The Waterbury Democrat., 1945-05-31

OOloSle pldlilS, DdGIlellelQ WHICH mas Eve.
 and small losses. Field Marshal Sir Harold R. L. G. Alexander admit ted that the campaign was rather stuck"
 In another sector of the Medi- teranean theater, the coming of winter brought liberation. As a consequence of Romania's surreri- der, the equalization of Bulgaria and Russian passage into Yugo- slavia, the Germans were com- pelled to evacuate Greece. British and Greek troops occupied Athens. By Nov 1, the British had reached Salonika, and on Nov. 4, Greece was officially liberated.
 The NaI star sank lower, and German power waned as both Great Britain and the United States resumed diplomatic rela- tions with Italy having already recognized the French government of Gen. Charles de Gaulle.
 By November, the Russians were preparing for their final drive on the Reich. A heavy Red force laid siege to Budapest capital of Hun gary. Striking across the flat Hun- garian plain, the Russians ap- parently aimed to take the prize by storm rather than to reduce it slowly by bombardment.
 Red Army Month
 November was traditionally the month when the Red Army began its winter offensive.
 In 1941, the Russians ended their long retreat, throwing the Germans back from Moscow. In November, 1942, they began the counter offensive at Stalingrad which marked the turning point of the war. In 1943, they smashed the Dnepr barrier carrying their offensive 250 miles west by spring through the prewar borders of Poland and Romania.
 British, American and French armies, too, were preparing for the final winter offensive. Their armies were ranged along the 5OO-mile length of the Western Front from the Netherlands to the Swiss bor- ocr. Six great armies drove into Nazi lines and two more were available.
 It. Gen. George s. Patton's Sd Army forces, which had spear headed the assault beginning in August in the Avranches break through, had taken Metz, fortress city since the time of Attila the Hun, entered Germany, reaching Sehndorf, near the junction of the German-Luxembourg border: then moving on to the Saar river. Final ly, Patton's troops had brokenintc burning Saarlautern and were holding mile stretch along the Saar river.
 The French 1st Army had reached the Rhine river nea, Kembs and taken Belfort afte, passing through the Belfort gap ir the Vosges. By the middle of No. Vember, French forces moved into StraSbourg. The U. S. 7th Arm, aug III on the German frontiel along a l7-mile front from thu Vosges to the Rhine and crossed the border in two places in tht Palatinate.
 The maSsing of six Allied armies aiming for the heart of Fortres: Germania was phase three of the offensive against the Reich. Phase one was the June 6 invasion ana the establishment of a permanent orldgehead. Phase two had been the burst out of the Avranches peninsula, setting in motion the multiple attack which smashed the Wehrmacht in France, driving its remnants back to the Reich from tier and through the Siegfried Line.
 This was the lineup of troops at live gateways to Germany: British Ed Army in the Netherlands, at the Westphalian gate in the lower Rhine valley, the best approach tc Berlin; the U. s. 1st and 9th Armies at the Cologne plain gate, between Belgium and the Rhine; the U. & 3d Army, striking from Metz at the Moselle gate; the 7th U. & Army at the Lorraine gate; and to the south, the French lst Army at the Belfort gap.