STOP PRESS

Evening Star, Issue 24003, 30 September 1941, Page 12

STOP PRESS

ATTACK ON CRIMEA. LONDON, September 29.—There is no further information supporting the earlier report that a German onslaught .against Kharkov had already begun, but brisk engagements occurred at various points, in which tho Russians wore often tile attackers. The Berlin radio admitted that the Russians <n:l the southern front launched attacks “ with numerically greater superior forces," which were ■ repulsed after fierce tank encounters. The sudden slowing down of the German advance in the Rkraiim may merely mean that the most advanced troops have been cheeked, and that the German High Command is making the customary preparations for a further battering ram push in great force. The ‘ Daily Telegraph’s ’ Stockholm ccrrespondent says the attack against the Crimea took on tremendous dimensions, when early to-day panzer brigades launched a new mass attack from the village of Kalanehak against the defences of the I’erekop Isthmus. Von Rnndstedt has concentrated 12 full divisions, or nearly 250,000 men, on this front. Stukas and Hcinkels are raiding Russian positions and lines of communication without a stop, hut the defenders’ organisation and morale are unshaken. The Germans’ frontal attacks during the past five days have all been costly, spectacular failures. The ‘ Daily Telegraph ’ adds that it is believed in Stockholm that the Germans intend to launch a gigantic air-borne invasion of the Crimea. According to information received in Russian circles in Stockholm, four regular “ wehrmncht ” divisions are standing by in Rumania in readiness for invasion of the Crimea, while shock spearhead forces, consisting of three special pnratroop divisions, with 7,000 men in each, and two picked S.S. divisions arc assembled in the Bulgarian airfields at Varna and Burgas, also at Ruse. The Russians also report tho arrival of 1,000 Junkers transport planes at those airfields, also the arrival of paratroops at Constanta, Tnleea, and 'Silistra.