Good Progress Reported

Press, Volume LXXX, Issue 24366, 19 September 1944, Page 5

Good Progress Reported

LAND FORCES ADVANCING FROM SOUTH (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 11 p.m.) LONDON, September 18. Unofficial reports indicate that the great Allied air-borne invasion of Holland, launched on Sunday afternoon, is going well. By Sunday evening several towns near the German frontier had been cleared. At the same time Canadian troops and the British 2nd Army are moving up from the south along the Belgian-Dutch border. Tanks and infantry moved up along a narrow front after one of the heaviest shellings of the German defences on this front. The landings in Holland by the Allied Ist Air-borne Army are reported to have been carried out by more than 1000 aircraft and Light guns, jeeps, and other equipment were landed with the troops in what is officially described as the Rhine Delta area. Official broadcasts to Holland refer to the area as south of the Rhine and Lek rivers. (Where it enters Holland, near Nijmegen, the Rhine divides into the Waal and the Neder Rijn; the lower reaches of the Neder Rijn form the Lek, which flows through Rotterdam to the sea.) The Official German News Agency said that the landings were in the Tilburg, Eindhoven, and Nijmegen areas, and that German forces had immediately gone into action. A British United Press correspondent with the air-borne forces says; “Opposition was comparatively light m the southernmost landing area. Small-arms and mortar fire ceased within half an hour, and within an hour the air-borne troops had liberated several villages from which the Germans had fled. Men from the famous 7th Armoured Division of Field-Marshal Montgomery’s Bth Army are among the air-borne forces.” “The percentage losses of the sky-trains carrying the paratroopers was lower than in any other air-borne operations of the war,” says an Associated Press correspondent from Advanced Headquarters of the Troop-carrier Command. “All members of the staff, including Lieutenant-General Brereton, are delighted with the landings, which are described as successful beyond expectations.”

The Official German News Agency this morning claimed that a German counter-attack had frustrated an Allied attack launched on Sunday evening in the Neerpelt area, in the direction, of Eindhoven, with the object of linking up with the air-borne, forces dropped in Holland. The agency added that the Allied paratroops and air-borne forces in Holland had received continuous reinforcements throughout the night. Immediately after the Allied announcements of the air-borne landings in Holland the German-controlled Hllversum radio said that the fighting on the river Gheel, which is in Belgium, behind the air-borne forces, had reached a new pitch of intensity, “The Americans have attacked heavily in the Valkenburg area,” said the radio. “The Allies are concentrating against a narrow front in order to punch their way through the German lines.”

The Official German News Agency said yesterday: “Allied paratroopers and airborne formations continue to land on Dutch territory. We are coun-ter-attacking.” The .only reports so far received of enemy air opposition come from a British United Press correspondent, who says: “Some fighter pilots radioed a running commentary to their headquarters on fierce air battles over the invasion area. They reported that Mustangs destroyed at least five Focke Wulf 190’s. “German fighters dived from clouds against a glider formation, and then turned and climbed into the cloud cover. They repeated these tactics several times. One of our pilots claimed the destruction of three out of seven enemy aeroplanes which attacked the section of fighter cover he was leading.” One American radio reporter who flew over the Invasion area said: “We had been expecting an air-borne invasion for some time. To-day the conditions were right. This operation is one of the most daring attempted during the campaign in western Europe, but the paratroops participating are not suicide troops. They will be fighting on when the Allied troops over whom they , flew to-day link up with them.” A British United Press correspondent who was oyer the invasion area in an aeroplane which dropped paratroopers, said: “We were the second group in and we could see that the going had not been easy. There were some aeroplanes burning below us. Others had crash-landed, evidently Drought down by German flak.” A New Zealander, Squadron Leader D. S. Gibb, of Canterbury, who piloted 8 tow-plane, said he was amazed at the speed with which the glider troops Went into action after crash-landing. Reuter’s correspondent, who flew in one of the tow-planes, said: “The landings were carried out under ideal wopp-carrier weather—perfect target visibility with the clouds just low enough to provide some cover for the carriers. I was most impressed with wnat might be termed the unevehtfulness of the entire operation. It was later described as ‘eminently satisfactory, with losses practically negligible mview of the size of the operation.” The representative of the Combined Press, from somewhere in Holland, in * dispatch last night, said that 50 strong units, of the Ist Allied Air-borne Army swooped down near the German Border Losses from flak were small, strong fighter and bomber support ensuring the success of the operation. CHANNEL PORTS ASSAULT LAUNCHED „ AT BOULOGNE tHec. V p.m.) LONDON, Sept. 17. .Canadian troops, to-day (Sunday) launched an all-out attack on Bousflys Reuter’s correspondent, fo i? p ’ m “ * n fighting, they had thr °ugh the outer delences of P® town. They dominate the town u he north-east, and are still driving ahead. .n" ,^le , str . en ßth of the Boulogne garrison is believed to be 5000. and it may W considerably more.” p - 1 "® Associated Press says that the Jrf n , a dian troops assaulting Boulogne used flame-throwers and other special The attack was co-ordin-ated with a big effort by the Bomber command. Reuter correspondent says: No e ..Canadians attacked Cap Gris fl” tightening the noose round this Jm° n j Point ’ A third Canadian force So. closer to Dunkirk, occupying nWrt 63, three m ‘lcs to the south-east. Germans abandoned Berguesdur]?®Jne night. The perimeter of the siderabiy ° e^ences * ias narrowed confcrugge 1 ” is Still figlting at Zee ‘ n«o 5? u ders on Sunday night flew "he German garrisons holding out , jfilany and on the Channel coast ff5 O PPed 4,000.000 leaflets containJ?|, n ® w s of the critical position of the armies in Germany and Hoi-