Fifth And Eighth Armies

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 112, 13 May 1944, Page 7

Fifth And Eighth Armies

SEQUEL TO REGROUPING (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.) , .- _ _„■_,_ __ Rec. 9 a.m. LONDON, May 12. The Fifth and Eighth Armies have launched a new offensive along the whole Italian front after an intense artillery barrage that stretched from the Adriatic to the Tyrrhenian Sea, says the British United Press correspondent at Allied headquarters in Italy. : Advance guards from both armies began to move forward at 11.30 o'clock last night. The main assault was between Cassino and the Mediterranean.

A special communique from Allied headquarters states: "Eegroupment of the Allied armies in Italy has now been successfully completed without enemy interference. The operations have been covered hy continuous air action and by patrol activity along the whole front. Complicated heavy road and railway'movements of men and material have been smoothly carried out. This has made heavy calls on all the administration services. All Allied formations have been involved, and despite bad weather and difficult terrain, the regrouping has been accomplished on time; The Fifth and Eighth Armies, directed by General Alexander and supported by the Mediterranean Allied Tactical Air Force, began an attack against the Gustav Line at 11.30 o'clock last night." The correspondent of the Exchange Telegraph agency at Allied headquarters reports that elements of the Eighth Army Iby 3 a.m. were believed to have crossed the Rapido River and consolidated new positions. Initial successes were reported at other points along the Italian front. ' .

The Eighth Army was moved secretly across1 the Apennines, and began X powerful break-through effort into the Liri Valley. The Fifth Army, -on the Tyrrhenian coastal flank, is driving north-eastward to clear the mountains. The British United Press correspondent at Allied headquarters says that the regrouping of the Allied armies included British, American, French, and Polish units. Entire supply dumps ihad to be moved and the supply lines relaid simultaneously with the crosscountry shifting of tens of thousands of men. Virtually every Allied division in Italy has been shifted during the last two months, sometimes in ■weather which made the snow-covered Apennines almost impassable. At other times clouds of dust shrouded the overworked roads in the rear areas; Keuter's correspondent with the Eighth Army reports that General Alexander launched the long-awaited all-out offensive with the greatest artillery barrage in the. history of the war in this theatre. Striking the first blow in the Allies' final assault against Europe, General Alexander brought off the sudden surprise blow against the German defences in the Liri Valley by concentrating both the Fifth and the Eighth Armies, supported by armour, gunfire, and air power, between Cassino and the sea. Thousands of guns opened up at 11.30 p.m. under a bright starlit.sky and pounded the German positions for hours while British, Dominion, Indian, and Polish troops, with .the aid of the late moon, formed the spearhead of the Eighth Army's initial

tery. During the day soldiers removed coffins from the crypts, whose thick walls offered .the best shelter for the troops. „ Then they went to sleep, and when they awoke at night the coffins were replaced. The Allied guns opened-the barrage late at night, and against one narrow front alone about 8500 shells were hurled against the Germans in three minutes after the attack began. The Germans' guns , went into action seven minutes later, but their shelling was very weak.By S a.m. today thousands of American and French troops had pushed forward nearly. two miles to a small town which is now being assaulted. The German shelling did little damage in the early stages of the offensiye. The cemetery suffered badly from the enemy's mortar fire, but there were no longer any troops in the crypts. The British United Press correspondent with the Eighth Army reports that the Allied casualties were light in the first phase of the battle. A number of prisoners have already been captured in the north-west. They were fanatical members of the First Parachute Division, mostly 17 or 18 years of age. The Germans are reacting very vigorously on the high .ground between, Monte Cairo and. Cassino. In one sector alone they launched five ccunter-attacks in. two hours. Prisoners' have also been captured in other sectors. DESPERATE RESISTANCE. Troops of the Eighth Army crossed the Rapido River at several, points in rafts and. collapsible boats, and are now hammering; the German defences to i the west, says a special correspondent with the Indian, forces. The Germans are resisting desperately, and Allied infantrymen at some places are locked in a grim struggle.: The same correspondent, ■ describing

task of cracking the formidable Gustav Line, which has been held throughout •the winter by the Germans against repeated assaults. , ■ • The Gustav Line consists of a series of strongly fortified positions on the main sector of the Fifth Army front, running 30 miles' from the mouth of the Garigliano River to Santa. Eliia, in the mountains above Cassino. FieldMarshal Kesselring is said to have several more lines'of defence behind the Gustav Line, of which Cassino is the king pin.' The Liri Valley and the upper part of the Garigliano is a bottleneck beyond . Cassino through •which the Allied armies, must force their way before reaching the main road to Rome and before they will be ■able to link up with, General Clark's men in the Anizio beach-head. The: .'Associated Press of Great , Britain says, that the attack was launched along a front roughly from Cassino westwards to the Gulf of Gaeta. As the great guns shook the earth British, Indian, and Polish, troops of the Eighth Army went forward in a daring plan to bludgeon the Germans from their positions. French troops are fighting, in the Fifth Army. A great mass of guns was concentrated for the first 40 minntes against' the. German batteries and mortar positions /and'-then they swung round and engaged the enemy positions on a wholesale scale while our troops swarmed to the banks: o^,the Rapido River. ACCORDING TO ITLAN. British and Indian troops of the Eighth Army have crossed the Rapido and' Garigliano Rivers, and fierce fighting is now going on in the Gustav Line. A barrage of many hundreds of guns continued to batter the German positions today. The navy supported the Allied attack, turning big guns on the German positions. The correspondent of the Columbia Broadcasting System, at the front says that a very hard enemy counterattack began at dawn today and the Allied troops were driven' back at some points. "It is going to be another battle of endurance," he declares. Troops of the Eighth Army swarmed across the Rapido River on a front of eight miles- between Cassino and1' the Liri. They also drove westwards through the mountains above Cassino and crossed the Gari River. An attack is at present in progress against the entire Gustav Line from the Gulf of Gaeta to the plains below Pescara. The main push appears to be against the defences covering the Via Casilina and the Appian Way,, leading t<> Rome. The British United Press correspondent with the Fifth Army says that fiame-throwers and also every other weapon the Germans can lay their hands on are being used in the effort to stem the new offensive in the Garigliano sector, where Allied troops have already advanced nearly two miles. Since daylight today the Germans have sharply increased their artillery fire, but a comforting feeling is the steady, swelling stream of our own, planes, which are continually smashing the German gunners and other enemy positions. The enemy resistance is fierce, but twelve hours after the beginning of the offensive things were still going exactly according to plan. The offensive may go down in history as a campaign launched from a cemetery. .The most advanced points in the line v/ere situated m a ceme-

the opening of the offensive,, gays: "Many hundreds of/ guns ~ more than were employed at El Alamein opened fire simultaneously, and the whole battlefield quaked as the guns thundered. The concentrated artillery fire was followed by hours of 'softening' fire. Just-before the barrage opened there was an intriguing silence, over a 30-mile ■ stretch of ground that has known no peace for the last six months. When Ihe : guns started everything was blotted out. The barrage was a gigantic fireworks show, with hundreds of flashes lighting the hills and valleys. The Germans' readiness ta offer very stiff opposition was known, but they, hardly; expected an attack on such a broad front." The correspondent of the: Associated ; Press of Great Britain with the American air forces in Italy says- that hundreds of Allied war' planes started sweeping the sky at the crack of dawn and gave record-breaking support to the ground1 forces in the first round of the new offensive. .. With superiority at last in men, and with massive air and artillery support, the Eighth and Fifth Armies have opened what is hoped will be the final assault to smash the defences of the Gustav Line, says Reuters correspondent at advanced headquarters in Italy. Warships in the Gulf of Gaeta pumped broadsides into the German

flank defences, which are anchored among difficult mountains, some rising to 5000 feet, and it was against these that the warships directed their fire. The Fifth Army's barrage gave the Eighth Army an opportunity to move the equipment to the banks gf the Rapido River. The operations were carefully timed, and when the moon rose and the river had been crossed swarms of fighter-bombers of the tactical air force carried out pin-point attacks against the gun positions. Light and medium bombers joined in and pounded the heavily entrenched, wired, and mined Gustav. Line., INFANTRYMAN'S BATTLE. A "Daily Express" correspondent who watched the barrage which opened the offensive draws a comparison, between the Allies "belching heE" and the "twinkle" of the German reply. "This comparison," he says, "is an indica-

tion that for this battle we greatly outnumber the enemy. We have more guns, tanks, and planes, and, most of all, more men. It is the infantryman who will fight this battle. His air colleague in the next few days cannot do much to help him. Even pin-pointed dive-bombing helps little in mountainous country. The Germans are too well dug" in to suffer many personal losses by bombing. The air farces can scarcely hope to bend a single gun, but they can bend man's will and break his heart." ■ ■ .■' ' • "The Mediterranean air forces, before th 6 first shell screamed through the moonlight last night, had been fighting a'battle for a whole month— an all-out' effort. to strangle- Kesselring's supply lines.' The plan was officially. known as an 'operation strangle.' The intention of the whole scheme was to cut off the railway and sea communications to- the German battle fronts*: So successful has been the strangulation that today the Germans as far*north as Florence have not a single through, train to send supplies and to any front. Kesselring's roads are deserted by day, and there is no such thing as a German road convoy—just odd vehicles travelling; at night time. The* Germans at sea have not dared to use anything larger than 300-ton vessels, and even caiques and schooners sail only at night time, hugging the- coast and sheltering in daytime in coves. There is a bridge blown up on every railway route, and every major line is blocked, usually at more points than one. The Germans, therefore, in the -course of the past few weeks of lull, have been able to get through only enough to live on. It now remains to be seen if they have enough to fight on, but whatever' : the air forces have done in .the past month it will not save a single infantryman's life It may take days, perhaps weeks, in the first fierce fighting before the Germans use up their immediate supplies." Other correspondents emphasise that this battle is bound to be a slow, frontal, up-hill fight for many days to come/ and that spectacular results should not be expected. Lieut. General Sir Oliver Leese r commander of the Eighth Army, told correspondents before the attack began that unless a 100 to 1 chance occurred there wonld be heavy lighting and that it would be wrong to expect a quick break-through.