Current Events march 25, 1943; GERMAN OFFENSIVE HALTED IN DONETS AREA / FIERCE AXIS COUNTER ATTACKS REPELLED ON MARETH LINE / JAPANESE SEAPLANE BASE, ON KISKA, BOMBED:

                        THE TIMES RECORD

              Axis Counter-Attacks Mareth Line

    THE TIMES RECORD, TROY. N. T., THURSDAY EVENING, MARCH 25, 1943

German Offensive Against

Upper Donets Line Halted

REDS HOLD FIRM

IN SPITE OF WEEK

OF BITTER BLOWS

Piles of Corpses Littering

Right Bank of River Only

Achievement of Foe, Says

Red Star.

Moscow (UP)—The Red Army reported today that a week-long German

offensive against the upper Donets Line had failed to carry

across the river, and the Soviet positions are intact everywhere on

a broad arc east of Kharkov. "Several day« of storming the

upper reaches of the Donets have not brought th« enemy any results

except piles of corpses littering the right bank," the official Army organ

Red Star said. "The Soviet defenses have not been broken at a

single point."

The Germans, their strength sapped by enormous losses and stubborn

Russian resistance, have reduced the scale of their attacks

along the Donets to relatively feeble thrusts, front dispatches said.

Nevertheless they were reported still moving up fresh armored forces,

apparently not having given up hope of forcing the Donets de-

spite the fact that they had been brought to a standstill from the

Belgorod area of the river to the

Chuguev region above Kharkov.

Advance On Smolensk.

AMRERICANS SHELL

GERMANS' AIRPORT

DESPITE BOMBING

Yankees Win Control of

Last Mountain Ramparts

Overlooking Foes' Corridor to Sea.

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Gen Sir Bernard L. Montgomery's

British Eighth Army troops

were reported fendding off fierce

Axis counter-attacks m a "Devil's

Cauldron" salient at the upper end

of the Mareth Line in Southern

Tunisia today while f a r t h e r up the

front LINES. long-ran^e 155 mm guns

shelled Mezzouna Aifield only 22

miles fiom the sea.

A bulletin from Gen Dwight D.

Eisenhower's headquarters said the

battle for the Mareth Line continued,

yesterday marked by heavy

artillery dueling.

To the north. the communique

said, American patrols scored local

gains in the Maknassy area.

"In the Gafsa sector, American

patrols carried out offensive operations

with success," the communique

declared. and Allied aerial

squadrons. attacking by- night and

day, bombed and shot up Axis concentrations

along a twenty-mile

stretch between Mareth and Gabes.

Yanks Control Mountains.

YANKS BLAST JAPS ON KISKA—The speculation photo above, taken from a U. S. warplane,shows the results ot a U. S. Army Air Force bombing raid on a Japanese camp and seaplane base on Kiska and, Alaska. Fierce fires rage from hangars and other buildings hit by bombs. Between the pillars ot smoke can be seen seaplanes and, lower left, boats in the water.

Current Events March 26, 1943