GREAT NEWS FROM RUSSIA

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXIII, Issue 236, 3 September 1943, Page 5

GREAT NEWS FROM RUSSIA

IMPORTANT TOWNS RETAKEN LONDON, Sept. 2. There is more great news from Russia today. It reports the recapture of Sumy (100 miles north of Kharkov), Lisichansk (on the northern side of the Donetz bend) and Voroshilovsk, and more progress west of Kharkov and towards Smolensk, releasing more than 100 places. The Sumy victory was announced in a special Order of the Day, issued by M. Stalin. The gains in the Donetz Basin are bringing nearer the threat to the important town of Stalino, while in the Ukraine the Russians are rapidly approaching Kiev. They are now only 20 miles from the important railway junction of Konotop, half-way between Kursk and Kiev, and have cut the railway from Bryansk at Krolevets, which has brought the Russians to their most westerly point. Konotop is threatened from three sides. The Soviet armies are making two parallel drives on Smolensk, the most important German base in Russia.

Since the Russians took Yelnia (50 miles south-east of Smolensk) they have advanced about 10 miles nearer the big bastion, while the army advancing along the road from Moscow —the road used by Napoleon's army in its great retreat—is about 50 miles from the city. Moscow reports an advance of another three to six miles in this area, where there are signs that the stiff enemy resistance is beginning to crumble. Further south the Russians have made progress along the whole 80 miles of the are running northward from Sumy. On the southern end of the line the Russians, following up their Taganrog victory, are pushing on westwards and are now 25 miles from Mariupol (on the Sea of Azov), the terminus of the railway from Stalino. The Russian progress on the southern flank formed a big bulge in which are large forces of Germans. The Red Army struck at the northern side of this bulge to-day, the result being the recapture of Lisichansk and severak other places, the Russians ending the day 20 miles nearer to Stalino, which is now threatened from the north-east, east, and south-east. .Many of the places retaken wen* given uii by the Russians in the spring, when the Germans launched their counter-attack and halted the Russian offensive and forced them back in some areas, but other places now retaken by the Russians have been in German hands for two years In the Kharkov region and in the area just north of the Sea of Azov the Russians have reached points further west than at any time since they were forced to give them up two years ago. The reappearance lately of the phrase "elastic defence" in Nazi statements about the war in Russia is reported to have caused wide amusement inside the "fortress" of Europe. One report savs that even among Germans the following piece of news is making the rounds: "Hitler has a new secret weapon. He is using it on the Eastern Front. It is a kind of ersatz rubber. It gives when pushed, and doesn't snap back."

Sumv, a town in the "Ukraine, is on the Iscl River, a tributary of_ the Psiol. It is a grain and beet-collecting centre. Its industries include' the making of agricultural machinery, sugar-refining, woollen, cloth and leather manufacture and saw-milling. Its population at the last census was nearly 40,000.