Troops At Arnhem

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 75, 26 September 1944, Page 5

Troops At Arnhem

SUPPLY LINE CUT AND REOPENED

LONDON, September 25. The situation of the British airborne troops on the north bank of the Dutch Rhine around Arnhem gave cause for anxiety last night, because their vital supply line through Eindhoven to Nijmegen was cut by the enemy. Picked S.S. troops, rebforeed by tanks, last night launched a strong attack against the supply road midway ■between the two towns, and by dawn they had cut the road and occupied a stretch about five miles long. British tanks then began strong counter-attacks in an attempt to restore the situation, and the latest reports by correspondents at Supreme Headquarters state that the German tank and infantry forces have been driven off and that supplies and troops can now use the supply route again.

■':'- There has been a renewal of heavyfighting along the canal from Antwerp. Yesterday the Germans fell tack to the canal, hotly pursued by troops of the Canadian First Army, but today they are showing signs of attacking along the canal line.

Canadian troops have begun an allout assault on Calais. This morning 300 R.A.F. bombers dropped nearly 1300 tons of bombs on the port's defences, and then tanks and Canadian infantry.got to work. The bombing began in a ground mist. It was so thick .that some of the bombers had to come away with their bombs still in their racks; but then the mist cleared and the full-scale bombing got under : way. There was no question of its'being indiscriminate. The target was the defences outside the town, and as the bombs went down huge clouds of.smoke and dust rolled over the countryside. Wave after wave of bombers, mostly Halifaxes, circled over the target, splitting its massive defences. They were directed by a master bomber, and the British and .German lines were so near that it was part of his job to see that the Allied planes did not bomb their own men.. A correspondent says that the Germans had had time to strengthen the landward defences of the port, and knew that if they were attacked from inland the best approach would be along the coast road from the west. They.,.had considerable artillery, pill boxes, barbed-wire barriers, and thousands of anti-tank guns. The moment the last bomb exploded flail tanks moved in from the south-west and beat two paths through the minefields. Then came assault troops, using flamethrowing Churchills and other armour. The tanks went so quickly that the infantry could hardly keep up with them. When they did eventually reach the outer defences they found dejected Germans sitting about on the ground. They had tried to surrender to the flails, but the men in the tanks had no time to take prisoners; so the Germans had to wait until the infantry came along;

.Two hours after the attack began an officer said it seemed to be going extremely well. The first strong-point to fall was about four miles south-west of Galais. In their advance our men stormed several of the emplacements the Germans had used for their big cross-channel guns.

paratroops, but the enemy opposition weakened after this, and it became a triumphant march to the river. "Some parts of the river bank were too steep for the ducks, but the Poles produced home-made rafts, with which they reinforced the hard-pressed British airborne forces. The ducks operated across the river at the first light yesterday morning. A staff officer said: "The whole thing was .brilliant in conception and execution, especially in view of the troops' long, tireless race.' "British infantry last night and this morning ferried food and other supplies to the airborne forces across the Neder Rhine. The relief came just in time, because the airborne forces were holding on by sheer courage."