January 14, 1945;

THIS WAS REPORTED TODAY, JANUARY 14, 1945

MADISON, SUNDAY, JANUARY 14, 1945

Fighter-Bombers

Carry Out Attacks

'On Normandy Scale'

By JAMES F. McGLINCY

(United Press War Correspondent)

P A R IS—

Allied armies opened a supreme offensive Saturday to wipe out the Ardennes salient and gained up to 3 miles in a two-way drive seeking to .cut off Field

Marshal Karl Gerd Von Rundstedt's panzers at the base of the bulge while U. S. Third army tanks crashed across the enemy's lifeline at two points southwest of Houffalize.

Lieut. Gen. George S. Patton's forces at the same time drove within 5% miles of a junction with the First army in the waist of the wedge and the converging artillery blasts of the two armies also blocked off a stretch of the Germans' escape road east of Houffalize.

Thousands of Germans of the Fifth and Sixth panzer armies, rocked by shells and with their columns torn for the first time by strong forces of Allied planes, reversed their field in a disorganized scramble to get out of the pocket by secondary roads. At least 100 tanks and other vehicles in the' milling mass were destroyed by planes alone.

Small Pockets Formed

 Other and smaller pockets were forming farther west as the new Allied attacks spread around 60 miles of the bulge perimeter. One was in the Champion area. 12 miles southwest of Houffalize, where the Third army, gaining up to 3 miles on an 8-mile" front, moved within two miles of British

forces striking south after mopping up the toe of the salient Fighter-bombers ranged

ranged  east and northeast against huge German columns which had run the Houffalize gauntlet and carried out attacks on "something like the Normandy scale," pilots reported in reference to the piling up ofthe German Seventh army in its retreat across France.

Konev's Army Hears

Eastern Germany's

'Ruhr/ Silesia

LONDON — (U.P.) —

Smashing to within 72 milts of southeastern Germany, the Red army has broken 25 miles through German lines in south-central Poland, Marshal

Stalin announced Saturday night, while Berlin said the Russians' winter offensive, spreading like wildfire along a 600-mile front, had flared in East Prussia, Czechoslovakia, and on five other fronts.

Marshal Ivan S. Konev's First Ukrainian army, breaking out of its bridgehead on the west bank of the Vistula river 100 miles south of Warsaw, was moving toward

highly-industrial German Silesia and the ancient Polish capital of Krakow on a 37-mile front, Stalin revealed.

In an order of the day 24 hours after the first reports of the opening of the Red army's winter offensive were broadcast by Berlin, Stalin announced that Konev's army had captured more than 350 towns and villages in Poland.

Take Town by Storm

Crashing through powerful enemy defenses, the Russians took by storm the fortified town of Wislica which carried them to within 36 miles northeast of Krakow and 72 miles from Silesia "the Ruhr of eastern Germany." Krakow is

the gateway to Silesia, but it appeared that the Red army might by-pass the fortress on the north.

Besides Wislica, the Russians recaptured Szydlow and Stopniea and advanced to win the strongholds of Chmielnik, 19 miles south southeast of Kielce, and Busko, 27 miles south southeast. Kielce in an important junction on the main Krakow-Wanaw railroad, and by seizing Chmielnik. Konev's forces hammered to

within nine miles of the vital enemy’s supply line in southwestern Poland.