Offensive Round Stalingrad

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23804, 25 November 1942, Page 3

Offensive Round Stalingrad

FIVE MORE TOWNS CAPTURED IN.Z. Press Association—Copyright.) (Rec. II p.ni-) LONDON, November 21. The Russians throughout the night continued their great Offensive north-west and south of Stalingrad. To-day’s Moscow communique, icfcning to the north-west sector, saysi “Our troops smashed further enemy resistance and occupied a number of populated places. One unit smashed nine German tanks, and another unit smashed 13 tanks and captured six. “Rooty continues to pile up and prisoners are pouring in,” says the communique. In their southern advance the Russians have fought a series of separate engagements and have not had lime to assess the general effect of their successes. In one village, where the Germans were caught unprepared, the Russians killed 1000 officers and men and destroyed 70 lorries and 25 aircraft on the ground. One Russian unit killed 850 Germans, took more than 500 prisoners, and destroyed 14 tanks. The Russians on Monday made a further general advance of up to 12 miles and recaptured five more towns. The enemy’s losses in men and equipment have been greatly increased. The Russians claim that 12,000 more German dead have been left on the battlefield and that 11,000 more prisoners have been taken, bringing the total number of prisoners in the present offensive to 24,000. Moscow reports that the defenders of Stalingrad are forging ahead in the factory area, and that 1000 Germans were killed in an all-day battle. Last night the Russians cleared the enemy from 17 blockhouses and seized guns and machine-guns.

Dispatches from Moscow agree that more than 20 German divisions are within the area which the Russian armies north and south of Stalingrad are at present attempting to encircle. General von Hoth is reported to be trying to, extricate his troops under cover of fresh attacks against Stalingrad itself. General von Hoth is rcooncd to have already ordered a retreat through the bottleneck against which the Russians are smashing. The Russians are bringing up long-range guns on both sides, to shell the whole depth of General von Hoth’s only exit. It is most difficult to trap 300.000 to 400,000 men in a pincers movement, however shaken and mutilated they may be, but the Russians are attempting it. "The tables have been turned at Stalingrad. The Germans, and not the Russians, are now menaced/with destruction unless they are relieved,” says the Moscow correspondent of “The Times.” “The position of the Germans is increasingly precarious. They are being forced to fight from a line parallel with their communications, and their offensiveness has been blunted /after the long battering against Stalin--1 grad. “Heavy Russian tanks are playing a great part in the forward drive. At one point they simply rolled over the German positions, crushing more than ICO men under their caterpillars.” The correspondent adds; “The Berlin spokesman is probably right when he expresses the opinion that the Russian b'ows in the Stalingrad area are merely preliminaries to large-scale winter operations. Since November 21 Germm communications with their rear inside the Don bend have been confined to a passage without railways, which is now less than 40 miles wide. Most of the advanced German forces are in a very precarious position. Both sides have masses of men and material, but the Russians have the advantage of an excellent offensive spirit, whereas the edge of 'the German offensive has been blunted.” Reuter’s Moscow correspondent ,e----ports that the Red Army’s advance has broken a triple line of fortifications and field works, bristling with artillery and machine-guns, which the Germans established on their long line of communications. . The Moscow radio says the whole of Russia is rejoicing. , To-day’s, Russian communique also reports a Russian counter-attack northeast of the Black Sea port of Tuapse, and the capture of an important fortified point. The fighting south-east of Nalchik, towards the Groznyi oilfields, is described as being of local significance, with the Russians holding on. Monday’s midday Soviet communique said: “During the night our troops in the Stalingrad area continued to conduct offensive battles in the same direction as before. Two German shock battalions were wiped out and much booty was captured during the enemy’s desperate attempts to hold Up the Soviet advance from the northwest of Stalingrad. In Stalingrad itself the enemy launched an ineffective attack in the factory area, and in another sector it had two "costly failures in counter-attacks.” Results in Advance from South Earlier news from the north-west of the city was that the Russians encountered Rumanian troops on • the Serafimovich - Kletskaya front, but they continued to advance in a southwesterly direction. However, it is the development of the attack from the south of Stalingrad which seems to have achieved the most remarkable results, This advance, apparently, has not only cut the Stalingrad-Krasnodar railway linking up with Rostov, but also the Germans’ main line of supply —the railway from Kharkov to Stalingrad. Kalach, which the Russians captured, is on a branch line from the Stalingrad-Kharkov railway, and it lies about due west of Stalingrad. The fact that the Russians have developed such a telling offensive from the south of Stalingrad appears to show that they have maintained effective control, of the Volga communications, in spite of the arrival of ice. It is also noticed that the Stalingrad offensive has been well timed in support of the recent victory in the central Caucasus. Observers in London point out that during last month, in addition to the rout of two armoured divisions of the Afrika Korps in Egypt, two armoured German divisions have been badly mauled in the Caucasus and three more in the Stalingrad area. A message from Moscow' states that the Russian break-through north-west of‘Stalingrad began with a short but intense artillery preparation. The Soviet gunners 'had such exact data about most of the enemy batteries that the first defence lines were silenced within an hour. This success was followed up by tanks and infantry and the attack culminated in bitter hand-to-hand fighting. The Germans were scattered and the Russians then thrust through the defences in depth. They steadily maintained their progress against a dense system of minefields, emplacements, and a fierce anti-tank fire covering a wide area.

feeding the German spearhead,” states the Moscow correspondent of the Columbia Broadcasting System. “The Germans wedged in at Stalingrad could get out if they gave up the attempt to take the city and retreated to the open country between the railways, but they are trying to hold on. and the Russian columns are closing.” The military writer of the “Evening Standard” states that the Russian advance has placed very large German forces in the Stalingrad area in the gravest peril. There are in this area 13 German infantry, three panzer, and two motorised divisions, with probably seven or eight unspecified divisions, all of which have suffered more or less serious losses. In addition, in the Caucasus sector, the 13th and 23rd panzer divisions have been severely mauled. Winter Offensive Plans Following'closely on the defeat of the German offensive in the central Caucasus, the Russian victory on the flanks of the Stalingrad front is evidence that in spite of the heavy losses which the Soviet forces suffered in the summer and autumn the Red Army is determined to stage a vigorous winter offensive. It now seems that the Germans’ most recent attacks against Stalingrad were designed to cover a general withdrawal to the Don. This would be a logical move for the Germans when it became clear that Stalingrad could not be taken. The Moscow correspondent of “The Times” says; “The Red Army’s current operations, which have already achieved tactical successes of the first magnitude, arc clearly part of shrewd strategic plans to cut off the enemy's advanced forces from their bases. This plan is being carried out with the painstaking efficiency which characterises the Red Army. The Germans in the Stalingrad area, as in the Central Caucasus, where the Russians report a further improvement, are reaping the consequences of their failure to achieve the main object of their offensive —namely, the destruction of the Red Army, which eluded the Germans in spite of their great territorial gains.” Mr Morley Richards, the “Daily Express” war writer, states that Marshal Timoshenko knew that the Germans had planned to withdraw from the approaches to Stalingrad and he "beat them to the draw.” He was not fooled by Marshal von Hoth’s two minor offensives against the city. “It looks like a repetition of Hitler’s blunder on the Moscow front last year, when he left his withdrawal too late. It is a striking commentary on Hitler’s lack of soldierly skill.” states Mr Richards. A message from Zurich states that it is officially admitted in Berlin that the Russians have penetrated the German lines north and south of Stalingrad. A German communique states that the Rumanians and Germans in the region of the great Don elbow and south of Stalingrad continued strong defensive fighting. A Finnish communique reports that the Russians on Sunday night bombed Helsinki and started two large fires.

Tables Turned on Germans

The Russian thrust from the lower Volga to Kalach is seen in London jjs having turned the tables on the Germans. If Kalach remains in Russian hands and (he thrust from the north inside the Don bend continues, the Problem for the Germans in the corridor between the Volga and the Don elbows will no longer be how to get into Stalingrad, but how to get out. The German losses of men and matwial are regarded as a particularly heavy blow at this time of the year, when winter is already making the Problem of communication more difficult.

"The Axis divisions remaining before Stalingrad are threatened with encirclement as a result of the cutting off at. Abganerova and Krivomusgin•kaya of two vital supply railways