Isolated Groups Still Holding Out

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 111, 12 May 1945, Page 7

Isolated Groups Still Holding Out

MOPPING UP BY SOVIET FORCES

(By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright.) Bee. 11a.m. LONDON, May 11. Embittered fighting is going on between Russians and Germans in some isolated sectors in Bohemia, says the Moscow correspondent of the Associated Press of Great Britain. The Russians have thrown in new armour and motor-cycle faoops, directed, by Stormoviks, to smash the last groups of Nazi fanatics who have broken the surrender terms. Mopping up continues from the Baltic, to the Alps. More than 200,000 prisoners have been taken in the past 24 hours.

Thousands of panic-stricken German troops striving to reach a point beyond the Russian lines delayed the British Bth Army on its way to link up with the Red Army in Austria, gays a correspondent of the Associated Press. Two of the Red Army's toughest tank commanders, Colonel-General Leliushenko, a hero of Moscow, Stalingrad, and Berlin, and Colonel-Gene-ral Tybalko, a veteran of Voronezh and the Silesian break-throiigh, have been, sent by the Russian High Command to settle stiff and scattered opposition which is still being put up by the Germans resisting in Czechoslovakia and parts of Austria, says the Moscow correspondent of the Associated Press of Great Britain. 'Red Army tanks, backed.up by planes, are spreading out in a wide arc, with Prague in the centre, storming dozens bf towns, taking thousands of prisoners, and killing many breakers of the surrender terms. ' The Germans have no line or front, but they possess several hundred tanks well supplied with ammunition, and are giving considerable trouble. The Sofia correspondent of the Associated Press of Great Britain says that despite the formal announcement of the cessation of hostilities along the Bulgarian front, some German units are violating the capitulation, order and continuing resistance., Bulgarian troops consequently have renewed their operations, and, advancing westward, have taken the major city of Slovakia, Maribor. Prague radio said that General Koniev, commander of the Red Army forces which liberated Prague on May 11, has arrived in the city. He was cheered by large crowds. Field-Marshal Busch broadcast an announcement over Flensburg radio "on the instructions of the Grand Admiral and the British occupation authorities, I have taken over the command in Schleswig Holstein and in the area Occupied by Field-Marshal Montgomery. My task is to maintain order and discipline and assure the supply of the army and civilian population in all spheres of public life." He added ,that he had full military and civil powers. - LINK-UP IN THE SOUTH. The wreckage of the German army which fought the Balkan campaign litters mile after mile of the twisting mountain road. Columns of soldiers, some barefoot, wind endlessly over the hills. They delayed the Sth Army so long that the link-up did not take place at Graz as planned. Russians had already reached Voitsberg, west of Graz, when they met the British. The Russians in the town were friendly and curious, but heavily armed and alert. They placed a pole across the road before their lines and prevented anyone entering, including the British. They were in the town only a few hours when the British arrived, but invited the officers to breakfast, at which there was a Russian band and a succession of courses. - ' , The German General Blumentritt sent iri an operational report to FieldMarshal Montgomery's. headquarters today, saying: "My troops are satisfactorily, continuing the task of clearing the forest north of Hamburg. They are overcoming resistance by the SS troops who are holding out in defiance ,of the armistice." Lublin radio, in announcing plans for the Polish occupation of German territory, said that the first thousand officials will shortly be leaving Lodz for Frankfurt-on-Oder. "Frankfurt suffered extremely little damage," it said. "This commercial city awaits Polish pioneers." The United States War Department, in announcing plans for the American share in the occupation of Germany, said that the American military government will contain a special intelligence section to detect and ruthlessly suppress any Nazi underground activities.

The War Department did not define the American occupation area, but said , that tiie American Government unit will be divided into 12 major divisions, corresponding generally to Ministries of the German central Government.