RUSSIAN ADVANCES

Greymouth Evening Star, 22 July 1943, Page 5

RUSSIAN ADVANCES

OREL AND SOUTHERN FRONTS MORE AREAS RETAKEN \ RUGBY, July 21. The Soviet High Command announces a further contraction of the Orel salient. To-day, the Russians advanced three-quarters to seven and a half miles, recovering 40 inhabited places north of Orel, and GO to the east. They also continue to advance south of Orel, and the Byelgorod direction, and have further improved positions south of Izyum, and south-west of Voroshii°T?ie Moscow radio last night said that the Red Army yesterday took several dozen more populated places on the Orel front. The Germans were still bringing in fresh forces and resisting stubbornly. The Germans brought up heavy reinforcements ot men tanks, and aircraft in a despei - ate effort to keep the Orel-Bryansk I’ailwciy open, but oil their countei - attacks were repulsed with heavy losses In the Byelgorod sector the Red Army has now swept away the last gains of the short-lived German offensive when German troops diove a wedge into the Russian positions some time ago. Yesterday Soviet forces broke through and recaptured a belt of territory between six and. seven miles deep. Russian troops on the Orel front on Mondav destroyed or damaged 143 tanks and destroyed 117 enemy aeroplanes.

BRYANSK MENACED

“OREL IN THE BAG”

(Recd. 12.35 p.m.) LONDON, July 21. The Russians are gaining ground and are continuing to hammer the German armies in most of the key sectors on the curving 500 miles front from Mtsensk in the north-east to Orel and to Voroshilovgrad in the Donetz Basin, but the fiercest fighting is still round Orel. The Russians are clearly determined again to trap thousands of Germans and are using familiar princers-like smashes from the north and the south of the objective, which, this time, is the Germans’ escape railways from Oiel to Bryansk. Reuter’s Moscow correspondent says that the Russians besides reaching Ermolaevo, seven miles east ot Orel are also fanning out westwards towards the great German base o Bryansk. The Germans m the Qi el sector are mainly supplied from Bryansk and the Russians are already shelling the supply line. ?he Russian tank column from the nobwest which captured Ihnskoe has made a new advance and is now within five miles of Studenkovo railway station. The Russians at the western end of the gap north-west of Orel now stand only 3d miles east-north-east of Bryansk. The Russians advancing towards the eastern gate of Orel are now 17 miles from the city at Protasova. Reuter s continues that military observers in Moscow consider Orel is practically in the bag” now and that the only question is how many Germans .will be captured and how many will manage to escape through the ever-narrowmg ga To-night’s Russian communique states: Russian forces in the Orel sector, overcoming enemy resistance, continued the offensive advanced three to eleven miles. Noi th of Orel, the Russians occupied over forty inhabited localities, including a district centre and two railway localities. South of Orel, Red Army troops continued to advance in face of stiff resistance, as they did in the Byel gorod sector. Russians alter local engagements considerably impioved their positions in the Donetz Basin, south of Isyum, also south-west ol Voroshilovgrad. Reuter says the most bitter fighting of the whole front is still in the Orel sector, where the Germans are powerfully defending the railway leading to Bryansk. The Germans on the whole length ol the road and lailway between the two cities, have a series of especially good airfields with concrete runways, Irom which trie Luftwaffe is constantly going into ac--10“ The Times’s” Stockholm .correspondent says: The railway and also a good parallel road, immediate y south oi the railway, are the sole routes for a German escape from the Orel picket. It is now probably too late for the Germans to run the gauntlet, which perhaps is why there is no indication they intend to do anything but stand and light an already hopeless battle to the finish. German troops which were intended to be sent to Sicily, have been thrown into the fighting on the Russian front in the effort to stop the Russians from completing the encirclement of the German forces in the Orel area. The British United Press Moscow correspondent says: It has been established from prisoners taken from one German division that a number ot fresh divisions were thrown _in against the northern arm of the giant Russian pincer around Orel. Fresh divisions are still being sent .up to the front. The Red Army took the Germans by surprise when they stormed into the fortress oi Mtsensk. The German garrison suffered heavy losses as they tried to extricate themselves from what had become a death trap. The Russians, according to Red Star had already infiltrated, through the German lines, and almost, surrounded the town before the artillerybarrage preceding the final attack was laid down on the Mtsensk defences. The Russians were so auick that the Germans had no time to blow up bridges over the river Susha, which curls around the western side of Mtsensk.