Evening star., 1944-12-08
Patton Forces
AdvanceDeeper
Into WestW
Lines Inside Forbuch
Extended; Guns Still
SheIIing Soorbrucken
By the Associated Press.

By the Associated Press.
PARIS, Dec. 8.-Lt. Gen.
George S. Patton, jr,. today ham
mered home his attack a mile
and a half into the Siegfried
Line and 8 miles deep in Ger
many's Saar Valley. while his Sd
Army Long Toms and hoWitzers
ripped to pieces its capital of
Saarbrucken from about 3 miles
away.
The campaign was a month old
today and already had invalidated
the rich coal region which supplies
the German Army with 10 per cent
of its iron and steel
Infantry broadened their foothold
across the Saar, merging three orig
inal crossings into two strong bridge
heads at Saarlautern and Dillingen
along stretch where the whole east
bank is built solidly with one little
war industry steel town after an
other. A cavalry squadron extended
its lines inside Forbach, French rail
city of II 500 population, 81 miles
southwest of Saarbrucken.
The Paris radio broadcast that
the Sd Army had captured For
bach
Yanks Penetrate Woods.
Back in the heavily hills
behind the factory towns which the
American assault has turned into
backgrounds are the great collieries
and coke ovens, whose l6,500 900 tons
annual output have been forging the
metal for much of HitlerS fighting
machine.
The Yanks penetrated into the
Pachtener BuchWald, woods north
west Of Saarlautern. after cutting
the railroad to Merzig in a penetra-
ton of the stout Siegfried Line. The
drive appeared to be gaining mo-
mentum.
Saarbrucken, Saar capital of 1885,
000 was suffering the fate of Aachen
For the ninth consecutive day, Sd
Army loss and 155S deluged its for
ests of factory chimneys with high
Texans of the Goth Infantry pene-
trated the Slegfried Line 3 miles
north of Saarlautern. Mai. Gen
Harry L. TWaddle's 95th Infantry,
across the river from Saarlautern,
also was beating against a fringe of
Siegfried Line pillboXes in the sub
urban towns
Furnaces Practically Useless.
Already the great blast furnaces
of Dillingen, Volklingen, Neunkir-
chen and-most of all-of Saar-
brucken. now are as good as useless
to Germany. They drew their iron
ore almost entirely from French
Lorraine, which now is almost COM
pletely in Allied hands.
The two greatest steel plants in
the whole Saar Valley are located
in the Eastern Saarbrucken suburb
of Brebach and the western suburb
of Burbach.
While the Germans sacrificed
their rich little arsenal valley of a
million population, hundreds of
thousands of whom are skilled IRON
mongers and coal miners, there were
continued evidences of German
withdrawal on both vital f1anks.
along the Upper Rhine and the
middle Roer opposite Cologne
To the north, the Germans again
cloaked their movements on the east
bank of the Roer with smokescreens
on the American 9Th Army front.
First Army patrols pushed to the
bank of the flooded Roer beyond
the Hurtgen Forest village of Berg
stein.
The weather was so bad that
night fighters were grounded.
Miles From COlmar.
To the south, the Allies jabbed
down the Alsace Plain to within 4
miles of Colmar. where front dis
patches said the Germans were
fighting a rear-guard action toward
the Rhine rail bridge at Breisach.
IA miles from. United States 7th
Army vanguards.
French 1st Army troops virtually