RUSSIANS STILL SHUSH THROUGH

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 307, 29 December 1942, Page 5

RUSSIANS STILL SHUSH THROUGH

DRIVING TO ROSTOV

Slightly Over Seventy Miles Away

N.Z.P.A. and British Wireless Roc. 2.30 p.m. LONDON, Dec. 28. The Russians are smashing through village after village along the railway from Voronezh, and according to latest reports from Moscow are now only slightly over 70 miles from Rostov.

Reuters Moscow correspondent says the Germans are falling back disorganised and bewildered. Thero are no signs yet of a big Axis stand against the Russians, who in their advance face fierce but not largescale opposition. The British United Press Moscow correspondent says that new Russian advances, after smashing the German counter - offensive, threaten Kotelnikovo, where there are already signs of encirclement from the Russian arc which at the nearest point is about 12 miles from the city. Another circle, enclosing the Germans, is rapidly forming in roughly the same area west of Potemkinsk and north of Tsymlyanskaya. Key Positions Captured Further important gains between Kotelnikovo and the Stalingrad pocket were made by the Russians yesterday when they took positions in and near f,he south-east angle of the River Don bend. Here they have reached points 12 and 20 miles north-east of Kotelnikovo.

The Germans presumably still hold the area inside the bend south of the River Chir and therefore may still be only 40 miles from their besieged army, but, if so, their rear is now gravely threatened by the Russian advance towards the Lower Don, which has reached a point 33 miles north of Tsymlyanskaya.

The Russians approaching the< Donetz River appear to be along a line about 20 miles from that river, stretching from north to east of Kamensk. It is thought they are now mopping up pockets of resistance between the Middle Don and the Lower Don and the Donetz. South-west of Stalingrad South-west of Stalingrad the German relief army is still on the run, leaving the encircled enemy divisions west of the city to their fate. The Russians are fighting their way along the railroad toward Kotelnikovo and are also in action north of the town. They report enormous German losses on this front.

There Is a marked revival of activity inside Stalingrad. The Russians are storming many forts and have ejected the Germans from an important factory.

The Germans in the Caucasus are anxiously watching the Russians as they move toward Rostov, a development which threatens to cut them off completely. The Germans are still falling back nea.* Nalchik. Berlin admitted this last night.