The Waterbury Democrat., 1945-04-02


 quarters. Late dispatches placed thu size of the trapped Nazi army al 100000 to l50,OOO men, comprising the last major fighting force 1T northwestern Germany.
 More than 350,OO0 Germans al. ready had been captured in March and cock British and American troops streaming eastward toward Berlin told reporters the enemy'l complete collapse would be only 2 matter of days.
 On the heels of that far-reach' ing victory, probably the greates won by the Allied Armies of tht west since D-Day, the German! were reported in headlong fligh from Northern Holland, site of tht V-bomb bases from which tht Nazis had been bombarding Eng land since last June.
 Roads damned
 Front dispatches said miles-lonf columns of German transport were tanning the roads leading east ward from Holland. Trucks, tank: and staff cars were reported mov- ing bumper to bumper in a wilc race to escape with swarms of AL lied warplaneS bombing and straf- ing their line of flight.
 Far to the southeast, the Amer ican Third Army battled into the streets of Kassel, pivot of the splintered German defenses in the center of the Reich only l65 miles southwest of Berlin.
 Other Third rmy forces raced to the outskirts of EiSenach, 40 miles southeast of Kassel. There the Americans were 152 miles from Berlin and only 90 miles from Leip- zig, target of Red Army drive from the cast.
 Still farther south, the Nazl Shrine City of Nuremberg was im- periled by armored columns of the American Seventh Army racing down over the broad plains barely 40 miles to the northwest.
 On the Seventh Army's right flank, vanguards of the French First Army were across the Rhine in force on a front of more than 12 miles. Late dispatches said the French were more than 19 miles beyond the Rhine and moving fast toward Stuttgart, 31 miles south- east of their advanced spearheads
 The averaging French Army, led by Fierce Moroccan and Algerian veterans, were heading for the castle town of Sigmaringen, 46 miles south of Stuttgart, where the aged Marshal Henri Philippe Pe- tain and the traitor Pierre Laval last were reported hiding out un- der protection of the gestapo.
 Even more sensational advances were reeled of at the northern end of the battlefront, where Field Marshal Sir Bernard L. Montgom- ery's American and British forces of the Fist Army group were sweep ing almost unchallenged across the Westphalian plain on the wide open roads to Berlin and the North German seaport.
 Montgomery's American Ninth, British Second and Canadian First Armies were operating under a complete security blackput that cloaked the location of their fore most units. R.
 But heavily-censored front dis patches said the three armies had thrown perhaps 1000 tanks and hundreds of fast armored cars into tremendous breakthrough 100 miles or more beyond the Rhine and about 19O miles due west of Berlin.
 Sth, 1st Linked
 The Ninth Arlny's Second Ar mored Division linked up with the American First Army near Lipp- stadt, IT miles west of Paderborn to seal of the Ruhr, while the Brit ish and Canadians swung out to the east and northeast in twin powerdrives into Holland and the north German plain.
 German military spokesmen ad- mitted somberly that the Tommies were in the Westphalian capital o1 Muenster and 40 miles beyond ir the Bielefeld area, 189 miles west of the Nazi capital
 The extent of the German col lapse in the north was evidenced in the flaming ruins of Rheine. where the Luftwaffe blew up its greatest fighter base in western Germany leaving the broken Wehrmacht to the mercy of the Allied Air Forces
 Allied headquarters gave only the sketchiest details on the envelop- ment of the Ruhr, but it was indi- cated that doughboys of the Amer ican First and Ninth Armies were swarming through the teeming fac tory cities to root out and capture trapped German divisions there.
 Some NaI units near the eastern end of the pocket were reported fighting fiercely in vain effort tc break out and rejoin their fleeing Army. Most of the trapped divi- sions, however, appeared ready tc quit and the Ruhr was said to be festooned with white flags.
 Front correspondents predicted the entire Ruhr would be cleared within a very few days. That tri- umph, more than nay other Allied victory in the east or west, sig nailed the end of Germany's bid for world conquest.
 Stripped of the great arsenals oi the Ruhr, the Nazi regime that Hit Ter boasted would endure for a thou sand years had little hope of liv- ing for another thousand hours. Cross Sieg River
 Sixty miles southwest of the junc- ture point at Lippstadt, other First Army troops broke across the Siee river into the southern flank O! the Ruhr basin and entered Siegen
 Only moderate rifle and machine gun fire met the first Tanks into that city, and it was expected to fall in short order.
 Twenty-Five miles southeast oi Paderborn, the First Army's 104tt Onfantry Division advanced 3 1-s xx441aW r,% VHya ,.t.,,~rx ko vaa oIS kIaa D;,sa