ONE LAST BID

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 251, 23 October 1944, Page 5

ONE LAST BID

TO WIN WAE IN 1944

Great Offensive Predicted On Russian Front

LONDON, Oct 20. Military observers are now saying that all signs from the Russian front indicate that preliminary conditions have been completed for the greatest offensive the world has ever known, designed to finish the war in 1944.

Whether or not .this is overoptimism, only events can show, but various developments are cited as supporting this belief. Mr. Churchill's prolonged stay in Moscow is creating speculation because it is suggested that political questions, including the settlement' of the Polish trouble, are not sufficient to keep him in Russia. Another factor is the. known Russian desire to end the war before the winter. » A third aspect is the Red Army's intensified activities in many sectors of the 1500-mile, front from the Baltic to the Adriatic.

These activities menace alike East Prussia—which the Germans say the Russians have already entered— and the whole of the Danubian regions, including Hungary, which is Germany's "under-belly."

The Times military correspondent, Captain Falls, thinks that Mr. Churchill's conversations with Marshal Stalin embraced, above all, the question of inflicting the earliest possible decisive defeat on Germany.

Writing in the Illustrated London News, Captain Falls says this would only be possible with the aid of a victorious Russian campaign on the East Prussian and Polish fronts, which are the only roads which can carry the Russians to their vital objectives in the coming winter.

One More Effort in West Mr. Churchill probably told Marshal Stalin that the Allies in the West were determined to make one further effort to break down the German frontier defences before the end of October, and has suggested that this offensive should be concerted with one on the Russian central front. Captain Falls adds: "We should be deceiving ourselves if we thought we have more than one chance before the winter f "With good weather and a wellplanned strategy, it is still a possibility, but only if the handicap to the Allies' communications is overcome, and the British, French and American armies are able to strike heavy and repeated blows."