The Waterbury Democrat., 1943-12-10
The War On
 MonyFronts

.-
 Bulgaria, the chief Axis satellite i.1 the Balkans, was reported on t..e verge of quitting the war to- (, as beaten German armies be- I an apparently general retreat J n their mountain oefenses III '. ly and fell back under increas- i. ,ly heavy Soviet blows In Russia.
 Press and radio dispatches from { yitzerland, Sweden and Axis-dom- = irated Hungary-all unconf1rmed Gus far-said Bulgaria was about t, sue for peace to avoid becoming |. battlefield for Germany and the :. led powers.
 These reports said the government ! ordered general mobilization as < precaution against German re- ! .sals and that Premier Dobri Eo- ov was trying to form new cab- i t.
 .he reported crack-up followed a .rrny secret session Of the Bull ian parliament yesterday in which f.e opposition excoriated the gov uient's pro-Ge1man policy ana
 .,.G the removal of Foreign Min ,r Georgi Shishmanov.
 Red Delegation
 Simultaneously, new Russian :, i!itary delegation arrived in Sofia f,,d NaZi envoy Herbert von Rich tofen handed the Bulgarian govern r a-lt a stern warning not to aban- cen the war.
 One report said the situation, ap- parently touched of by the Anglo hmerican-Turlisn conference and s,tbreouent indications that Turkey rad decided to join the Allies, would reach a showdown within the next 52 hours. .,
 Balkan sources in Cairo said frhting already had flared up be- tween German and Turkish troops along tie T'urko- Bulgarian frontier and that both sides had exchanged shots across the border
 Berlin also showed signs of nerv- ousness over the decisions reached at the recent series of Allied con- frences in tn Middl East, and the transocean news agency's military commentator predicted an Allied Invasion of western Europe this winter or spring, coinciding with a east.
 Cairo Report
 Cairo reports said one of the first results of the Allied meetings might be the appointment of General George c. Marshall U. s. Army chief of staff. as commander Of the western invasion armies
 Tn Italy, meanwhile, Lieutenant General Mark Clark's Anglo Amer ican Fifth Army stepped up the pace of its Rome-bound offensive and front reports indicated the Germans were pulling out rapidly from their shattered defenses.
 Clark's infantrymen established firm control over the key Axis po s,tion at Mignano and swept down the northern slopes of the Camino N1aggiore Heights toward the main Rome road.
 United Press Correspondent Key holds Packard reported the retreat ing Germans were burning moun- tain villages behind them and fall ing back so rapidly that they were unable to save many of their heavy guns and trucks.
 Break Up Imminent
 A similar breakup appeared inn ss.Aent on the Adriatic front. where HAneral Sir Bernard L. Montgom- s- y,s British Eigth Army veterans s~g1t the Nazis reeling northward in She Orsogna and Ortona sectors both anchor points in the German Nne below Pescara.
 Heavy fighting continued in Rus sia along a broad front from the .alev Salient to the Lower Dnieper. In the latter area, the German stronghold at Znamenka, control point of the Nal-held railway net work in the southern Ukraine, fell to the Red Army.
 German defenses south of Znam- enka fell apart under the Russian attack and the enemy fled pell-men from Meredova, 10 miles south of the junction town, abandoning guns and ammunition in the flight.
 Capture of znamenka was an- Hounced by Premier Marshal Posef Stalin fin an order of the day.
 Farther north, Red Army troops finally halted the massive German counter-attack against the Kiev salient after having been forced back twice in the previous "A hours. Seventy-five German tanks were knocked out in the critical Chern- yal.hov sector of that front yes- tarday, running German losses in three days of fighting to 234 pan gers.
 Moscow emphasized, however, that the Germans were continuing their attacks and hurling huge tank and infantry forces against the Russian salient in endless waves, in an ef- fort to smash through to the Dnieper River.
 Tn Washington, naval experts said the number of NaI U-boats sunk Ey Allied sea and air forces in had exceeded the number of their victims and they indicated the Germans might be forced to their "wolf-pack" Subma- rine tactics.
 1,,auia~ .haoL, keaav.~ ixs kkA YTh1