EMPHASIS BY MOSCOW

Evening Post, Volume CXXXV, Issue 39, 16 February 1943, Page 5

EMPHASIS BY MOSCOW

RECAPTURE OF ROSTOV

LONDON, February 14. Moscow radio signalised the recapture of Rostov with the greatest emphasis it has hitherto shown. Ihe - -German-controlled stations had just been asserting that the Russian press- ' ure on the Rostov area had relaxed, and that a slight Russian break- - - through at Voroshilovgrad had been T* sealed off, when Moscow dramatically interrupted its own programme. The - announcer said: "Attention for a special last-minute announcement." He then slowly read the High Command's - special communique 'three times, after which triumphal marches were played ■-' for a quarter of an hour and the com- :,. '. munique was thrice read again. The Stockholm correspondent of "The Times" says the Germans must now realise their mistake in shortening the front by withdrawing from the . Caucasus via Rostov, because the remnants of yon List's chivvied and maulV ed army have weakened instead of strengthening the Donets forces by increasing the confusion due to the ' arrival of defeated troops who had been chased from the Don bend. The Russians are now compressing the German bridgehead in the Caucasus into the Taman Peninsula, and simul- .. taneously are making a direct attack on Novorossisk, says the correspond- * -ent. The Germans presumably have ' managed to remove a substantial part of their men to the Crimea, but infor- .'",' anation on this is scanty. The Washington correspondent of the "New York Times" says that strategists are of the opinion that the fall of Rostov, the importance of which ' even exceeds that of Stalingrad, will inevitably force the Nazis to fall back " "to the Dnieper, and will result in the ■"• disintegration of the Donets line, from where the Germans launched their "■' 1942 offensive. The strategists point • '-out that such a retreat will probably be accompanied by a withdrawal in