OVER A MILLION

Grey River Argus, 4 May 1944, Page 5

OVER A MILLION

GERMAN FORCES To Counter Invasion [Aust. & N.Z. Press Assn.] (Rec. 6.30) LONDON, May 3. The “Daily Telegraph’s” Stockholm correspondent in what he claims to be : “the first uncensored account £>i how Germany is armed for her last struggle;,” states; (The enemy s maximum strength against in the west is 1,100,000 men. There are one hundred divisions to-day guarding the Atlantic seaboard, one of Germany’s three hundred optative divisions. A modern Gel ’"a Arm v division at full strength to eleven thousand effectives, so that. * enemy’s strength in the MeSi, s at eleven hundred thousand men. T. • is a formidable army. It was up only, at the cost of big sa £™ e r in the East, which may grow bigger The correspondent P rOc t eds was a dramatic decision by Maisha Von Rommel the anti-mvasion cnief to switch fifty crack divisions from Rus. sin to meet the threatened Allied as Suit This I.S left little more than one million seven hundred and fif/ thousand men to stem the spring tide of a Red Army advance. There are nine German divisions idle under General Dietl in northern ■ Finland. The remainder are grouped, and aie wa? weary, on the Mediterranean C °“The defences of the Atlantic lyall from North Cape, in Norway, to the Pyrenees in Spain, are divided into coastal zones of defence. There are two zones each in France and in Norway; while Belgium, Holland and North-west Germany are each separate commands. France is an armed camp, with fifty-two of Germany’s finest divisions. Fourteen more German divisions man Belgium’s defences. Eight divisions are considered sufficient to hold Holland’s flooded lowlands. There are six divisions in Denmark, eight divisions in Norway, ten divisions inside of the borders of the Reich. Germany’s air support in Norwav is under one hundred planes, the bulk of which are reconnaissance machines. The Luftwaffe experts claim that, by a process of shifting planes all along their line from, the Mediterranean northwards, they could have a powerful air force in action in Norway within two days of an invasion there. The Nazi ” commander, General Christiannsen who is in luxurious headquarters in a Dutch country house is confident that his “.sandwich” system of fortifications will defy invasion. This system includes flooding as well as other fortifications.

Belgium offers the same problem as France. What will happen there no man can tell.

A report from Stockholm said: “The Germans in France are setting out ruthlessly to empty Northern France of every' man, and woman who might aid the Allies when an invasion begins. Hitler’s personal friend, Fepp Dietrich, the highest ranking general of the notorious Black Guard Unit of the Nazi Army, has taken over command of the threatened .sectors of the Atlantic Wall in France. The Germans are speeding up the evacuation .of the Belgian coast. Inhabitants of Blankenbergh, Knocke and Zoute, seaside resorts near the border of Belgium and Holland have been ordered to move.

Anti-invasion precautions have also been taken in Germany. Foreign workers are forbidden to travel by -ail unless thev obtain special permits and all citizens over fifteen years nust carry identity papers, giving proof of their home and employment addresses.

Poles Trouble Germans ARMED FARMS SET UP AS , PROTECTION, INDUSTRY TO GERMANY DECENTRALISED. (Rec. 11.35.) LONDON, Mav 3. , “The Times’s” Stockholm correspondent describes what he terms the German efforts to strengthen their ‘‘east wall,” and to hold off Red Armies while they meet an Allied in, vasion in the West. He says: “The potentialities of the disciplined underground Polish forces, and also a general uncertainty about Hungary, Roumania and Czechoslovakia are unquestionably affecting German nerves and are nroducing anticipatory measures reflecting an inner knowledge qf an impending defeat. The Germans ;;re creating a deep and elaborate system of armed villages along the jlusso-Polish frontier, while rifle and pistol training have become compulsory for adult and adolescent males throughout Germany. The Germons choose the staunch and pugnacious peasant wlic is willing to fight to the death foi his own land. They give him a farm, presumably after evicting or liquidating the owner. Then thev arm and train him. They first established armed farms at intervals. Then they set un a long line of armed farms, which are rapidly becoming a solid area of armed villages, witn an obligation to defend their own property, and to keep the German supply arteries open and the region free from partisans. The correspondent says there is in- • creased decentralisation of German industry as a remedv against the Allied bombing offensive. The correspondent says: “Wherever possible. German factories are being transferred from crippled cities to remote places, where bombing is not expected. There is also a movement to take the factories to the workers, involving, wherever possible, the installing , of machinery in homes and the collecting of the finished parts for delivery to the assembly centre. Nothing is yet known about how these systems work in practice. According to. latest reports the problem of synthetic oil production in the Ruhr has been solved. This was done by laying subterranean pipelines, conveying coal gas from the pits to distant and dispersed equipment for treatment.