GERMANS SEEN TO SEE DEFEAT AHEAD

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 4, 6 January 1944, Page 5

GERMANS SEEN TO SEE DEFEAT AHEAD

FRANK ADMISSIONS Sufferings In Russia May End In Rout N.Z. Press Association—Copyright Rec. noon. LONDON, Jan. 5. Nazi officials are admitting frankly for the first time that Germany faces a critical situation. Gloomy reports which are reaching neutral countries every day from Germany suggest that the Nazis can see defeat ahead. The newspaper Berliner Boersen Zeitung says: "Germany last year suffered political and military setbacks which would have tirought collapse to any nation in the Allied camp. The new year will bring still greater tests to be overcome not merely for fortifications but also for fanatical zeal." German officers on the Russian front apparently fear that the terrible experiences' their troops are suffering may turn their retreat into a rout. An officer of a panzer division, in an astonishingly frank broadcast to Berlin, said: "Our comrades are becoming very disquieted. We shoot like madmen, but the Russians have so many guns and they are such brilliant marksmen that we are unable to achieve anything. The communication lines between our retreating troops are constantly interrupted by guerillas."

Mud, Rain, Snow and Ice

A German war correspondent on the Russian front says: "It is almost impossible to live, let alone fight, on the eastern front. Our clothing is useless in the mud, rain, snow and icy winds. Hot food never reaches our lines. We never get cigarettes. It is so terrible that you cannot realise the conditions. Ivlany soldiers are ill, especially with gastric trouble. Life on the eastern front cannot be compared with anything." The German Foreign Office spokesman told Swedish correspondents .in Berlin: "The German winter line in Russia nas been split by the deep penetration of the Russian Army." The spokesman said the two fronts left in Russia were 360 and 480 miles long. He did not expect the German counter-attacks to regain the lost positions, but claimed that the Russians would be unable to roll up the German flanks because the two long fronts were still holding.