NEARING ENEMY BORDER

Southland Times, Issue 25548, 16 December 1944, Page 5

NEARING ENEMY BORDER

7th Army Continues To Advance (Rec. 10.30 p.m.) LONDON, Dec. 15. The American 7th Army continues to make good progress and at one point is almost up to the German border. The important centre of Karlsruhe is now within range of the American artillery. The American’s latest move seems directed against encircling the whole of the Hagenau Forest, north of Hagenau, says the correspondent at SHAEF of The Exchange Telegraph Agency. The Americans on the western side are sweeping in an eastward curve, while the other forces, who have reached the eastern tip of the forest, are advancing westward. Only seven miles separates the two bodies, which are threatening to trap the Germans in the forest. The latest advances measure to three miles, despite heavy minefields. The enemy’s resistance is described as scattered. MATTSALL TAKEN The Americans north of this sector captured Mattsall, six miles north-east of Reichshoffen and three miles from the German border. The Americans in the Bitsche sector, further west, found some of the Maginot defences flooded, but wherever possible the Germans are manning them against us. JET AIRCRAFT SEEN BY N.Z. PILOTS Extreme Speed Sometimes A Handicap (Special Correspondent, N.Z.P.A.) LONDON, December 14. German jet aircraft, roaming through the night sky like a red ball, have been seen by New Zealand Lancaster bomber pilots during raids on Germany. Flying Officer E. C. Harris, of Waitua, the captain of a crew which has done 24 raids, said: “We have seen three jet aircraft at different times. You can watch them coming miles away because their jet exhaust flares like a rocket. They go at a terrific pace but don’t seem to do much good. If they miss you at the first shot they have no chance of finding you again because they are miles away in a few seconds. “Our best view of one of them was one night when we were returning from a raid and flying at 18,000 feet. Eight thousand feet below we saw a jet fighter silhouetted against a bank of clouds. We watched it for about 10 minutes. It was circling around and did not see us. In fact, it did not appear to find any bombers at all.” ROCKETS MAY CONTINUE UNTIL VICTORY Destruction Of Factories Impossible (Special Correspondent, N.Z.P.A.) LONDON, December 15. Reports from Belgium state that the people of England may expect rockets to fall on them until the end of the war. It is stated that the new rockets are impossible to overcome at their source as they are manufactured in vast underground factories. They are also more mobile and require smaller sites than flying bombs and have been fired from city squares, roadways, and woods. People in the affected areas, therefore, have something of a gambler’s chance of surviving.