MAKING PEAR

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 89, 11 October 1941, Page 9

MAKING PEAR

VIOLENT BATTLES

STALIN VISITS THE

FRONT

GREAT TEST COMING

By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.) LONDON, October 10. The Stockholm correspondent of the "Daily Mail" says that after a hurried secret visit to Marshal Timoshenko's headquarters behind Vyazma, M. Stalin returned to Moscow apparently satisfied that everything is in order for the supreme test, which is expected to materialise this weekend. He'•was accompanied by his leading military adviser, General Shaposhnikov. With 'both sides throwing /in fresh troops, the great battles now raging on the central front seem to be approaching a peak of violence, says the Moscow correspondent of the "Daily Telegraph." The Russians' reply to the new German onslaught is a crowning effort not only to' prevent the enemy from reaching the approaches to Moscow but also to break his heart by killing. It is difficult, he says, to visualise the size of this jagged battlefield—or, rather, series of battlefields—with great gaps sometimes. 30 to 40 miles wide. The fighting is at certain points, but it is essentially a battle of manoeuvre in which there are big tank actions in many different areas. Elsewhere the stubborn Russian infantry and field gunners strive to canalise the German armoured rushes and. pitch out the motorised. infantry following ,up these thrusts. DESTRUCTION BY SOVIET PLANES. The Russian air force meanwhile is fighting with desperate bravery and even ramming German bombers rather than let them escape. Hitherto the Germans have mostly held their air-borne troops in reserve, but they used parachutists in immense numbers and lost thousands when attacking the railway near Orel, where the Russians destroyed all munitions and grain stocks before their evacuation. The Germans are using a great number of planes in the Vyazma offensive, but they have failed to gain air superiority, and Russian planes have wrecked several of the German air bases. A captured German pilot 'told the Russians that a large number of German planes were concentrated on a German aerodrome near Leningrad, whereupon Soviet planes made a surprise attack and destroyed or damaged 40 planes in 20 minutes. The workers at Kharkov have held mass meetings in the factories and also overflow meetings in the street, voicing their defiance of the invaders. The workers in one factory passed a resolution to work without reward and to redouble their efforts. NAZIS' POSITION CRITICAL. "The Times" correspondent on the German frontier says that in spite of their, impressive successes, the whole position of the Germans is admitted to be critical, because their preparations for a winter campaign began far too late. There is no adequate provision for winter foods and supplies, particularly fats, warm clothing, woollen blankets, medical service, sanitation, housing, heating, and transport. Hence, the failure to capture Moscow and smash the Russian resistance before winter sets in would be a German disaster of the first magnitude. In spite of all propaganda asserting the contrary, the German army does not possess many winter-type planes capable of landing on ice, or motor fuel which remains liquid at the-lowest temperatures, whereas the Russians possess both in ample supply.