MAULED BY RUSSIANS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 14 July 1943, Page 4

MAULED BY RUSSIANS

15 ARMOURED DIVISIONS IN KURSK SALIENT BATTLES. GENERAL SITUATION RATHER EASIER. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 10.40 a.m.) RUGBY, July 13. German pressure against the Kursk salient continues, mainly at the south end, but the general situation is regarded in London as rather easier. After sustaining more than a week’s heavy assaults, with masses of tanks, the Russian salient still holds firm in its main outlines. German tank losses are already evtremely severe. The Russians have identified at least 15 armoured divisions which have been thrown into unsuccessful attempts to demolish the salient. Presumably these divisions have been considerably mauled, and the German armour is still being used up at a great rate. Today’s Moscow messages say that although terrific losses have compelled the enemy to relax his pressure, attacks continue without respite, as the enemy- probes for a weak spot. There has been especially heavy fighting in the Byelgorod sector, where the situation is described as remaining tense, but the Russians continue coun-ter-attacking strongly, regaining temporarily lost positions. It is estimated that a third of all the German tanks employed are Tigers, which are used as a spearhead and protection for the lAss strongly armoured tanks behind. The Russians have learned to wait until the Tigers are within. 200 yards and then take advantage of the relatively large target.

GERMANS BEATEN BACK BUT GREAT TANK BATTLES STILL RAGING. (Received This Day, 1230 p.m.) LONDON, July 13. Great tank battles continue near Byelgorod, where the Germans are trying to widen the wedge driven into the .Soviet defences. The Russians state that all the German thrusts have been beaten back with heavy losses, but the Russians admit that the continuing German thrusts in this sector seriously threaten the Soviet flank. The “Red Star” declares that the Russian Guards in one sector of the Byelgorod area recaptured their original positions, while Soviet troops on the Orel-Kursk front captured a line of German trenches, after which they beat back a panzer attack. The paper added that the battle on the Byelgorod front was daily becoming more acute. The Germans were suffering heavy losses in tanks and planes as their attacks were repeatedly flung back. One correspondent says desperate fighting has been raging eastward of Byelgorod during the last two days, with General Rokossovsky’s armoured units smashing repeated panzer attempts to force a crossing of the Upper Donetz, which runs eastward of Byelgorod. Attack and counter-at-tack are still following each other in rapid succession, in one of the most violent battles of the war. as the Germans hurl in more tanks, planes and masses of infantry. The “Izvestia” states that Russian artillerymen on the Byelgorod front, in a three-day battle, knocked out 62 tanks, silenced 34 and 14 mortar batteries, and repulsed 36 German panzer and infantry attacks. In London, military commentators consider that the Russians have won the first round and that, on the ninth day of the offensive, the danger is no greater than on the first day of the attack.