Evening star., 1942-08-28
Swurms of Soviet
Troops EnguIf
Advancing Foe
Bv EDDY GILMORE,

9 fought their way 400 miles from
the Ukraine to the Volga Valley
reached the distant approaches
to Stalingrad today, but Russian
dispatches said they were
blocked there by swarms of Red
Army infantry who closed In
from all sides.
The situation at the great Volga
city of Stain admittedly was grave,
with the fight raging to a climax,
but Russian reports took the en-
couraging tone that shock troops
of the Nazi assault had been forced
to form the classic round detense
and fight for survival.
One German armored spearhead
was reported cut off completely and
encircled on the sun-baked steppes
northwest of Stalingrad.
The main German forces
streamed up from the rear in a
desperate attempt to make good
their break through by force OF
numbers, and dive bombers began
destructive attacks on the city.
Reds Pressing Offensive.
While the land and air battle
for the "city of Stain" ragged to
full violence, the Red Army was
f1ammering home its own offensive
in the suburbs of Nazi-held Rzhev,
where the Germans held out 13O
miles from Moscow through last
urirters Russian push.
Red Star, tho army newspaper,
declared the fight for Stalingrad
held "the key to victory" so impor-
tant was regarded the great indus
trial town which sprawls for miles
along the low west bank of the
mighty Volga.
with the stiffenil4s of the Russian
last ditch stand there, dispatches
declared that in one salient pre-
sumably northwest OF the city, the
Russians had hurled the Germans
back in local counterattacks, recap
turing three settlements.
The defenders we're hardest
pressed from the southwest where
the Germans were reported charging
over mounds of their own dead.
Prayda reported that a strong
force of Nazi parachutisss who
landed behind the Stalingrad line
and seized temporary control OF
road junction had been wiped out.
Caucasus Battle Slowed.
Fighting for the Caucasus ap-
peared moving at slower pace
now that the battles had moved into
mountain passes more easily de-
Tended.
Red Army men fell back again in
the Prokhladnenski area OF the
Caucasus but held firm at junction
of mountain roads south of Krasno-
dar. the midday communique an
nounced.
Without identifying the fortiflca-
tions seized in the 16-day -old push
west of Moscow, the communique
reported two tanks were destroyed
and more than 100 Germans were
killed"
I'm another sector our troops, de-
veloping the offensive, occupied
seven populated places" it was an
nounced. I'VE destroyed 13 Ger
man tanks, 10 anti-tank guns and
Is trucks and captured 2 tanks, l
armored car, several guns and other
war materiel."
Two Penetrati0ns Closed.
Two detachments from the Nazi
pincers squeezing on Soviet lines
before Stalingrad in the Don-Volga
corridor succeeded in penetrating
the defenses, but both breaks were
repaired by counterattacks, the
Russians said.
One was an automatic rife force,
wiped out; the other tank and in
fantry unit which developed a
wedge northeast of Kotelnikovski
only to lose nine tanks, more than
200 men and war supplies.
/. (The Vichy radio, broadcasting
q report unconfirmed by other
sources, said the Germans were
before the last belt of fortifi-
cations only 13 miles from Stall
ingrad. The Germans announced
strong aerial squadrons bombed
! Russian lines and widened fires
reported burning in Stalingrad
several days.
Russian dispatches declared the
Germans had turned to bombing
residential sections at the center Of
Stalingrad after raids on its mill
tary objectives yielded no lmpor.
tant successes. Many homes were
set aflame by the explosive patterr
of hundreds of bombs
Dozens of planes duelled over the
steppes at the approaches to thu
steel city. A Russian frontal as.
sault was reported to have destroyed
so tanks and killed hundreds Of Ger.
mans to break up Nazi spearheat
striking from the northwest.
Break Through Lines.
Field dispatches said troops from
the Kalinin front had broker
through three successive lines o
Notifications the Germans were 81,
months in building about Rzhev.
Every available German within
Rzhev was pressed into duty TO
front-line service, the government
newspaper Izvestia declared.
Russian attacks were also presses
against the Gzhatsk and Vyazm
areas to the south.
Between Rzhev and Leningrad,
center of German resistance base'
on three tanks placed as pill boxe
was declared captured in local fight
ing on the northwestern front.
The midnight communiQue SAT-
Russian troops, maintaining tn
initiative in their drive Launched
August IL, broke into heavil
fortified populated place on the cen
trail front and killed 200 German
and disabled 26 enemy tanks.
Field dispatches indicated tn
point might be Sychevka, wa
station on the Rzhev-Vyazma rail