The Waterbury Democrat., 1945-01-06
Ardennes Fight Moving Toward Climax
GERMANS FEAR DEATH POCKET
 FOR 100000

DA Js EDWhkSD MURRAY United Press War COrrespOndentg
 Paris, January 6. - (UP) - Spreading tank and infan- try battles ragged indecisively all around the ArdenneS salient today as the Germans retreated grudgingly before the Allied counter-offenSive in the north and lashed back furiouSly at the American Third Army on their south ern flank.
 Headquarters revealed that the American Second and Third armored divisions, the 84th and 83rd Infantry and the 82nd Air Borne Division were experimenting the U. s. First Army attack in the north.
 Bad weather limited Allied aerial operations over the Ardennes early today, but 8 force of British heavy bomb CTS pounded German troop and tank concentrations in the Houffalize area at the center of the pocket before dawn.
 Perhaps 100000 men and massive armored forces already were committed on both sides, and field diS~ patches said the battle of the Ardennes was moving swiftly toward it's climax, with the Allies hurling their greatest strength against the nortll- ern flank in a bid for a break through that would splinter the Nazi pocket. s
 More than 100 miles to the south east, the Germans were embarked on a second dangerous gamble in a twin drive into the Alsace corner that menaced the entire U. s. Sev- enth Army front, but which also was being countered effectively by the Americans.
 In that area, the Germans forced a crossing of the Rhine above Strassbourg and drove more than ten miles through the Seventh Army front below Bitche to cut the important rail and road lines be- tween Haguenau and Saarbrucken. A prompt American counter-attaek hurled the Germans back on the latter sector, but at last reports the enemy still held his new Rhine brtdgehead.
 Resistance Stiffens
 On the Ardennes front, the Am~ erican First and British Second Armiesu nder Field Marshal Sir Bernard l.. Montgomery battled yard by yard through the NaZiS' northern and northwestern Hanks against resistance that appeared to be stiffening by the hour.
 Hampered by sudden thaw that turned many sectors of the front into 8 slushy quagmire and chan neled their armored units onto the narrow mountain roads, the Allies were making only slow progress, but & communique said the counter.of. fensive still was rolling steadily for~ ward.
 Early today, after advances rang ing from about 1000 yards to more than two miles in 24 hours, the Al- lies had showed forward an average of four miles on the focal 21-mile front from Marche to Arbrefon- taine since the jump-off Wednesday morning.
 The German salient, now little more than half its original size, was compressing slowly under the con- verging Allied blows and threaten~ ing to become death pocket for the 20O,O00-odd NaziS locked in the ArdenneS.
 Latest headquarters dispatches said Montgomerys Vanguards were within two miles of the St. Vith-La Roche highway at a number of places and less than four miles from La Roche itself at two points.
 The waist of the pocket was bare. ly l2 miles wide between the First Army spearheads ill the Bois De Fave south of Grandmenil and It. Gen. George s. Pattons Third Army forces north of Bastogne.
 Montgomery's troops were fight ing everywhere inside the Germans main battle screen thrown across the northern flank of the salient1 cracking head-on through Nazi are tillery and machine gun nests com- manding every road and mountain trail in the Ardennes.
 On the eastern flank of the Al lied attack line, American troops heat off series of stabbing Ger man counter-attacks and captured