DEFEAT SEEN AHEAD

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

DEFEAT SEEN AHEAD

Reich Facing Critical

Situation

Frank Admission by Nazi

Officials

By Telegraph—N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright (Rec. 8 p.m.) LONDON. Jan. 4. Nazi officials are admitting frankly—for the first time—that Germany faces a critical situation.

Gloomy reports reaching neutral countries e”' - day from Gennany

„ every u , suggest that the Nazis see defeat

The “Berliner Boersen Zeitung” says: "Germany last year suffered political and military setbacks which would have brought collapse to any nation in the Allied camp. The new year will bring still greater tests to be overcome, not merely for fortifications but for fanatical zeal.” German officers on the Russian front apparently fear that the terrible experiences their troops are suffering may turn the retreat into a rout. A panzer officer said in an astonishingly trank broadcast to Berlin: “Our comrades are becoming very disquieted. We shoot like madmen, but the Russians have so many guns and are such brilliant marksmen that we are unable to achieve anything. The communication lines between our retreating troops are constantly interrupted by guerrillas.”

A German war correspondent on the Russian front says: “It is almost impossible to live, let alone fight, on the Eastern Front. Our clothing is useless in the mud, rain, snow and icy winds. Hot food never reaches our lines. We never get cigarettes. It is so terrible that one cannot think. Many soldiers are ill. especially with gastric trouble. Life on the Eastern Front cannot be compared with anything.” A German spokesman of the Foreign Office told Swedish correspondents in Berlin-: "The winter line in Russia has been split by the deep penetration by the Russian Army.” The spokesman said that the two fronts left in Russia were 360 and 480 miles long. He did not expect German counter-attacks to regain the lost positions, but he claimed that the Russians would be unable to roll up the German flanks because two long fronts were still holding. “The Axis can still win if the Japanese and German peoples tide themselves coolly and calmly over the present war crisis,” said Goebbels in an interview with Japanese correspondents in Berlin, quoted by the Tokio radio. “The war may last many years, but we must fight on to victory, otherwise a golden opportunity for crushing Britain and America will not visit us for many centuries. The Japanese and Germans may retreat for strategical reasons in certain circumstances, but this will not affect our chances of victory.”