuter’s Moscow correspondent reports. The Russians have devised special tank traps intended to cripple the Germans’ much-vaunted new Tiger type.