RUSSIAN ADVANCES

Waikato Times, Volume 132, Issue 22155, 29 September 1943, Page 3

RUSSIAN ADVANCES

IMPPRTANT TOWNS CAPTURED HUGE ARMY OF PARATROOPS (Received Sept. 29, noon) LONDON, Sept. 28 Tonight’s Soviet communique records advances up to 13 miles in the Kremenchug direction, in which Potoki, five miles north-east, and Rubievka, 12 miles north-west of Kremenchug. were captured. In the Gomel direction the Russians advanced from 6 to 9 miles and took Zyabrovka, 14 miles south-east, and Krssnayagora, 45 miles north-east of Gomel. Advances up to 15 miles were made in the Mohilev direction and 12 miles in the Vitebsk direction. Excluding a “large number” of inhabited places captured on the left bank of the Dnieper River the Red Army today freed over 1120 localities. The Moscow radio said that Soviet planes of all types are providing enormous assistance to the troops at the approaches to the Dnieper River. “They are intensifying their blows against the Dnieper crossings, to which the retreating Germans are rushing,” it says. Front-line reports say that a huge army of paratroops is forming up behind the Russian lines to join in the battle for the Dnieper River. This will be the first major test for Russia’s great parachute army, probably the finest in the world. Already some of these paratroops have landed beyond the western bank of the Dnieper River. They are contesting the German attempt to wipe out the bridgeheads over the river established by the Russian forces.