November 17, 1944; Nazis Pull Back in Italy:

THIS WAS REPORTED TODAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1944:

ABILENE, TEXAS, FRIDAY MORNING, NOVEMBER 17, 1944—TWENTY-TWO PAGES

Ninth Makes

Appearance

SUPREME HEADQUARTERS ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY

FORCE, Paris, Nov. 16 —(AP)—

The Allies launched a general offensive in the west today with the veteran U. S. First and the long-hidden U. S. Ninth joining four other armies in attacks along a 300-mile front against the Reich and its approaches from Holland southward to the Alps.

The newly moved up U. S. Ninth drove 'into Germany along a nine-mile are between Geilenkirchen, 12 miles-north of Aachen, and Eschweiler, 10 miles northeast of Aachen, where the west wall already has been breached.

Simultaneously the U. S.  first Army attacked east of Aachen itself.

(A late dispatch from the Ninth Army front, reporting the fall of at least four German towns, said shocked German prisoners were captured by the score as the Americans broke through the crust of enemy defenses.

(Associated Press Correspondent Wes Gallagher said that in the first few hours, tanks and infantry swept forward up to a  mile, seizing Euchen, five miles northeast of Aachen, and Immendorf, Beggendorf and Floverlch, from two to three miles east of Geilenkirchen.)

London announced that 1,150' British heavies also attacked Duren ana heavily-fortified Julich and Helnsbcrg to the north in co-ordinated assaults on the

west wall.

YANKS ON LEYTE TIGHTENING

GRIP ON KEY JAP TERRITORY

GENERAL MacARTHUR'S HEADQUARTERS; Philippines,

Friday, Nov. 17 —(AP)—

Infantrymen of the 24th division and dismounted first division cavalrymen are tightening their grip on the Japanese salient at Limon, four miles south of Carigara bay, on Leyte island, headquarters reported today.

American long-range artillery "continues its havoc" throughout the Ormoc corridor, leading from Pinamopoan to the besieged port of Ormoc, a communique said.

Nazis Pull Back

On Italian Front

ROME, Nov. 17.— (AP)—

Fifth army troops have occupied Modigliana, important road junction nine miles south of the Bologna-Rimini highway town of Faenza, in the wake of

a surprise German withdrawal after a week-long vigorous defense. Allied headquarters announced today. Several previous Allied assaults on the town had been thrown back by desperately

fighting Nazis. When British and Indian troops moved in yesterday they found the Germans had left the town thoroughly mined and booby-trapped.

Six miles north of captured Forli, Eighth army units, moving cautiously toward the Montone river, cleared Coccolia and reached a point within 2,000 yards of San Pancrazio.

Other troops pushed about two and a half miles west of Forli against comparatively light resistance from German rear guards.

In the Adriatic coastal sector the Germans blew a gap in the "banks of the Fiumi Uniti, flooding large tracts of land east of highway 16 and making maneuvers there virtually impossible. (insert Map)