Nazi Keypoints Taken

Timaru Herald, Volume CLV, Issue 22784, 7 January 1944, Page 5

Nazi Keypoints Taken

Russian Advance Unchecked

Stuez River Line Penetrated

N.Z.P.A.—Special London Correspondent. (Received 8.55 p.m.) LONDON, January 5.

11l STALIN, in an Order of the Day addressed to !'*• General Vatutin, said that troops of the First Ukrainian Front after five days’ fierce fighting to-day carried by asault the large railway junction and key centre of the enemy’s defences, Berdichev. The feat will be recognised in Moscow with 20 salvoes from 124 guns.

Reuter’s Moscow correspondent says that late to-night the Russian military commentator, Colonel Amikov, said the Russians had taken the Stuez River line and penetrated deeply in the direction of Sarny, which is 35 miles west of the old Polish frontier. Berdichev, a tough kernel of German resistance, stood in the way of General Vatutin’s drive south from Kiev, and its fall will open up the way to the important rail junction of Smerinka, through which German supplies pass to the armies in the Bend.

In the Novograd Volinsk area, west of Kiev, the Germans have been counter-attacking for the last 24 hours, but the Russians have flung them back every time and have themselves pushed on. Meanwhile heavy fighting continues on the northern front. Correspondents state that the Germans are fighting tooth and nail to hold Vitebsk. To the north from Nevel the Russian advance is gaining momentum in spite of difficult terrain and uncertain weather.

General Vatutin is firmly astride the big Kiev salient and punching hard against the retreating Germans, declares Reuter’s Moscow correspondent. Operations are rapidly moving to a new climax for the Germans’ north-western and Dnieper line. The Russians are increasingly threatening Kanev, which is the Germans’ only remaining hold on the right bank of the Middle Dnieper. The fall of Berdichev after five days’ fighting of extreme ferocity between large forces on each side is hailed by the Soviet press as a major victory. It splits open the German defences protecting the approaches to the River Bug and the Odessa-Rovno-Wilno railway. The Russian spearhead is already 15 miles north-east of Shepetovka. The Vichy radio, in an unusually outspoken report on the eastern front, said it seems that General Vatutin’s offensive is forcing the Germans to give up the entire territory south of the Dnieper. General Vatutin, besides using more than 1,000,000 men has considerable reserves which have not yet been in action.

A New Offensive A new Russian offensive in the Propoisk area of White Russia, 120 miles north of Vitebsk, is reported by the Berlin radio. The attack is designed to smash the German bridgehead east of the Dnieper, says the radio. The Russians, after using fog shells and putting up a heavy barrage, attacked with big forces first to the west and then to the north. Fierce battles are going on. The battle of the Dnieper Bend reached a stage toward its conclusion, and the battle for the River Bug came into closer perspective by the capture of Byelaya-Tserkov, states a Moscow message. This Soviet victory made the position of the Gsrmans, who have been holding the right bank of the Dnieper from the southern environs of Kiev to the small Soviet bridgehead south of Persyaslavl, more critical. Byelaya Tserkov was the centre of a fortified zone with permanent ferroconcrete defences and steel pill-boxes of a portable type. The Germans had built up similar areas at Nanev and Rzsishenev, on the right bank of the Dnieper, but their military value slumped after the loss of Byelaya Tserkov. South-west of this sector the Russians accelerated their advance toward the River Bug after the capture of Pliskov had disorganised the German defences. Defence line in Poland Although Moscow has not yet officially announced that the Red Army has crossed the Polish border, the Berlin radio’s commentator (Captain Sertorlus) to-night tacitly admitted that Ruslan forces had reached the border area. He declared that the Germans were preparing a defence line behind the Russian-Polish border and said: "General Vatutin’s army group, advancing beyond Olevsk and Novograd Vollnsk, will be faced with a new defence line now being constructed.” Marshal von Mannstein in the last 24 hours has started determined counter-attacks from bases in the Novograd Volinsk area, says Reuter’s correspondent at Moscow. Tire Red Army has beaten back all counterblows and is advancing north and south of Novograd Volinsk. The Red Army is approaching the Odessa-Cracow-Berlin railway at the rate of 10 miles a day, and it is difficult to see. even now, how the Germans will be able to move any great proportion of the armies in the Dnieper Bend except through the Bessarabian mountains into Rumania. Tire Red Army is rapidly sweeping on all sectors in a drive towards the River Bug. According to the Soviet Army newspaoer "Red Star.” the canture of Pliska will end the deep thrusts by Red Army tanks into the German positions. The tanks are outflanking the railway junction of Vinnitsa from the east. The German Command, after the fall of Byelaya Tserkov, is in a precarious position from Smyela to Nikopol, report Moscow correspondents quoting last-minute dispatches from the front line. The Red Army has bitten deeply into the German defence system in the Ukraine with its target the railway network on which the safety of the Germans in the Dnieper Bend depends. The latest reports Indicate that General Vatutin has decided to consolidate his positions in the NovogradVolinsk area and secure his rear between Byelaya Tserkov and the west bank,of the Dnieper before pushing on toward Rovno, savs the British United Press. Most of the German "colonists” settled around Rovno have already moved back to the Reich. The German Commissioner (General Koch) used Rovno as his headquarters from which he organised the pillage of the Ukraine. All the original Russian inhabitants of the town were expelled and the town completely turned over to Nazi settlers. Russians and Czechs fought their way side by side through a quagmire to seize Byelaya Tserkov after a furious barrage by the Red Army had disrupted the first-line defences. Russians and Czechs, when the Germans regrouped on the second defence line, charged the dispositions and launched a surprise attack from another quarter. sweeping the Germans out of the town. The German High Command, in a communique Issued to-day. savs: "After fierce fighting we evacuated th? eastern part of Berdichev. We threw the Russians back in the remaining parts of the town.” The Soviet communique to-night announces the capture of Berdichev and 60 other places in the Kiev region, includin'' Tarascha. It adds that the Red Army north of Nevel continued its offensive and captured more titan 90 inhabited places. German Atrocities Whole colonies of Russians have been reduced to Stone Age conditions since the Germans swept over their areas, says the war correspondent of "Izvestia" after a tour of the ravaged territories now being liberated. The correspondent relates that in a three days* ride iii the Novograd-Volynsk area he did not see a single person,

house or village. Dozens of villages had been systematically burned down and the inhabitants locked in large stables, which were set on fire. At Domanovich. 250 children were herded into the school and burned to death. A memorial mound has already been erected to the children reading, "Cursed forever be the German butchers.” Peasants were driven into their own wooden houses, the doors nailed up and the buildings set on fire. Whole families perished from the 100 years old grandfather to the few dav« old baby. The bedridden and sick were pinned to their bed by German bayonets before their homes were set on fire. Those who escape the systematic terror are now living in huge underground burrows. The correspondent met a man whose tongue had been cut out and a girl whose eyes had been put out with needles.