BEYOND KUSTRIN

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 63, 15 March 1945, Page 7

BEYOND KUSTRIN

FLOODS HAMPER RUSSIANS Hec. 11 a.m. LONDON, March 14. Floods, are hampering the Russian pursuit of the Germans after the fall of Kustrin, says the British United Press correspondent in Moscow. A vast area west of Kustrin has been deeply flooded by the Oder and its tributaries overflowing their banks and also artificially by the Germans opening the sluices of canals. . The correspondent explains that an ingenious technique used by the Red Army helped to account for the German failure to hold Kustrin. Soviet planes first dropped petrol drums on the' German positions and followed up with incendiaries. The fire which resulted produced an enormous smoke screen, under cover of which ground troops were able to approach the fortress and easily knock out the enemy firing-points. Russian commentators are now openly hinting that the drive through northern Germany is outflanking Berlin. They saythe Red Army's arrival at the immediate approaches of Stettin as a salutary reminder for the German troops in Mecklenburg and the Baltic coast region west of Pomerania. It is pointed out that every/German Baltic port is now within easy range of the Red Air Force, which is bringing up its airfield;? close to the advancing front line. ARMIES ON MOVE. Masses of infantry and artillery, set free by the cleaning up of Pomerania, are streaming to the Oder, their vehicles marked "To Stettin. To Berlin." A "Pravda" correspondent writes: "Never have the fields and forests of Pomerania seen such numbers of tanks and guns, such a great, determined, well-organised army. As in East P.russia, Bx-andenburg, and Poland, this avalanche of troops is meeting thousands of liberated men, women, and children besides columns of German prisoners." The correspondent concluded that the doomed German garrisons of blazing Danzig and Gdynia are increasing their attacks but have not prevented Rokossovsky from gaining more ground over the tangle of canals surrounding the twin ports and entering' more of their suburbs. VITAL STRETCH CLEARED. Reuters Moscow correspondent says that over 100 miles of vital line from Kustrin to the approach to Goerlitz the Germans are digging in and massing troops at high speed. He adds that the Russians are simply massing. A Soviet news agency war commentator reports that the Russians have cleared the eastern bank of the Oder River over nearly 100 miles between Kustrin and Kammin with the exception of the- German bridgehead at Altdamm. He says the Russians, at the southern end of. the, front, are threatening the German communications to northern Italy. 'The German news agency admits that the Russians have captured a town 75 rmiles north of Budapest and 55 miles from the Danube. •■The Exchange Telegraph agency's Moscow correspondent states that the figKting around ..the Lake Balaton region is growing fiercer as the Germans try to find weak spots in the defences. The Russians last week destroyed 570 tanks. South of Budapest, Tolbukhin is hurling back frantic German attempts to reach the Danube. SEVEN ARMIES. The German news agency states that the, Russians are using seven infantry armies supported by many tank forniationsin the new offensive in East Prussia, the focal points of which are north-west of Zfnten and east of Braunsb'erg. The' Germans under the command of General Rendulic are fighting a tough defensive battle. .

' Tonight's Soviet communique states that troops of the Third White Russian Front, south-west of Konigsberg, today engaged in battles for the destruction of the encircled enemy grouping in East Prussia. They captured a number of inhabited places, including Spheral near Braunsberg and Zinten. 1 ; In Hungary, north-east and west of Eafee Balaton, troops repelled attacks Sytanks 'and infantry.