Evening star., 1944-02-20
Warships Shell Rabau|> Kavienq;
Big Eniwetok Airbase Captured;
German Losses Heavy at Anzio
5th Army Lines
Hold Firm Under
Fierce Assault
= the Associated Press.

ALLIED HEADQUARTERS
NAPLES, Feb. 19.-American and
British troops have carpeted the
ground before their Anzio beach
head line with German dead and
in four days have wiped out as
many as half of some Nazi units
in one of the greatest and most
crucial battles of the war, front
dispatches reaching here dis
closed tonight.
| Meeting the German attempt to
push them back into the sea with
a hurricane of steel, 5th Army troops
! fell back in one sector, but kept
their lines intact and prevented a
break-through. The Allied soldiers
were fighting doggedly to wear out
the Germans.
Against them the Germans have
thrown at least four divisions of
infantry and armor in this battle on
the beachhead front south of Rome.
~ NaZl FlaneS DOWned.
Allied airmen in a day of in
tense activity over the beachhead
today shot down at least II Nazi
planes and probably destroyed five
others of the more than 100 enemy
aircraft which attacked the British
ana American ground troops
The grim determination of the
British and American infantrymen
at the beachhead was praised by
1t. Gen. Mark w. Clark today who
said that these soldiers had risen
to new heights of courage and skill
in the bitter struggle
| He made this statement after an
other visit to his advanced head
quarters at the beachhead, and said
he was inspired anew by the wav
the Allied troops had guarded their
position against numerically su-
perlor forces. He had praise also
for the 5th Army tankmen and the
Allied naval forces engaged in the
| battle.
| Warning that further German as
saults could be expected, Gen. Clark
said that the enemy was finding it
increasingly difficult to pick soft
spots in the perimeter of the beach,
head.
Nazi Offensive Being Held.
In the days air battles over the
beachhead American medium
bombers shot down eight out of 20
German planes that tried to inter-
cept their bombing of Nazi supply
dumps around Carroceto. Return
ing pilots said that five more Ger
man planes were SO badly dam
aged that they probably crashed.
The bombers blew up a gasoline
dump which sent flames spouting
200 feet in the air.
| Seven German planes were shot
down by British fighters and two
by American fighter bombers.
A dispatch filed from the beach,
head at noon today by Daniel De
Luce, Associated Press correspond
ent. summed up the situation as of
that moment by saying: Field
Marshal Albert Kesselring's often
sive is being held"
Telling story of swaying battle
in which the Germans attacked with
"almoSt reckless sacrifice of lives
Mr.. DE Luce radioed:
i saw American doughboys and
tankmen hit back and recover in
two hours some ground that the
Germans had paid for with a heavy
loss of lives in "a hours continuous
fighting day earlier"
str Army Reinforced at Casino.
Mr.. De Luce had filed a dispatch
II hours previously declaring that
KeSselring by the weight of his in
tantry-arm blows, supported by
artillery and air power. had forced
the Allies back in a sector miles
wide. The correspondent asserted
however, that the Allied troops had
prevented breakthrough and the
Germans failed to gain tactically
decisive ground.
Mr.. De Luce's censored noon dis
(See TTAIV Dooo ac1