Scorch or Be Scotched

If the German break-through this week was as extensive as the Nazis claimed, there was only one substantial Soviet hope left: the classic scorched earth. How well was it working last week?

One widely advertised Nazi advantage was said to be the fact that grain was still too green to burn. But in some places they were reaping green corn; in others, they hauled out sprayers formerly used for pest-killing, and burned the grain with chemicals; in others, though abandoning the standing grain, they ruined agricutural machinery, depriving the Germans of the means of reaping it.

Communications were being wrecked. Russian railways are wide-gauge, so that German rolling stock is useless; and the Russians were withdrawing or wrecking such of their rolling stock that survived German attacks. Bridges were blown up, telephone lines cut, wells destroyed or poisoned. Roads were piled high with wrecked equipment, pitted deep with shells, sewn thick with mines.

Meantime if the scorched earth does not materially delay Adolf Hitler, soaked earth may bog him down. Last week, after early torrents, an Italian reporter wrote: "The German tanks churn up the mud and earth with their treads and reach their objectives only after great difficulty."

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