INITIATIVE LOST

Grey River Argus, 16 July 1943, Page 5

INITIATIVE LOST

BY THE GERMANS On Kursk Salient [Aust. &. N.Z. Cable Assn.) (Rec. 7.40) LONDON, July 15. Russian planes on Tuesday night heavily bombed a railway junction at Orel, high explosives and incendiaries being dropped on concentrations of enemy trains and ammunition dumps. Many: fires were started. 'They merged into a huge fire which enveloped the whole central part of the junction. Several big explosions were seen. All the Russian planes returned, Moscow reports a heavy Russian counter-attack in the Byelgorod area. Tank reinforcements have been used and the Germans have been thrown back from a number of their forward positions in the wedge they had driven into the Russian lines

The Germans have stated that their attacks have been stopped by heavy rain. The Germans also speak of Russian attacks east and north of Orel, and admit breaches of their defences, but there is no news from Moscow of this. Reuter’s Moscow correspondent states that the Byelgorod battle raged furiously to-day. The interlocked armies swaged to and fro. Places changed hands frequently. Hitler is estimated to have thrown one million. mem 2500 planes and four thousand tanks, into the battle for the Kursk salient.

A Russian military spokesman declared that the Russians were gradually getting the upper hand in the Byelgorod area. The Red Army is sending in substantial tank reinforcements, and constantly attacking the heavily fortified flank positions against German wedges. These attacks are increasing in frequency and reduced the pressure the Germans were able to exert at the tips of the wedges. The British United Press Moscow correspondent declared that the Russians wrested the initiative from the Germans, and appeal- to be on the way to forcing a decision along the whole 165 miles front between Orel and Byelgorod,

Commentators here draw attention to the fact that it is becoming clear that the Germans are suffering a very severe reverse in their assault against the Orel-Kursk bulge, against which they threw the heaviest armed strength employed in any battle. Commentators suggest the general public, in justifiable admiration for the Allied feats of arms in Sicily perhaps to do realise the significance of what is happening in Russia. “The Times’s” Stockholm correspondent points out that while losses in men and materials were heavy on both sides, the important fact is that the German enterprise failed and it is the first failure of any German Summer offensive in Europe. The Germans did not succeed in breaking into the Russian positions or removing the great Kursk bulge, which remains as inconvenient and as dangerous as previously. "The Times” continues: Information from Moscow and Berlin cleany indicate the finish of the first German aggressive stage of the battle. However,- desperate fighting continues in the Byelgorod area; tank battles here continue on a vast scale, with the Germans vainly seeking to hammer a deeper dent in the Russian defences. Latest Berlin . news agency reports state that the tank battle surpasses in violence and extent anything hitherto known.