Evening star., 1944-07-17
Other Red Units
Only 10 Miles
From kuunus
MAP on Page A-5.)
BY the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press,
MOSCOW, July 17.-Red Army
troops pushed forward today
along a broad front stretching
from the Battles to the Pripet
Marshes after capturing the
German-held fortress of Grod-
no, described by Premier Stain
as covering the approach to
East Prussia"
Grodno, which the Germans an
nounced earlier they had evacuated.
is only as miles from the East Prus-
sian border. With its fall the Ger
mans have no natural barrier be-
tween them and their homeland. to
which it appeared the fighting
soon would be carried
The Germans fell back at Grodno
to the west bank of the Niemen
River, which parallels the East
Prussian border in that sector. Field
dispatches said new Russian cross
ing of the Niemen was made during
the Grodno battle The river has
been crossed by the Russians farther
north in the Alytus sector. where
the Red Army, pushing west of
Wilno, has driven within so miles
of East Prussia.
Consolidate Bridgehead.
The Russians have consolidated a
bridgehead on the west bank of the
Niemen. taking more than 40 posi-
tions across the stream in the Alytus
sector. front dispatches said.
Martin Hallensleben. military
expert for DNB German news
agency, suggested in a Berlin
broadcast that the Red Army
might be entering a trap in its
lightning offensive threatened to
isolate German troops in the Bal
| tic.
| tHallenSleben. admitting 1t as
| poor strategy to hold in the north
while giving up comparatively
extensive areas in the middle of
the line, asserted there will be
reasons for allowing the Russians
! to come so close. 1t will be safe
/ to count on number of sur
prises.'J
The Moscow communique disclosed
that Russian troops We're within 10
miles OF kaunas. old capital of Lith-
uania. with 63 capture of Dorsu-
nishki on the southeast. 1t reported d
the capture of more than $40 cities
and town extending from the east
ern border of Latvia southwest
through the big bulge into Lithuania
through GrodnO and to the eastern
approaches of Bialystok and Brest-
Litovsk.
/ Capture MstibOvO.
The Russians captured Mstibovo.
Is miles east Of Bialystok. bastion
on the Wilno- Warsaw railroad line
and series of towns to the north
east
Pushing toward Brest -Litovsk
Red Army troops captured Berez-
kartushkaya. 60 miles northeast.
and were about the same distance
away in a push westward along the
railroad from Pinsk.
! "a special broadcast by the
Moscow radio heard in London
told the Germans the game is
up II said 100000 Germans
we're taken prisoner and so di-
visions, possibly 500. 900 men. were
annihilated on the eastern front.
THE Germans squealed at our
declaration that we were making
straight for Berlin but these
were no empty words" the broad
cast saidD
The Russians announced they had
forced the Issa River in drive
westward and southwestWard from
Opochka, and had reached the ap-
proaches of Sebezh. 10 miles from
the Latvian border. killing 1900
Germans in the days fighting.
/ Even as Cossacks. tanks and in
fantry charged inexorably toward
East Prussia. Red Air Force fighters
began shooting up objectives in that
cradle of Junkers militariSm Pravda
said an aerial regiment of stout little
Yak-9 fighters strafed an East Prus-
sian industrial city, so surprising
the Germans that they were unable
to throw up fax.