The Waterbury Democrat., 1942-05-21
Red Army Is Fighting
 Inside Inner Circle
CContlnued from Page D

H&WAAAAAAM%1 AuiEiila .. Allied planes blast ] Eocpaug and Oin on Tim0r Island destroying two Japanese planes and Gtaytlng big fires,
 Ernnce RAT FeneWs daylight at- saclD en Dieppe and LeT7avre sec- Cor e Cerman-held coast.
 Aedikerfnnean-RAF bombs axis convoy, hitting mediurn-siezd mer- chant ships. Also attack Nax bases an Crete in Labya.
 Rmssfans stfll At Kerch Dispatches from the Russian front indicated tho Russians still were in action on the Kerch Peninsula of tho Orimea, but the main trend of alae whole southern front depended en the outcome of the Kharkov bat- eis.
 Military experts said there was little or no possibility of the Ger mans attempting any thrust from the Crimea toward the Caucasus oil nelds until and if they were able to break through the Ukraine front toward Rostov, where they suffered "a heavy defeat last year. Any ate tempt to cross the Kerch Straits to the mainland on Q short cut to the Caucasus at present would merely make the Nazis vulnerable to coun- ter-attacks unless 6 strong axis naval forces could be mustered in the Black Sea, which appears to be out of the question now.
 Dispatches from Istanbul said the Russian Black Sea fleet still was strong, including modern cruisers, destroyers and submarines and at least one old battleship. Thus the Kharkov battle is expected to decide the whole trend of the campaign in southern Russia.
 Fighting inside the Nazl hedge- hog defense system--a series of spine like fortified points stretching out from Kharkov-developed in open fields among the forts and in eiaveloping attacks on strong points as q result of the Russian break through to the inner lines.
 The break through did not nec- essarily mean that Kharkov was about to fall. Both sides apparent ly have spent men and material freely in the battle and the Nazi hedgehog system is designed to make the offensive more and more costly as 1t moves closer to the city
 Reds Hold Offensive
 But 1t was of utmost importance that the Red army continued to hold the offensive in the Ukraine, that the Berlin high command acknowledged continued attacks (which the Nazis said were repuls- cd with the "gravest" losses) and that the German attempt to launch counter of fensive on the Russian south flank had not developed. The dimunition of German tank striking power also was likely to be decisive factor in the battle unless Hitler can rush mechanized re- serves to the Kharkov front. This arrangement is wild contest and the side that can stand up and keep going longest is likely to emerge successful not only in the struggle for Kharkov but in the battle to hold the affensive on the whole southern front.
 An indication of the toll being taken in the Kharkov battle was given by the Russian comnunique, which listed 27 German planes, 42 tanks, 35 field guns, 12 anti-aircraft guns, 37 mortarS, 360 trucks and 700 men destroyed in one days fighting. On the same day, the Germans claimed they had knocked out 63 Russian tanks.
 Fighting on other sectors of the Russian front appeared to have di- minished, but there were indirect reports that the Soviets were pounding at the Germans on the Sea of Azov front, in the area of Povovsk and Taganrog, in the soutah Ukraine. The Germans said they had repulsed Russian attacks 2 on the northwestern front south of Lake Ilmen, the Russians said they had killed 500 on the Leningrad front and sunk three enemy trans ports in tn Parents Sea.
 Fighting continued on the Kerch front, in the eastern Crimea, the Russian communique said.
 No Big RAF Raids
 Tn Germany, where Reichsnar- shal Hermann Goering told Ger mans that more food rationing was in prospect due to poor harvests, there were no big-scale RAF raids last night but British fighter bomber squadrons attacked Dieppe and LaTIavre on the French coast.
 An Italian communique claimed that Fascist submarines had joined the German U-boats of the Amer ican coast and sunk three vessels, including one tanker.
 A German news agency report claimed that American troops had arrived at the British fortress of Gibraltar and suggested that they might be en route to some other destination in the Mediterranean area, where the Italians and Vichy French have been increasingly fear full of invasion. There was no com- ment from Washington.
 In the Far East, the Japanese offensive against China assumed still more serious proportions, with liO,O00 Japanese troops concentrat- ed on two main fronts in eastern China and in an apparent attempt to knock out Allied air and supply bases. This was regarded as of spe-