STRONG ATTACK

New Zealand Herald, Volume 81, Issue 25056, 21 November 1944, Page 5

STRONG ATTACK

[TANKS SEVER RAILWAY FORTRESSES_OF BELFORT , OUTER RING CAPTURED (Becd. 6.30 p.m.) LONDON, Nov. 20 "The French First Army, supported exclusively by the French Air Force, has been attacking in the past three days on a front of over 60 miles, stretching from Dieuze to the Swiss border," stated General de Gaulle in a broadcast. "The enemy is bending under our blows. We have already taken nearly 10,000 prisoners." The British United Press correspondent with the French First Army says the French troops are now within 18 miles o! tho Rhine. According to the Swiss radio French tanks irWch outflanked Belfort have cut the Mulhouse railway. The radio bbxs that street fighting is going on in Belfort. The large fortress town of Belfort is being more seriously threatened every hour, said the British official wireless earlier, but as yet there have been no reports of the guns of the fortress interfering with the French progress. There are 17 fortresses of varying sizes, aast of them within an arc due east to due south of the city. _A position teems to be arising here similar to that it Metz, where most of _ the forttea defences have been eliminated and jo decent escape road from the city ki been left. ■ The German garrison in Belfort may Ifflng on for a time, as it is still not entirely cut off, says a later message. However, the French attack is closing on the town across the ridges and rolling hills of the gap, and one of the Mter rings of fort 3 has been taken by French troops only a few miles from the town itself. There are still many Germans here fighting hard; but the French have 'forced the historic gap between the iJura Mountains and the Vosges, and they are on the way to turning the .whole Yosges line. ; In their drive through the gap the French troops captured a company of Germans all of whom were deaf and flnmb. They had been conscripted in a libour battalion and then sent to the front. •)! _______________