ON THE EASTERN FRONT

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 63, Issue 4462, 11 August 1941, Page 5

ON THE EASTERN FRONT

RUSSIAN STRATEGY STAYS NAZI ADVANCE.

SOVIET DEPENDS ON DEFENCE IN DEPTH

(By the Military Correspondent of the Sydney Morning Herald.)

SYDNEY, 28th July. The Germans have not made much progress in the fifth week of their attack on Russia. While gains have been recorded at various isolated points, the general position remains as it was a week ago, and the Germans are still as far from achieving the occupation of Leningrad, Moscow, and Kiev as they were when they boasted on 12th July that the last obstacles had been removed. In the north the threat to Leningrad which appeared to be emerging early last week has not been advaneedL The pincer -arms that wer to develop on each side of Lake Peipus remain merely potential. In spite of continued fighting the Germans still seem to be held up on the Pskov-Porkhov line to the south while the northern drive through the Narva bottle-neck must hdve been stillborn, for even the Germans now admit that they have not cleared the Russians out of northern Estonia. To the north of Leningrad the Germans have not cut off Murmansk or reached the White Sea, and their claims to have advanced on each side of Lake Ladoga have not been confirmed. On the other hand, it is clear that the naval base.at Hanko is still holding uut. although surrounded on land, and the Red Air Force has bombed Helsinki and other Finnish towns. The Russians are still using the Gulf of Finland as a base from which to attack sea-borne enemy convoys. On the main eastern front, while some advance panzer units may have swept through or past Smolensk the city itself remains in Russian hands. The repeated references to infantry fighting, however justify the conclusion that the Germans have been :naking feverish efforts to consolidate the position behind their advanced mechanised formations, and they have probablv formed a deep salient in this region. A VITAL SECTOR. But such a gain may be transformed into a dangerous liability, and the Russians appear fully aware ot this possibility. Earlier in the week they counter-attacked south-west of Smolensk, and the marked German silence regarding this sector suggests that this move may have strengthened the Russian position on the Dnieper and in the direction of Bobruisk. References to strong pockets of Russian troops near Minsk justify the supposition that, if this southwestern counter-attack can be maintained, the German salient nearer Smolensk may be dangerously threatened. The Russians themselves claim to have smashed three German infantry divisions in the latter part of the week, and the Germans admit further counter-attacks on their flanks “ west and south-west ” of Vyassma. German military commentators confess that gigantic “ battles within battles ” are taking place.

There is no news from the vast area directly east of the Pripet Marshes, and it is the possibility of sudden Nazi sweeps south-easterly across these provinces from the main Smolensk front that makes the surrounding of the Smolensk salient so important. If the present series of battles on the Moscow road should allow the Germans to sweep round towards Kiev, the position in the Ukraine would be rapidly changed. As matters stand at the present time, however, the German claims of a fortnight to be “ within sight of Kiev ” are still as far from realisation as ever. There is nothing to show that they are any closer to Kiev than Zhitomir, and the withdrawal earlier this week from Novograd Volynsk to Zhitomir was tactically wise if any danger existed of advances further south. UKRAINE HELD. During the week the Germans have put out absurd statements that they were near the Dnieper to the south of Kiev the inference being that they had driven across from Bessarabia, but the latest Rumanian communiques tell of completing the occupation of Bessarabia itself, and do not even mention any connected crossing of the Dniester, let alone the Dnieper The plain truth is that, even in the Zhitomir sector, the Germans are still on the very fringes of the Ukraine, and their failure to have made any

ieal progress in the last five weeks has practically destroyed all their hopes to secure the crops because thi' breathing-space has given the Russians time to garner or, destroy them. Because something like a stalemate had emerged at so many points of this 1800-mile-long war zone, the Germans have turned increasinp-lv to th c air. Moscow has been raided for five successive nights, and Leningrad has been attacked twelve times in a week; but the raids have not met with any gi-eat success, and it is significant that the Germans do not risk daylight attacks. One of the advantages of the extreme depth system which the Russians are using on land is that German air bases must be kept very far back, and this makes the bombing of the key cities more difficult and militates aaginst the employment of fighter aeroplanes. Even in the actual fighting- the Germans seem no nearer than before to that complete air mastery which they claimed over a month ago, and the Red Air Force seems particularly active in harrying German communications and in attacking Finland and Rumania. DEFENCE IN DEPTH. Viewed as a whole, the struggle undoubtedly presents a novel development in the historv of war. For the first time the world is witnessing a real use of the tactics of defence-in depth, and German commentators complain that battles are taking place on “ an unbelievably vast battle area,' with fighting hundreds of miles behind advance units. The Germans may be east of .Smlolensk, but they are also fighting west of Minsk. German mobile methods were very effective in countries where the issue wa~ decided before the original panzer penetration lost i'ts momentum, and especially where there was no room for a defensive depth strategy; bui the vast distances in Russia have allowed a genuine defence-in-depth in ter,ms of hundreds rather than of scores of miles, while the Russian strength in war materials has made possible large-scale counter-attacks. fcere are twio vast forces, strongly equipped for mechanised mobile warfare, employing panzer tactics simultaneouslv in a single huge area. Sufficient time has now elapsed for the Russians to counteract the initial advantages which the Germans gained by a surprise attack; and now it is the Germans, rather than the Russians, who are experiencing supply difficulties, communication obstacles, and problems of replacing men and machines. The Germjans must either periodicals pause to consolidate, or must put up with increasingly tenuous communications, while the Russians have the advantage of everstronger bases further back. That is why a very real strategical entity can be discovered on the Russian side beyond what may appear at first sight to be a tactically chaotic position on a front 1800 miles long. THE GERMAN GAMjBLE.

The Germans gambled on the supposition that Russian organisation was brittle enough to snap before surprised mechanised penetrations; but the Russians have planned a viscous organisation which would spread around any invaders and would give the defenders further back time to bring the gigantic Red military machine to its full efficiency. As far as we can gauge at present, the five weeks of resistance in. the outer parts of the occupied provinces, White Russia, and the Ukraine, have justified the Russian concept, the result being that Germany will find her task increasing in severity instead of diminishing, as the weeks pass. Even the occupation of Leningrad, Moscow, and Kiev would not alter this fundamental analysis so long as organisation of the Russian forces remains intact in a strongly contested “ withdrawal towards strength.”

With this prospect confronting a persistence in direct assaults, the Germans may well attempt to outflank Russia by striking through Turkey at the Caucasian oilfields; and in this connection the recent occupation by the Russians of a strategical island at the mouth of the Danube, and their constant attacks on Rumanian ports, may not be ’without significance.