FALL OF BIG FORTRESS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 88, Issue 4, 6 January 1944, Page 5

FALL OF BIG FORTRESS

RUSSIANS IN BELAYA TSERKOV

CRIPPLING BLOW FOR NAZIS

(By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright)

Recd. 7.20 p.m. London, Jan. 4. The Russians have struck another crippling blow at the main defences of the German armies in the Dnieper bend. After a fourday battle Red Army men have stormed the big jail and supply centre of Belaya Tserkov, 50 miles south-west of Kiev, says a special Order of the Day by Marshal Stalin to-night. The men of General Vatutin’s army who captured the town were honoured to-night by 12 salvos from 124 of Moscow s guns. The victorious forces included a Czechoslovak brigade which is fighting with the Russians.

The capture of Belaya Tserkov is a major success for the Russians. When the Red Army offensive in the Dnieper bend first began to show itself some months ago the Germans built what they called an impregnable line stretching right across the northern flank of the bend.

This defence line was anchored on the two powerful fortresses of Belaya Tserkov at the eastern end, and Berdichev at the western end. Since the Russians began their offensive in the Kiev bulge nearly a fortnight ago they have penetrated this defence line at several points, but the two bastions held out.

As long as they remained in German hands there was always a chance that the enemy might succeed in holding up the main Russian thrust into the bend. For several days how the Germans have been pouring men and tanks into fierce counter-attacks from both towns, but these attacks only succeeded in deferring the inevit able for a very short time

Now that Belaya Tserkov is in Russian hands the Russians are free to drive down on the enemy forces in the Dnieper bend and on a wide front. Berdichev, at the other end of the defence line, is also seriously threatened, with the Russians only six miles from its one remaining link with the main German forces. If this town falls there will be nothing to prevent the full weight of the Russian offensive from driving right across the bend to the lower Dnieper on the other side. Further north. Red Army men, surging forward on a 70-mile front far to the west of Kiev, are reported to have crossed the 1939 Polish frontier at several points to-day. Moscow correspondents say that Cossack patrols were the first to cross the frontier and were quickly followed by mobile Russian columns.

These columns were last reported four miles beyond the frontier. There has been no official confirmation of this, but it is known that Red Army units were only eight miles away from the border last night and there ha*> been no sign yet of any effective counter stroke.

General Vatutin’s advanced forces are to-night in contact with the retreating German rearguards several miles west of the Polish border, says Reuter’s Moscow correspondent, quot ing front line dispatches. The Red Army columns advancing from Korosten towards Sarny is 12 miles beyond Oleysk and the Russians have thus advanced four miles intc the Polish Ukraine. A second Russian column is advancing along the Khito* mir-Rovno road, on which big clashes are occurring between Novograd Volynsk and Korzar. The latter place is 15 miles inside the Polish Ukraine.

This road is of exceptional importance and constitutes approximately the dividing line between the marshes and forests of the lowlands to the north and the hilly country to the south.

General Vatutin’s forces, in a sweep south-w’estwards from the Kiev bulge, re approaching the Bug-Odessa railway, which is the main German sup nlv ariprv. The front stretches from the Kaza-tin-Voinnitsa railway eastwards to Krivyets, which is 2b miles soutn of Belaya Tserkov. which the Red Army captured to-day. The Russians firmly hold all the ground between Krivyets and the .olayatserkov. Their grip on the Berdichev railway junction is also steadily being tightened. Berdichev is now cut off on three sides and is without railway communication The inequations are that the Germans intend to make a determined stand at Berdichev. Berlin radio says the Russians are already fighting in the town’s outskirts. A Red Army column is advancing along the raihVay from Novograd Volynsk, menacing the Sheptovka railway junction, and, according! to the Red Star, most of the line between Novograd Volynsk and Sheptovka > now in Russian hands.

Reuter says that the perspective opened up as the result of Vatutin’s great advance south and south-west of Kiev means cutting off at least 500,000 Germans in the Dnieper bend and the Crimea. The Germans’ railway communications between the Dnieper area and their westward bases are already thoroughly disorganised. With the River Bug no real to the Red Army the Germans rrtfiy be forced back as far as the river Dniester. from which Vatutin’s forces artonly 100 miles, which means that the Germans are raying good-bye to all contact with their Dnieper bend forces and facing the abandonment of Odessa. The Germans had converted Belaya Tserkov, wnich they captured in August, 1941, into a bolt position guarding the left flank of their forces in the Dnieper bend, its capture means that these forces are directly exposed to Russian pressure from the nortn and west. Belaya Tserkov was outflanked for days by the Russian wedge between it and Berdichev. The German-controlled Scandinavian Telegraph Bureau, quoting a report from Berlin, says: “Bloody battles are going on along the old Polish frontier in miserable thawing weather over a terrain mostly consisting of deep marsh land.’’ The Polish frontier which the Cossacks crossed was the outcome of the Polish-Russian treaty of March 13. 1941. A new demarcation line between Russia and Germany was drawn up as the result of the Russo-German pact in 1939. The Germans crossed this line on June 22, 1941. and crossed the old frontier about six days later. The Russians still nave about 20C m les to go to reach the Russo-German line.