The Waterbury Democrat., 1945-02-16

of isolated or partly isolated Ger man groups battled desperately against tightening Soviet rings or to escape the closing jaws of Red Army pincers.
 The German high command claimed that resistance in lower Si- lesia had stiffened. In the same communique. however. it said Ko- nev was able to enlarge his beach area yesterday"
 The Berlin communique said that in southern Pomerania the Germans had re-established contact with the Temporarily" encircled bases of Arnswalde and Balm, the latter 22 miles south of Stettin.
 Advancing at the same breakneck speed that marked the opening days of the Russian winter offensive five weeks ago, Marshal Ivan s. Konevs First Ukrainian Army broke across the Silesian border and plunged "A miles or more into Berlin's home province of Brandenburg.
 Konevs tanks and armored troop carriers drove ahead 25 miles in two dayes and were closing in swiftly on the twin German strongholds Of Cottbus and Guben, covering Ber- lin'S southern approaches.
 American heavy bombers came through with another smashing blow at Cottbus yesterday in direct support of the advancing Russians last reported only 12 miles from the city.
 The spectacular breakthrough threatened to drive an armored wedge between Berlin and the bomb-gutted Saxon capital of Ores den, barely 48 miles east of the Red Army.
 Moscow dispatches said Konev's troops had reached the Neisse river. last important water barrier before Dresden, and the river fortress of Goerlitz, 48 miles east of the Saxon capital, was believed already under assault.
 German military spokesmen in dicated the Neisse already had been preached at some points, and they reported that Konevs troops had joined forces with Marshal Gregory K. Zhukov's First White Russian Army massed along the Oder di- rectly east of Berlin.
 The Nazis said units of the First Ukrainian army pushed Six miles north of captured Gutenberg to link up with Zhukov's troops on the Oder.
 The Soviet morning communique gave no word on the battle raging along the First White Russian front 31 to 45 miles east of Berlin. Field dispatches, however, said Russian re serves and equipment were stream ing up to the river for a massive assault on Berlin.
 Sommerfield Falls
 At the center of Konev's offensive front, the Soviets captured Sommer- field, 66 miles southeast of Berlin, and Sorau, 12 miles farther south east. The fall of Sorau outfianked the Nal prisoner-of-War center of Sagan, seven miles to the west, but there was no immediate indication that any Allied captives still were being held ill that area. German reports, still unconfirmed ill Moscow, said the Russians pushed on a dozen miles or more beyond Sommerfield to the area northwest of Forst. where they were only l2 miles from Cottbus and 10 miles from the Spree river which, farther north, flows through Berlin. 1 The fall of Cottbus would put the Soviets on a military super-highway leading straight to Berlin, 48 miles to the northwest. Guben, highway center of almost equal importance. was only IA miles northwest or Konev' forces at Sommerfeld.
 The entire German front ap- peared to be crumbling under the Russian hammerblows, which all ready had broken through or breasted the enemys stand-or-die Oder line on a front of almost 300 miles extending from above Berlin down past encircled BreSlau almost to the Czechoslovak border.
 More than 1000 Germans were captured in the First Ukrainian Army breakthrough and thousands more were killed. The speed of the advance was indicated by the Mos COW announcement that 765 Ger man planes were seized intact on captured Nazi airdromes in the past five days.
 Far to the north, units of the Second White Russian Army battled up into the Polish Corridor to take Chojnice and Tuchola, 60 and 59 miles southwest of Danzig. In western Poland, other Soviet forces cleared most of the by-passed city of Ponan, whose complete capture would give the Russians & direct supply route from Warsaw to the 1 Oder hridpeheadS before Berlin.