WIPED OUT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 September 1943, Page 3

WIPED OUT

LAST GERMAN FORCES IN TAGANROG AREA .. . HEAVY SOVIET CAPTURES OF MEN & MATERIAL. CONTINUED ADVANCE TOWARDS SMOLENSK. LONDON, September 1. The Russians announce that they. wiped out the German forces trapped in the Taganrog region and have captured more places on the approaches to Smolensk. Early this morning Soviet armies smashed the last remnants of the big German forces in the Taganrog area. A Moscow communique states that the enemy lost 35,000 in killed alone. More than 5,000 prisoners were taken and several enemy divisions were routed. Heavy losses were suffered by four other German divisions. Great quantities of enemy equipment were destroyed, including 200 aircraft and 537 tanks. Considerable booty was taken intact on the battlefield.

While this battle of annihilation was drawing to a close, the Russians were extending their offensive into the Donbas. They have advanced four to six miles and mopped up enemy resistance in 30 towns and villages. The Russian armies on the Bryansk front have maintained their offensive and pushed on a few more miles. .In the Smolensk offensive, they are also moving steadily forward, and have advanced more than seven miles at some points. Two hundred places have been taken, including Dorogobuzh, little more than 50 miles from Smolensk.

The German war commentator, Captain Sertorius, speaking on Berlin radio, said: “The enemy is making great efforts to break through the shortened German positions north-west of Taganrog, and fighting has developed on a grim scale. The German command is husbanding its forces regardless of the consequences.’! Leningrad has again come into the Russian news with a disclosure that German artillery recently savagely bombarded the city. Retribution fell some nights later, says Reuter’s Moscow correspondent, when Russian bombers unloosed a deluge of high explosives against the German positions. The Russians again bombed the positions on the next night and since then not a single gun has been fired against Leningrad.