MUD AND MINES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 October 1943, Page 4

MUD AND MINES

4> GREATLY HINDERING ALLIES IN ITALY GERMANS FIGHTING GRIMLY. ATTEMPTING TO WARD OFF FLANK ATTACK. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) (Received This Day, 11.15 a.m.) LONDON, October 7. Stiffening German resistance and the breaking of the weather have slowed up the Allied forces in Italy. On the Fifth Army front, rain and mud are aggravating the difficulties the British and Americans are meeting from enemy minefields and demolitions as they slowly press on, while at the eastern end of the extended battle line, in the Termoli area, Marshal Kesselring is‘‘fighting grimly to ward off an outflanking threat to Rome. Main interest at present is centred on the fierce struggle at Termoli, where both the Eighth Army and the Germans have been reinforced. Reuter’s Algiers correspondent says a critical battle is developing in the rain-soaked countryside before Termoli. General Montgomery’s men are more than holding their own. Kesselring fears an Allied break-through to Pescara, GO miles northward. The Germans are using bombers against the Eighth Army for the first time since the British landed in Italy. The Germans also switched an entire panzer division from the west coast to the Termoli area, where it sharply counterattacked yesterday on the coast road near Termoli. The British United Press Algiers correspondent says earlier statements that the Fifth Army had smashed its way across the Volturno are corrected today, with the announcement that our troops crossed the Carole River, a --/tributary of the Vulturno. This means that the Volturno has not been reached. The Germans are holding the high ground north of the Volturno in considerable force. ABANDONED PLANES " FOUND IN HUNDREDS BY ALLIES. ON CAPTURED AIRFIELDS. (Received This Day, 12.50 p.m.) LONDON. October 7. ' The Fifth Army is now contending < with the difficulties of a flooded countryside. Constant rain has flooded " the lowlands between Naples and the . Volturno River, which the Germans .. are expected to hold in strength, as a f delaying line. The Allied line at pre- - sent runs from Focidaeatria, on the • coast eight miles south of the mouth of the Volturno, through Aversa to Maddaloni, to a point eleven miles east of Benevento, then northward to Termoli. ‘ A Combined Press correspondent ■ with the Fifth Army says: “The Germans are likely to withdraw to the hilly country nearer Rome, resembling the gorges around Salerno. Demolitions of every conceivable kind block the roads. Mines also are delaying the Fifth Army advance to the Volturno. The enemy is leaving rearguards in awkward pockets, instructed to fight to - the death. The German withdrawal to the Volturno is chiefly in the direction ? of the Capua area. “We are occupying an increasing ■ number of airfields as the Germans re- ■ treat, all with aircraft thereon, num:r bering in some cases hundreds.” The German determination to fight ■j for Italy is underlined by Swiss reports that considerable contingents, including defence works specialists, withdrawn from the Leningrad front, are being sent to Italy. One prisoner taken on the Fifth Army front was a youngster of sixteen years. His identity card gave his occupation as a schoolboy. AMERICAN ESTIMATE OF GERMAN STRENGTH IN ITALY. 20 TO 25 DIVISIONS. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day. 10.35 a.m.) RUGBY, October 7. • -- The Germans now in Italy are estimated at 20 to 25 divisions, said the United States Secretary for War (Mr. Stimson). The Germans, he said, were reinforcing their units in Italv, and Iht Eighth Army was encountering stiffer resistance as it advanced up the coast. Mr. Stimson stated that American casualties in the first four weeks since the landing at Salerno number 511 killed, 5428 wounded and 2638 missing, which was somewhat heavier than the losses of the British components in the Fifth Army.