Evening star., 1942-03-28
Nazis Reported
Attacking on
Soviet Front
Counterthrusts Are
Aimed to Shake Free
For Spring Offensive
BY the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
MOSCOW, March Fisherman
troops, encircled and besieged by
strong Russian forces, are coun-
terattacking all along the east
ern front in an effort to shake
of the Soviet Army for their
own spring offensive, an authori-
tative foreign military source
said today.
The Germans are striving might
lily to capture the initiative but it
still is definitely Russian" he added
The Germans have changed their
strategy to open-field fighting, he
declared. instead of clinging to forti-
fled villages and cities because of
fear of encirclements and out
flanking.
Violent Fighting Described.
Dispatches from the south de-
scribed violent fighting while the
encircled 18th German Army in the
Staraya Russa sector also was seek
ing to break through the Red Army
ring.
Pressure by Russian landing par
ties from Arctic beachheads behind
the left invasion flank, combined
with Soviet sea and air attacks, was
reported today to be making the
position of the German Alpine army
before Murmansk extremely difficult
1t. Gen. Eduard Dietl, 51-year-old
Bavarian whom Adolf Hitler deco
rated for his defense of Narvik in
1910, was identified by the army
newspaper Red Star as the enemy
commander.
Now Dietl has been forced on the
defensive and his Austrians (moun-
taineer troops are being steadily
pressed" it said.
To Clear Allied Supply Lines.
The surprise landing of Russian
seaborne force on Axis-occupied soil
of the Murmansk coast, designed
both to clear Allied supply lines and
imperil the invaders from the rear,
was announced last night. The
operation, however, apparently was
initiated some time ago, with Red
ships and planes in full support.
A Red Star dispatch said one Ger
man offensive had been blocked
after a month-long struggle.
CMurmansk, which lies ITS
miles north of the Arctic Circle,
is Russia's major Barents Sea
port and communications center.
Its population in 1926 was S,777.)
Submarine operations connected
with the Russian troop movement
was said to have cost the Germans
at least 10 transports and Red Star
dispatch said hydroplanes and dive
bombers recently sank a German
destroyer and damaged another
which attacked Soviet fishing boats.
Russian fighter squadronS on the
Kalinin front, which includes the
Staraya Russa defenses of the 18th
German Army, were credited by the
Moscow radio with shooting down
Is Nazi craft in an air fight from
which only nine flew away.
2,450 Germans Killed.
The Soviet Information Bureau
said Russian units assigned to a
Kalinin front sector had killed o
$50 Germans. wounded large num-
bers and destroyed Is tanks in five
days of fighting after "the Hitler
1te command brought up reserves
and attempted to deal blow to our
troops wedged into enemy defenses. -"
The German assault formations
were said to have been made up of
80 tanks, the Reich" SIS Division
and a regiment each from the 14th
Motorized Infantry Division and
the 206th Division (Which would
normally total about 10000 mem.
Red Army infantrymen dislodged
the Germans from another settle
ment on the central front and
killed hundreds of officers and men,
authorities announced
More than 500 Germans were an
initiated and much war materiel
was captured during a two-day fight
on a southwestern sector, the in
| formation bureau said.