CAUCASUS FRONT

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23718, 17 August 1942, Page 5

CAUCASUS FRONT

Russians Slow Down Enemy Advance

FIGHTING AMONG FOOTHILLS (Received August 16, 11.20 p.m.) (N.Z.P.A.) LONDON, August 16. The latest Russian communique mentions no new battle zones in the Caucasus. It says that the enemy was fought in the regions of Mineralnyevody, Cherkesk, Maikop, and Krasnodar. Mineralnyevody, 100 miles west of Groznyi, is still the most southeasterly point reached by the German advance. A supplement to the communique states that a heavy attack forced back one of the Soviet units at Mineralnyevody. On the north-west Caucasus front, fighting sways backwards and forwards in the area between Krasnodar and Maikop. The enemy attempted to put a pontoon bridge across the Kuban river, but it was destroyed by aircraft.

A German communique on Saturday claimed the fall of Georgievsk, about 120 miles west of Groznyi.

The Exchange Telegraph Agency’s Moscow correspondent says that after the latest German break-through in the Krasnodar area, the Russians attacked the flanks of the advancing enemy, inflicting losses and slowing up, but not stemming the advancer Strong Russian resistance is still reported from Cherkesk, where the Germans have encountered a solid resistance and are held up. General von Kliest has pushed on eastwards with other columns, but in a more southerly direction along the valley of the Upper Terek, from which military highways climb to the Caucasus. One of tlie world’s richest manganese deposits lies in the Upper Terek valley, where more powerful Russian forces are certainly occupying positions more favourable for defence. The main battle in the Caucasus seems now to be raging in the foothills, 150 miles from the Groznyi oilfields. It is reported that the Germans are not having it all their own way in the mountainous country and in some places have laid themselves open to attack from the rear.

To the north-west, at Krasnodar, all enemy attempts to cross the Kuban river for an advance on the naval base of Novorossiisk have so far been defeated. Enemy troops which reached the south bank were wiped out by artillery fire and aircraft, but it is emphasised that there are tremendous odds against the Russians here, and this cannot be ignored in estimating their future prospects. The Vichy radio claims that the Germans have reached the immediate approaches to the Grozny! oilfields.'