Germans Throw In Large, Reserves

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIII, Issue 114, 16 May 1942, Page 5

Germans Throw In Large, Reserves

COUNTER-ATTACKS FAIL

LONDON, May 15,

Marshal Timoshenko's drive towards Kharkov, the great industrial city of the Ukraine, is gathering momentum. The latest dispatches from the front say that his troops have reached the Germans' second line of defence.

It is believed in London that the Russian offensive was launched on a front of some 40 to 50 miles, and the enemy positions have been penetrated to a considerable depth.

The German commander defending Kharkov is reported to have thrown in large reserves of men and materials in the last 24 hours in a vain attempt to stem the Russian drive.

The "Isvestia" said today that, the tempo of Marshal Timoshenko's offensive was quickening, *and a correspondent ivith the Red armies in the south-west, describ•jng yesterday's fighting, says: rvAs the Germans retreated they left behind on the road hundreds

of bodies and large numbers of * guns, tanks, and other arms. Tired German troops were thrown into the battle straight from the march, and at some points the enemy even attempted to launch counterattacks, but all these efforts failed."

Tonight's Moscow communique says that theßussian troops are still advancing on the Kharkov front. In two days' fighting around Kharkov, 255 German guns have been captured, 250 German tanks destroyed or damaged, and 40 enemy planes shot down.

Moscow radio,' announcing successes