Current Events October 29, 1943

THIS WAS REPORTED TODAY OCTOBER 29, 1943:

While German troops fought desperately last night at Krivoi Rog to hold off the northern arm of a vast

developing pincers, others in the south raced pell-mell west to get out of a sack whose neck was being tightened by the great Russian breakthrough in the Melitopol sector.

The Red Army which smashed through Melitopol was advancing west and northwest on the Nogaisk steppe at the rate of sometimes as much as 18 miles a day. Columns striking upward from Melitopol were but 30 miles from the Lower Dnieper. Last night it had developed into a race between Germans within the Dnieper

Bend and Russians on the south side of the river. Soviet forces already were due south of Nikopol, on the Dnieper, and any German escape must be made southwestward down the railway from Aposlovo to Kherson at the Dnieper mouth.

                                              

Allied forces in Italy scored a general advance of three to four miles yesterday as Britain's Eighth Army drove a wedge into the German positions in the central sector, captured the hill town of Torella and increased the threat to the big Nazi base of Isernia 14 miles away.

New Britain—the Hamburg of the South Pacific—received another heavy pasting yesterday from Fifth Air Force bombers and fighters which destroyed 58 more Jap aircraft and boosted their three-day toll of enemy planes destroyed to 181.

              THE STARS AND STRIPES
            THE Daily Newspaper of U.S. Armed Forcesin the European Theater of Operations
      Vol. 3 No. 308                                   New York, N.Y.—London, England Friday, Oct. 29,1943


   Nazis Race West to Escape Soviet Trap

Neck of Sack
Is Tightened
By Russians
Germans Battle Fiercely
At Krivoi Rog to Slow
Arm of Pincers
While German troops fought desperately last night at Krivoi Rog to hold off the northern arm of a vast
developing pincers, others in the south raced pell-mell west to get out of a sack whose neck was being tightened by the great Russian breakthrough in the Melitopol sector.
The Red Army which smashed through Melitopol was advancing west and northwest on the Nogaisk steppe at the rate of sometimes as much as 18 miles a day. Columns striking upward from Melitopol were but 30 miles from the Lower Dnieper. Last night it had developed into a race between Germans within the Dnieper
Bend and Russians on the south side of the river. Soviet forces already were due south of Nikopol, on the Dnieper, and any German escape must be made southwestward down the railway from Aposlovo to Kherson at the Dnieper mouth.
                                                                    Key Rail Point is Goal
Kherson itself was a prime goal for both. Through it lies the last remaining escape rail line from the Crimea, whose peril grows hourly with the Russian breakthrough. Meanwhile the Germans were taking a terrible beating in the center of the Dnieper Bend as they fell back fromDniepropetrovsk. In addition to heavy
losses in men and material, they were forced to give up two key rail centers and 30 populated points.
Violent fighting raged at Krivoi Rog.
The Germans threw in everything in a fanatical attempt to stop the Russian wedge from smashing down and behind Nazi forces retreating westward in the Bend. Great aerial battles continued,with the Germans using fleets of transport planes to drop supplies to the besieged defenders.
Russian bombers were pounding ground forces and hammering rail junctions and other key points in the area.

 Allied Advances
Menace Isernia
Troopships Reported Off
Italy's West Coast
For New Landings
Allied forces in Italy scored a general advance of three to four miles yesterday as Britain's Eighth Army drove a wedge into the German positions in the central sector, captured the hill town of Torella and increased the threat to the big Nazi base of Isernia 14 miles away.
While Fifth Army patrols felt out enemy strength along the Massico line 40 miles westward, Eighth Army troops along the extreme right flank pushed further north up the Adriatic coast road, took over high ground overlooking theTrigno and enlarged their bridgehead over the river.
Although the Allied columns were meeting increasingly tough German resistance from artillery and mortars, a Berne dispatch to the Stockholm Svenska Dagbladet said, nevertheless, that the Nazis were preparing to evacuate southern Italy under Rommel's new supreme command.
Buttressing earlier neutral reports that the Germans feared a new Allied landing, Swiss dispatches said a large concentration of Allied transports, supply ships and warships was forming off Italy's west coast and troops were massing in Corsica for a new attack. Gaeta and Leghorn were mentioned as possible attack zones.

Japs at Rabaul
Get It Again
58 Planes Bagged as Libs
Return to -Base For
3rd Straight Day
ALLIED HQ., Southwest Pacific, Oct.
28—Rabaul,
New Britain—the Hamburg of the South Pacific—received another heavy pasting yesterday from Fifth Air Force bombers and fighters which destroyed 58 more Jap aircraft and boosted their three-day toll of enemy planes destroyed to 181.
The attack, directed chiefly at an airdrome north of Rabaul, left many fires burning and shattered planes and equipment everywhere. The Libs flew through one of the heaviest anti-aircraft barrages yet offered over the great New Britain base to drop 150 tons of bombs.
The B24s accounted for the wrecking of 21 parked planes and the damaging of 23 more. Of the 70 fighters that tried to intercept, P38s shot down 37 and damaged 20.