UNDER PRESSURE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 August 1943, Page 4

UNDER PRESSURE

GERMANS GETTING OUT OF KHARKOV WHOLE ENEMY SOUTHERN FLANK SAID TO BE THREATENED SERIOUSLY. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day, 12.5 p.m.) LONDON, August 10. With their last lines of retreat from Kharkov—the railway to Kiev via Poltava and th’e railway to the Crimea— already threatened, the Germans are beginning to get out of the city. Reuter’s Moscow correspondent says the Germans, in order to prevent their forces east cf the Dnieper being overrun and decimated, are unable to abandon Kharkov until the last moment.

They are therefore falling Pack in stages, withdrawing in the morning to trenches hurriedly dug during

the night. Reuter’s Stockholm correspondent, m a late message tonight, states that the Russians advancing from the railway station of Slazino, 12 miles north of Kharkov, are now less than eight miles from the city and are already battering its suburbs. An American broadcast from Moscow declared that: “The Russians are bypassing the Germans on all sides. Dispatches from the Kharkov sector speak of astounding Nazi confusion. This confusion has resulted from the hard-hitting advance of Russian tank forces, which are pressing the retreating Germans from all sides." The British United Press Moscow correspondent states that the Germans in some areas are fighting bitterly in order to stem the advance, but the Germans in other areas are retreating so fast that they have no time to blow up roads and bridges. The “Red Star” asserts that the retreating Germans in some areas on the Kharkov front are in a state of utter confusion. An “Izvestia” correspondent goes further and describes the German retreat as chaotic, resembling the German rout during the winter campaign. The “Red Star” adds: : “As the Red Army men advance into the Ukraine, they see strewn everywhere enormous quantities of destroyed or abandoned material.”

AIR & ARTILLERY ATTACKS. The “Izvestia" says German prisoners speak of the power of the Russian artillery and of the Red Air Force, stating that they had never experienced anything like it. The Russians’ other great offensive, from Orel to Bryansk, is also progressing well. Reuter's Moscow correspondent says the whole 30 miles stretch of •railway between Orel and Khotynets is now solidly in Russian hands. The Germans south of the railway are coun-tering-attacking fiercely in the area west of Kromy. A British United Press correspondent says the German resistance is stiffer in the Bryansk area. There are no signs of a general retreat on this front. The Germans are reported to be digging in along the Desna River, and arc counter-attacking despite heavy losses. Tonight’s Soviet communique announces that the Russians on the Bryansk front continued to advance and occupied over 30 inhabited localities, inculding the district' centre and railway station of Khotynets. On the Kharkov front the Russians advanced five to eight miles and captured over 70 places, including the district centre of Lipsi, 12 miles north-east of Kharkov.

Reuter’s military writer asserts that the threat against the whole right flank cf the German armies on the South Russian front is much more serious than that of last winter’. SOVIET BATTLE TACTICS. Reuter’s Moscow correspondent, describing the Red Army's tactics, says the Russians in the Kharkov offensive, on an irregular 80-milc front, are enveloping the German garrisons and slashing deep into the enemy lines with tactics similar to those used in the last stages of the Russian winter campaign. Russian mobile units first disrupt the German communications, with harassing attacks from many points. Tank “fists” then punch their way through the lines and split them into isolated groups, which are dealt with by following infantry. The correspondent adds that front line reports emphasise the excellent’ co-operation between the Red Air Force and the ground forces. The air force seems to have an unquestionable supremacy.

A dispatch from the front line to the “Red Star” states that the Russians are advancing under an air umbrella. The Red Air Force, dealing massive blows, has destroyed or damaged in the past three days 143 tanks and 600 lorries. It has blown up 24 ammunition dumps and silenced 68 field and anti-aircraft batteries.