PETERING OUT

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 99, 23 October 1942, Page 5

PETERING OUT

THE ENEMY STRENGTH

(By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.)

LONDON, October 22.

The Moscow correspondent of the British United Press says the weather has helped to slow down the Germans, who are showing exhaustion. The "Red Star" says: "Last week's fighting clearly shows that the strength of the enemy is petering out. The Germans only have force enough to concentrate on narrow sectors, thereby weakening the power of the offensive as a whole."

While deadly fighting is going on at both ends of Stalingrad, which is probably the longest city in the world, life in the centre is practically normal, "Fravda" says. The size of the city, which stretches 40 miles along the Volga, permits a continuance of life in the central section. Shells sometimes fall in these parts, but normally some children still play in the streets and women tend to their allotments. The electric power station is still working, and a newspaper is appearing daily. .'.-.■ The Moscow correspondent of "The Times" says that a battle of a very different character is being fought out on the billiard-table steppe south of Stalingrad, where villages are 10 or 15 miles apart. The struggles here are for the rare water-wells. Germans and Rumanians are trying to drive to Astrakhan via the lower Volga, and the Russians are countering with' small cavalry and motor-cycle patrols which audaciously swoop on the Germans. Moscow radio last night declared that the relief army north-west of Stalingrad improved its positions, the Russians having* widened the gap which they had previously made in the German C "Isvestia" states that the Luftwaffe dropped 1000 tons of bombs during 1800 air attacks against a mile-long sector in" northern Stalingrad during the latest German assualt. "The earth was seamed and wrecked by the whitehot metal, but the Germans have achieved only local successes, and nave failed in their objective of splitting the defences." it says. "The Russians are firmly entrenched and still barring Strange, murderous warfare is' being fought out in the Caucasus mountain passes. The Russians fire at rocks over the enemy positions in, order to bring down avalanches, or send blazing logs hurtling down on groups of German

and Rumanian alpine troops who ar4" painfully climbing the slopes. A message from Stockholm says that German panzer officers have brought" to Berlin reports about anew Russian* tank,, which is armed with several■-• cannon and machine-guns and came* -~- a crew of nearly 30 men.