The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-09-18
Stubborn Russians Fighting Viciously
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man positions at one point but the Germans said that their ring has been drawn tight around the city and that Kronstadt, the great north Russian naval base, now is under artillery bombardment.
 The Nazi Luftwaffe was ranging far and wide.
 Berlin reported Naz bombers in action as far east as the western shores of the Caspian Sea, prob- ably 600 or 700 miles behind the irn- mediate fighting lines.
 Other German bomber Squadrons battered ports on the Sea of Azov, the virtually land-locked sea area just east of Crimea. They attacked Russian shipping in the Black Sea, set fires raging in Leningrad and made new attacks on Russian trans- ports and warships in the arctic.
 Maxi Really Rolling
 There was mounting evidence that for the first time since the start of the war in the east l3 weeks ago the Nazi Wehrmacht was really rolling at a pace that rivalled that of its past campaigns in western Europe.
 Whether the Russians could con- solidate their defenses and once again bring the war mechanism of their enemy to a halt was not ap- parent. An additional factor of dan ger was the location of the chief Nazi offensive in the south along the Black Sea where even in winter temperatures are mild and whether many weeks of relatively good wea- ther can be anticipated before any effects of winter might bog down operations.
 There also was the likelihood that at any moment the German Black Sea campaign will be augmented by naval operations in the Black Sea from the new bases constructed by Germany in Bulgaria and Rumania.
 The naval operations probably would be directed against Crimea and the Georgian coast with a view to launching a direct Nazi offensive against the Caucasus oil regions be- fore cold weather piles snow into the difficult Caucasus mountain passes.
 This prospect brought up the di- rect possibility of involvement in the war of the chief middle eastern non belligerent, Turkey.
 Turkey Gets Demand
 Turkey was confronted with a de- mand by Bulgaria for the passage through the Dardanelles of 13 al- legged Bulgarian warships. These warships apparently are Italian craft which the Germans are hop ing to transfer from the Aegean to the Black Sea through the device of purported Bulgarian neutrality Belligerent warships are not allowed to pass the narrow Turkish straits.
 The Turks are said to have turned down the Bulgarian" proposal and the British have let 1t be known they will attack any such warships which attempt to pass the straits.
 If Turkey yields to Axis pressure and lets the ships through, she can expect the British to carry the war to her front door. If she does not yield, the prospect seems to be ale most equally good that the forces which Germany has rlasSed in Bull garia and Eastern Thrace will strike across the DardanelleS and attempt to control them by force.
 London indicated today that Roy. al Air Force planes now are operat- ing with the Russians on the Uk- raine front. This would indicate that the planes came from the Middle East. Previous indications were that RAF planes had been shipped to Murmansk or Archangel. It is pos sible that planes and pilots are go- ing in both ways in view of the urgency of Soviet needs.
 Suppress Rebellion
 Tn the occupied countries of Eu- rope the Germans were taking in. creasingly drastic measures to sup. press rebellion. Eleven Belgians were given death sentences, 50 alleged Communists were executed in Bel. grade, Norwegians were being ar. rested at the rate of 100 per day another Pole was sentenced to death and in France 1t was learned that arrests of alleged Communists by the Vichy government have now reached 2,o00.
 In the Far East the 10th anni- versary of the so-called "Mukden incident"-the pretext employed by Japan for the start of her military operations in China, the seizure of Manchuria.
 In Chungking General Chiang Kai-Shek declared that China would never cease fighting Japan until victorious. Chou En-Lai, Chin- csc Communist leader, echoed his sentiments. In Nanking . time bomb exploded in the railroad station,