BIG SUCCESSES

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXV, Issue 84, 8 March 1945, Page 5

BIG SUCCESSES

"MOVING ON BERLIN."

NEW OFFENSIVE OPENS

(N.Z. Press Association.—Copyright.) (liec. 12.10 p.m.) LONDON, Mar. 7. Today has been another day of big Russian successes. Marshal Stalin has' announced important captures on tliiee fronts and German sources report that the Red Army has launched an offensive on the "Berlin front".

Marshal Stalin, in his first Order of the Day to Marsnal Malinovsky, states that troops of the Second Ukrainian Command, overcoming resistance under difficult conditions and in the wooded, mountainous country of the Carpathians, occupied in Czechoslovak territory the town of Bauska-Stiavnika, a powerful defence point in the German defences.

The second Order of the Day, addressed to Marshal Rokossovsky, says that Starqgard and Gniew have been captured. A Third Order of the Day, addressed to Marshal Zhukov, reports that Gollnow and Massow have been captured, also Stepenitz, which is on the Stettin. Lagoon. A Berlin military spokesman said that the Russians in the past 24 hours launched a large-scale attack on the Berlin front after an extremely heavy artillery bombardment. He added that the Russians, as a first step, are trying to capture springboards on the west bank of the Oder for a' bigger operation, also to prise out Kustrin from the German defence .system. A Soviet front-line reporter, after announcing that the Red Army had broken into the. German defences on the west side of an undisclosed river, added: "Our troops arc now moving oji Berlin."

Reuter's Moscow correspondent, in cabling this news tonight, said that observers there attached great significance to this dispatch and added that fierce battles are beginning to take shape on all roads leading to Berlin.

Russian sources also said that after the Red Army had stormed an undisclosed river mobile formations penetrated deeply into the enemy rear and seized an important read knot on the west bank.

Russian guns are moving up to command Stettin and the seaward approaches; said an earlier message. The

time for the storming of the city is fast approaching. Reuter's Moscow correspondent says the port is already virtually cut off from the sea and the great shipyards and conveyorbelt submarine assembly plants are directly threatened. A powerful armoured ring is being drawn around the port which is overcast? with smoke after the heavy Russian;' air pounding. Red Army spearheads are on the eastern shore of the lagoon connecting the seaway and the Oder Estuary.

The British United Press correspondent says Red Army troops are clearing up Kammin, little over 40 miles from Peenemunde, the Germans' Vweapon base. It was believed the Germans would hotly contest the advance westward since it would threaten not only Peenemunde, but also Swinemunde, which is a naval station where important experiments are reported as being conducted.