ROAD TO BALTIC

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 125, 22 February 1944, Page 5

ROAD TO BALTIC

New Russian Pincers

(Received February 22, 1.30 ajn.) LONDON. February 21. A new Russian trap threatens to wipe out the German salient east of Pskov and to open the road to the Baltic States,' says the Moscow correspondent of the British United Press. While the Red Army is thrusting the long arms of a classical pincer movement round Dno, other forces are driving the Germans retreating - from Staraya "Russa westward into this trap. Reuter’s Moscow correspondent reports that three Russian armies are speeding up the assault on the important railway junction of Dno, where the Germans are expected to organize their last resistance before Pskov. The Red Army is crashing through the German defences north of Dno and has advanced 10 to 15 miles nearer the town. One Russian army is now 25 miles north-west of Dno, the second army is advancing from the north-east 30 miles away and the third Russian force is steadily pressing on from Staraya Russa.

In southern Russia Soviet troops are massing along a vast front from Shepetovka to the bank of the Dnieper opposite Kherson to hit General von Mannstein before he recovers from the Kanev disaster. The Russians are poised for an all-out sweep against Krivoi Rog which will carry them forward to cut the Odessa-Lvov escape railway.

Berlin radio announced that Herr Hitler has awarded General Stemmerman oak leaves to the Knight’s Cross “for his break-through in. the fighting west of Cherkassy,” thus repeating the earlier assertion that the Germans encircled at Kanev fought their way out of the trap. The radio did not mention the Russian claim that Stemmerman’s body was found on the battlefield.