MUCH WEAKENED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 16 August 1943, Page 4

MUCH WEAKENED

GERMAN DEFENCE OF BRYANSK

BY ATTEMPT TO HOLD KARACHEV RELENTLESS RED ARMY PRESSURE. SOVIET PROGRESS ON THREE OFFENSIVE FRONTS. (By Telegraph—Press Association Copyright) (Received This Day, 11.50 a.m.) LONDON, August 15. Besides capturing Karachev, 45 miles north-west of Orel, the Russians have made further progress on three offensive fronts. Tonight’s Soviet communique states that the Russians on die Bryansk front, after stubborn street fighting, captured Karachev, and, continuing their offensive in the same direction, advanced 3j to 6 miles and captured over 70 localities. On the Kharkov front, the Russians beat off coun-ter-attacks and forged ahead, capturing several inhabited localities. The Russians advancing in the Demen.sk sectoi considerably improved their positions. Writing earlier today, before the fall of Karachev had been announced, a British war correspondent with the Red Army on- the Bryansk front, said: “The Germans have sharply intensified their resistance at Karachev, the key to the railway and highway on the fringe of the great forests of Bryansk. With their backs to the blazing town, the Germans stand on wooded heights, the natural bastions guarding Karachev. After their expulsion from Orel, the Germans tried to withdraw their manpower and material in good order io Karachev, but the Russians, by swift flanking movements, forced them to give battle all the way, expending much of their strength which they had hoped to conserve for the defence of Karachev. Nov/ they have been forced to dip into the strength of the Bryansk garrison to maintain their resistance at Karachev. Thus, after the fall of Karachev the battle might switch immediately to the eastern outskirts of Bryansk, just as the capture of Mtsensk was speedily followed by the storming of Orel.

huge booty CAPTURED BY RUSSIANS . IN KHARKOV AREA. ROADS AND RAILWAYS CUT BY TANK FORCES. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 11.27 a.m.) RUGBY, August 15. A huge amount of booty has fallen into Soviet hands in the Kharkov area, where tank forces suddenly cut roads and railway lines, states a Moscow message. At one railway station the Red Army captured over half a million shells, a quarter of a million hand grenades, three of the Germans’ main food stores for the Kharkov sector, and thousands of barrels' of benzine.

In large-scale air battles over the city he Luftwaffe tried desperately to hold back the mounting superiority of the Soviet air forces. Every Soviet air scout in the Kharkov area had to run the gauntlet of five or six attacks by German fighters, and Soviet bombers and Stormoviks had to fight swarms of Focke-Wulfs. THREAT DEVELOPING TO WHOLE GERMAN FRONT. VIEW OF LONDON OBSERVERS. (Received This Day, 1.30 p.m.) LONDON, August 15. When Kharkov falls, the whole position of the Germans throughout South Russia, the Crimea and the Kuban region will be endangered, observers in London say. if Smolensk falls the position cf the Germans throughout North Russia will be even more serious. Their supply line from the Baltic to the Black Sea will be severed, and a retreat to the Riga-Odessa line will become a probability.

The Germans appear to favour a general withdrawal on the whole OrelKharkov front, but there is no indication of the line they intend to take up. though possibly it is along the Dnieper. On their right flank the Russians are already nearer to Bryansk than to Orel. The capture of Bryansk would greatly relieve the pressure which might threaten the flank. This is particularly necessary in view of the Russian attack which is developing against Smolensk. Reuter’s Moscow correspondent reports that Orel is still full of German mines, and that no Russian troops are yet stationed in the city. The Germans hanged or shot at least 12,000 of the city’s population.