FURTHER ADVANCES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 18 August 1943, Page 3

FURTHER ADVANCES

MADE BY RUSSIANS ON MAIN OFFENSIVE FRONTS HARD FIGHTING IN KHARKOV ZONE. NEW ATTACK REPORTED NORTH OF SMOLENSK. LONDON, August 17. Soviet troops continued their offensive on the Bryansk front today. In some sectors they advanced about three miles and occupied more than 60 places.

On the Smolensk front the Russians continue to advance and to consolidate their positions. They are driving towards the important Smolensk-Bryansk railway. In the Kharkov area, the Russians repelled enemy counter-attacks, in which tanks and infantry were used. Soviet troops continued their offensive and considerably improved their positions.

A Russian communique states that on all fronts yesterday the Russians smashed 96 tanks and shot down 78 aircraft.

The Berlin radio’s war commentator, Captain Sertorius, says that a new element has entered the situation on the Eastern front as a result of a northward extension of the Russian offensive to the Moscow-Smolensk highway. The Russians attacked Byeloi yesterday with several infantry divisions and tank brigades. He also reports that strong Russian forces are striking against the German lines on the Velizh sector, and adds that the Russians are “far superior’’ on this sector.

. - FIRM STAND ATTEMPTED BY GERMANS IN KHARKOV. REINFORCEMENTS BROUGHT UP. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 9.55 a.m.) RUGBY, August 17. The Germans apparently have decided to make a firm stand in the suburbs of Kharkov, especially in one sector where huge enemy reserves have arrived, allowing them to support each counter-attack by fifty panzers, despite continuing heavy losses, says a Moscow message. In another sector very stubborn resistance was crushed when the Red Army broke through a defence line in process of construction on the bank of a river. Advanced Soviet units forded the river, bringing the retreating enemy under a deadly fire from both banks. The enemy sustained very heavy losses.

A military commentator in London says it is inevitable that the Germans should try to hold their line on this front, as a defeat would endanger the whole of their positions in the Donetz Basin.

On the Bryansk front, according to another Moscow message, a swift Soviet advance south-west of Spas has increased the danger to Bryansk itself. The Germans, resisting savagely, threw in three panzer divisions, which had been somewhat battered in recent fighting, to reinforce their troops. Large numbers of enemy tanks are supporting the enemy counter-attacks in an effort to prevent the necessity for a hasty evacuation of Bryansk.