ABOUT TO BEGIN

Evening Star, Issue 25169, 8 May 1944, Page 3

ABOUT TO BEGIN

BIG RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE _ MESSAGE TO RED ARMY LONDON, May 6. " The Red army is on the eve of a great-scale offensive which will lead to final victory. Go forward quickly. Let nothing stop you. Give the enemy no respite." The message was broadcast over the Moscow radio on behalf of the Rusisan Command by Colonelgeneral Smetanov on the eve of battle orders to all units of the great new Russian armies massed along the eastern front. He added: " We will have to cross the Soviet State frontiers and destroy the wounded Nazi beast in his own lair." A similar call was issued to the Red air force and the Red fleet. " The long-awaited Soviet assault against Sebastopol has begun," declares the German News Agency. " The Russians are using great masses of heavy arms. They opened the assault with a very powerful drumfire artillery barrage,'and simultaneously strong battle plane formations rained bombs on our defence positions. Then Russian tanks, screening strong infantry formations, went into action."

SOVIET CIVILIANS GERMANS KILL TWO MILLION (Rec. 10.20 a.m.) RUGBY, May 7. A Moscow message says that over 2,000,000 Soviet civilians have been killed by the Germans, according to a provisional estimate made yesterday.