DANUBE BEND

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25804, 27 March 1945, Page 5

DANUBE BEND

SOVIET ARMIES GREAT OFFENSIVE ADVANCE ON AUSTRIA (Rec. 1 a.m.) LONDON, Mar. 26. Two great Russian armies, with the Vertes Mountains and Bakony Forest behind them, are fighting south of the great Danube bend between Budapest and Bratislava, reports an agency correspondent in Moscow. The sustained Russian pressure in the direction of the Austrian border, from which they are le«s than 35 miles, is taken as an indication that an attack against Vienna is near. The German army, severely mauled in Marshals Tolbukhin’s and Malinovsky’s offensives, has now fallen back on defence of the triangle formed by Gyor. Sopron, and Szombathely, which is cut up by swollen streams. The Red Army, advancing on a 50mile front, met stiff resistance from powerful German reserve units which were sent forward in an effort to hold the Russian break-through. Fierce clashes are developing east of the Gyor-Graz railway. Marshal Tolbukhin’s thrust at present is the most menacing to the frontier. His movement . against Gyor threatens to pin the Germans against the Danube bank in the face of Marshal Malinovsky’s forces unless they fall back in headlong retreat. The British United Press correspondent expresses the opinion that the crumbling of the entire German front can be expected in the . next few days. Marshal Koniev’s offensive front in Silesia is now well over 100 miles in length. General Petrov on his eastern flank is increasing the threat to the Moravian gap. The Russians in the north are squeezing out the last Germans from isolated strongpoints on the coast. On a 70-mile Front Marshal Stalin, in an order of the day, addressed to Marshal Malinovsky, says the Russians launched a new offensive and broke the German defences west of Budapest. They captured more than 200 towns, including Eztergom, Felosgaliia and Tata. Attacking on a 70-mile front. Marshal Tolbukhin’s armies to-night are within artillery range of Gyor, which is only 27 miles from the Austrian frontier, states Reuter’s Moscow correspondent. He added that what may prove to be thrusts to destroy the Wehrmacht in the east are now rapidly taking shape as more and more sectors of the Russian-German front flare up. Vienna is the goal of the Soviet pincers in the south, which are now beginning to close. With Marshal Tolbukhin’s tanks

sweeping through Western Hungary and Marshal Koniev’s stormtroops heavily levering German flanking positions guarding the Moravian Gap, the threat to Germany’s great southern arsenal quickens every hour. The battle, which is moving towards the Austrian border, has its most sensitive point near the Bratislava Gap. It is still a large-scale encounter between vast armoured and infantry forces paralleled by air battles over a broad area stretching at least 30 miles before the advancing Red Army. South of Gyor . the Hungarian railway junction of Papa which the Americans recently heavily bombed from Italy is now menaced by Soviet columns converging from the east and south-east. Enemy units east of Gyor .face the prospect of being pinned against the southern bank of the Danube and cut off. Speed of Offensive The speed with which Marshal Tolbukhin was able to switch to the offensive is explained by the fact that the Russians kept operational reserves intact throughout the battles in Western Hungary. Even planes were held back for the decisive moment. Prisoners say that thousands of members of the Lutfwaffe are being turned into infantrymen while their planes are idle for lack of fuel. The British United Press correspondent in Moscow says that apart from neutralising Komarno, Marshal Toibukhin’s immediate objective seems to be Gyor, on which many roads converge.

The Associated Press correspondent states that it is estimated in Moscow that German losses in the three weeks’ struggle for the gateway to Austria were 96,000 killed or taken prisoner. Fourteen hundred tanks and self-pro-pelled guns were destroyed.

Moscow correspondents report that the Red Army is tearing along the east bank of the Danube, less than 55 miles from Bratislava, and 80 miles from Vienna.

The converging drives of Marshal Tolbukhin, Marshal Malinovsky, and General Petrov not only threaten Hitler's last arsenals in Austria and Czechoslovakia, but constitute the preliminary round of the battle for South, ern Germany. Red Star says the successful development of the Red Army’s southern offensive seriously threatens the German groupings in Italy and Jugoslavia. Marshal Stalin, in a second order of the day addressed to Marshal Vassilevsky, said troops of the White Russian front, continuing their offensive today, captured Heilgenbeil. the last German defence point on the Frischeshaff coast south-west of Koenigsberg.