The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-02-09
The War On MonyFronts
By LOUIS F. KEEMLE Limited Pres War EditOr)


 Soviet armies, smashing into dis integrating German forward lines in the great Dnieper bend, threat ened today to break the backbone of the vaunted Wehmacht in southern Russia.
 The Russians in the last 10 days have defeated an estimated 29 German divisions of from 100000 to 100000 men, killing about 50,000, taking scores of thousands of pris- oners and driving the rest towards possible encirclement and ami hilation.
 With Nikopol in their hands and the last German bridgehead east of the Dnieper smashed, the Rus Sians were driving the remainder in retreat towards the mouths of the Dnieper and Bug rivers on the Black Sea. The Russian deter imitation not only to drive the enemy from Soviet soil but to smash his armies in the process was far closer to realization than I was at the time of the German disaster at Stalingrad.
 Elsewhere in the world except in Italy, Axis fortunes were at similarly low ebb. On the beach, head south of ome and on the main front running through Casino, the Germans threw all their energy into twin battls which for the time being had the Allies stopped.
 On the AnZio-Nettuno beachread the Allies had lost the initiative but were holling against heavy German counter attacks. Enemy aviation, although outnumbered, played an important part, in conjunction with artillery, which commanded the Allied positions from the heights.
 The Allies threw back repeated assaults by tanks and infantry, but the best that could be reported from the front was that they had lost no vital positions"
 Around Cassino the issue was similarly indecisive Fifth Army forces made some gains around the town, but in Casino itself a con- plete deadlock prevailed.
 In the air over western Europe, big formations of Allied medium bombers smashed at tactical targets in continuation of the heavy of- fensive which began yesterday.
 Bad for Nazis
 The situation on the Russian front was increasingly ominous for the Germans. It was clear that they had held their forward posi- tions along the middle Dnieper and around the bend too long.
 Now they are paying 6 heavy per- atty in men arc i3st tQuaplhent, with the possibility of withdrawing the bulk of their forces intact rapid ly vanishing.
 The entrapment of 10 divisions on the middle Dnieper near Cherkasi, the encirclement of five others in the advance on Nikopol, and now the routing of seven more across the river from Nikopol may be only the beginning.
 Russian armies to the north are driving into position to cut the main Odessa Warsaw railway, either at ~|AASA AAAAAiAel, bOWdANo CAlC DCSOdI dD4dIl border, or at the nerve center of Lwow within Poland. All the Ger man armies south of the Pripet marshes may be faced eventually with a withdrawal in poor order over poor communication lines towards southeastern Poland and the Bess- arabian-Rumanian border.
 Japan's position in the Pacific was developing along lines with a promising future outlook for the United Nations.
 The great American victory in the Marshall Islands has exposed what should turn out to be the fatal weakness of the Japanese both in sea and air power.
 Admiral Chester w. Nimitz, com mnader-in-chief in the Pacific, now envisions drive straight across the ocean to China, from where the death blow to Japan can be dealt. He does not believe the Japanese fleet can stop it.
 Japan did not dare risk her Navy to defend the MarshallS for obvious reasons. The ssea and air power which the United States unexpect- edly threw into that invasion would have smashed it, and the march to the Philippines, the Aslatic main-