HEAVY FIGHTING

Wairarapa Times-Age, 16 July 1943, Page 3

HEAVY FIGHTING

IN AREAS AROUND AUGUSTA GERMANS TRYING TO ARREST ADVANCE. ENEMY TANKS KNOCKED OUT. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) (Received This Day, 10.5 a.m.) LONDON, July 15. The Germans on Tuesday succeeded in infiltrating into the Augusta base, but Eighth Army units strongly attacked and drove them out. The Eighth Army has met with increased opposition around Augusta from German units to the west and north. Thcie have been several clashes and heavy fighting on a road north of Augusta, where the enemy is striving to hold up cur advance. The enemy threw in a number of tanks, some of which were knock'ed out. The Algiers radio says that the Americans are now 20 miles north of Comiso. German sources state that the Allied troops in Sicily are fighting forward through clouds of smoke from burning olive groves, which they set on fire to prevent Axis forces hiding in them, and also in order to use as cover for attacks on machine-gun nests and other centres of resistance. The Berlin radio says it is reported from Milan that two more areas of Southern Italy, Campagna and Basilicata, have been declared war zones.