SLOGGING FORWARD

Evening Star, Issue 25324, 4 November 1944, Page 7

SLOGGING FORWARD

ALLIED TROOPS IN ITALY FIERCE FIGHTING IN PROGRESS FOR FORLI AIRFIELD (Bee. 11.5 a.m.) LONDON, Nov. 3. British infantry and armour,- despite bad weather, slogged forward nearly one mile to contain Forli airfield on two sides, says Renter's correspondent at Allied headquarters in Italy. The Germans are desperately defending the airfield at tho north-west and north-east corners. They are using Tiger tanks to defend tho aerodrome, for which fighting is raging in violent thunderstorms. Only a cana separates the opposing forces. Tho German tanks are firing at point-blank range, supporting' the infantry. Eighth Army troops three miles south of Forli are enlarging their bridgehead across the Ronco River, and have captured the village of Grisignano, on the east bank of tho Rabin River, The German? aro established on heights west of the Rabbi River. The British United Press correspondent says the Germans before Ravenna and Bologna outnumber the Allied forces, but that would not matter if tho weather and the terrain were not against tho Allies, because wo outnumber the enemy in tanks and guns. The mountain slopes are not only sodden, thereby bogging down the Allies' tanks, but are covered with heavy fogs. Tho Exchange Telegraph's Rome correspondent reports that a thunderstorm, with torrential rain, raged for seven hours yesterday, with disastrous effects on roads and .bridges. Even the main road between Rome and Siena was temporarily impassable.