SURPRISES POSSIBLE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 July 1943, Page 4

SURPRISES POSSIBLE

Moscow observers warn that it is still too early to form a final judgment on the offensive. They point out that Field-Marshal . Gunther von Kluge, commanding the German armies, may have surprises in store. The “Pravdasays: “The Fascist beast, although tired out as a result of two years of struggle against Russia, is not yet dead. It still retains its strength. Stalingrad and Tunis may act like stings, exasperating the beast to some desperate undertaking, with all the forces at its command. Stalin has warned us that bitter fighting lies ahead. It will need tremendious staying power and straining of efforts and resources to bring the Allies’ task to a victorious conclusion.” Germany still declines to admit that she has opened an offensive on the central front. “It isn’t our offensive,” sums up the German attitude towards the Orel-Kursk-Byelgorod fight. “It is all a mistake,” said a German military spokesman. “The Russians mistook a local German attack for an all-out offensive and themselves launched an enormous counter-attack from which the present heavy and ever-spreading fighting developed.” PROVIDING AN ALIBI . One London comment is that the German object is to secure an alibi for themselves in case the offensive Tails. They will then be able to claim that their object has been achieved, namely that of disrupting a big Russian offensive. Today’s German communique states: “Heavy attacks by strong Russian forces concentrated on the Byelgorod area, and also south of Orel, again failed yesterday. Our troops on the other hand, with effective Luftwaffe support, went over to the offensive and succeeded in deeply penetrating Russian positions, inflicting the heaviest losses.”