Evening star., 1942-10-10
Soviets Intrench
Northwest Of City
On German Flank
BY HENRY C. CASSIDY,


Associated Press War Correspondent.
MOSCOW, Oct. 1O.-Tank and
infantry attacks so ferocious
that observers believed them to
be the German high commands
supreme bid for final decision
in the battle of Stalingrad were
reported continued today and
Red Army troops intrenched for
positional warfare against the
Nazi flank northwest of the city.
/. A front line correspondent of L.
vestia said there was every reason to
believe that Adolf Hitler's field Of
ficers expected finally to master the
battered industrial center, but this
expectation was not fulfilled"
A tank division and a motorized
infantry division were among sew
eral fresh German units which led
the latest offensive, four -day-old
action concentrated on a workers
settlement northwest of Stalingrad
and aimed at cutting through the
citys heart to the Volga.
1zvestia said as many as 80 as
saults were launched in this phase
OF the battle, the greater part fail
ing utterly and others gaining a few
dozen yards in various areas.
1000 Flights in a Day.
The army newspaper Red Star
said that recently more than 1000
German flights were made over
Stalingrad in single day with so
to IS bombers detailed to a single
objective.
But now it said the Germans were
compelled to reduce the number of
flights and even to take. a day or
two off while bombers were being
repaired. During these lulls only
fighters appeared over the city.
1zvestia said three -fourths of
Stalingrad was in flames or ruins
after the first German raid on Au-
gust %, carried out by more than
1000 planes. Later the Nazis dropped
leaflets calling for the citys sur
render in the mistaken belief that
it had been crushed.
Despite the savage air pourding
the Russians continued to ferry re-
inforcements across the Volga. The
captain Of one ship, the Abkhazetz,
named for the rugged Caucasian
Abkhazetz region, was reported to
have made 500 crossings under fire
while his family remained in the
flattened city area now occupied by
the Germans.
Five COunterattacks Repulsed.
The Soviet Information Bureau
in its broadcast of a noon COM
munique today, told of the repulse
of five German counterattacks
northwest of Stalingrad. The broad
cast said,
In the Stalingrad area our troops
continued to defend the positions
they had occupied and repulsed at
tacks by enemy infantry In a mar
row sector German infantry COM
pany attacked but was driven back
to its original positions.
I'm other sectors artillery and
mortar duels took place.
Northwest of Stalingrad our
troops repulsed five counter attacks
by enemy infantry. The Germans
lost about 200 killed and five mortars
and other material were destroyed.
I'm another sector an enemy am
munition dump was destroyed"
Official Soviet reports indicated a
relative stabilization of lines in the
greatest battle of the German-Rus-
sian conf1ict-the siege of Stalin-
grad, now in its 47th day.
A German hint that assault troops
would be withdrawn from Stalin-
grad, leaving the field to siege guns
and bombers, was again ignored by
the Soviet high command. But ar
tillery is among the best publicized
of the Red Army's weapons and the
Russians probably would welcome
a shelling duel there.
Withdrawal of Nazi infantry
would be regarded here as a tacit
admission that the German high
command had again miscalculated
the strength of Russian resistance,
as it did at Leningrad, at Tula and
on the approaches of Moscow last
year.
Diversion Implied.
A possibility that Axis shock
troops would be diverted against
the Volga Caspian shipping lanes
at Astrakhan, on the Volga's mouth,
was implied yesterday in an Izvestia
dispatch which reported for the
first time the German drive across
the Kalmyck steppes.
(The Germans declared several
weeks ago that an invasion force
had driven to the Caspian south
west of Astrakhan after captur-
ing Elisha, the Malmyck capital,
160 miles south of Stalingrad and
180 miles west of Astrakhap.
Later Berlin broadcasts have been
silent upon developments in that
region.
(The name Stalingrad reap
peared in the German high COM
mand communique today after q
one-day omission with report
that German shock troops had
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