NAZIS REPELLED

New Zealand Herald, Volume 80, Issue 24540, 24 March 1943, Page 3

NAZIS REPELLED

BRIANSK FIGHTING RUSSIAN SUCCESSES PROGRESS TO SMOLENSK LONDON. March 23 Russian artillery and infantry on the central front have thrown back enemy attacks in the area north of Briansk. The German initiative hero has proved expensive. In three days' fighting they lost more than 5000 men killed. Farther north the Russians are pushing steadily along the road from Viazma, and advanced forces are now about 20 miles from Yartsevo, the big outpost of Smolensk. The Berlin radio saya the centres of gravity on the Russian front have shifted to south-west of Viazma, south of Lake Ladoga, and south-east of Leningrad. It is in these regions where the Russians aro still pushing on, even when slowed up by terrain consisting of swampy, wooded plains intersected by rivers which are unfavourable for the deployment of big forces. The British United Press says the German attack in the Sliisdra area, north of Briansk, is aimed at" checking

the Russian columns advancing toward Briansk from the north. The Russians continue to drive toward Srnolonsk from the north and east. Their spearheads at present are 50 miles apart. Drawing attention to German references to important fighting in the vicinity of Ijcningrad, Sclilussclburg and the Finnish Gulf, the Stockholm correspondent of the Times recalls the German failure last year to take Oranienbaum, which is beleaguered by land, but the sea communications of which are open to Leningrad. He says the Germans expect the Russians to make a strong effort to press from Leningrad along the coast, with the object of freeing a passage for the Baltic Fleet from Kronstadt, and also to co-operate in the Lake 11 men operations. If both drives were pressed homo to the north of Lake Peipus, they would entrap the Germans north of Lake Ilmen. Experts in Berlin are. not certain whether the Russian activity at Leningrad is part of this operation or a preliminary probing to improve the position for a real summer offensive. Marshal Timoshenko's drive south of Lake Ilmen, in spite of its weight, is regarded as a preliminary, rather than a major operation. One of the most important features is that the Russians are preparing for large-scale summer offensives which the Germans hitherto have regarded as their own .monopoly. German anxiety is betrayed by the elaborate defences they are building far behind the lines in the Baltic States and White Russia, indicating that the Germans envisage a possible retreat. CLEARING THE CAUCASUS LONDON, March 22 General Maslennikov's army in the Caucasus, in spite of mud, has resumed its attempt to drive the Germans across the Kerch Strait to the Crimea. The Germans have thrown in many planes. The Russians are steadily bombing communications between the Kuban pocket and the Crimea.

U-BOAT ATTACKS INCREASING ACTIVITY (Rccd. 7.10 p.m.) NEW YORK, March 22 While March has been a bad month for Allied ship sinkings in the Atlantic, it is expected that U-boat attacks in April will become even fiercer and more concentrated. Mr. Elmer Davis, director of the Office of War Information, made this statement to a conference of United Nations' correspondents. Mr. Davis added that by. contrast Japanese submarines were relatively impotent. They only occasionally attacked shipping routes and had made no serious attempt to disrupt communications between America and the South Pacific.