Victory in the North

Last week the Red Army greatly improved its chances to win the war against Germany, greatly lessened the Germans' chances to come back this spring and summer. What had happened in south Russia, after the relief of Stalingrad, was now happening in the north. The Germans were retreating along most of a 700-mile front from Leningrad to Orel.

The northern retreat began in the Demyansk swamps south of Lake Ilmen, where Marshal Semion Timoshenko climaxed an offensive with a great breakthrough (TIME, March 8). For 18 months the Germans had clung doggedly to the western part of the swamp area. In the warm months these marshlands form one of the best natural barriers in Russia. Last year this barrier served the Germans; this year it will serve the Red Army and hamper any German counteroffensive in the north. Winter's freeze made the swamps passable, and Timoshenko used the waning weeks of winter to smash through so fast that the Nazis left behind enough equipment for a full army corps. At week's end Timoshenko's army was threatening Staraya Russa, Nazi-held fortress just south of Lake Ilmen.

Two days after Timoshenko's breakthrough, the Russians won an even bigger victory--the capture of Rzhev. It was from Rzhev, 140 miles northwest of Moscow, that the Germans began the powerful drive on Russia's capital in the autumn of 1941 which almost landed Adolf Hitler inside the Kremlin. It was the city which, above all others, Hitler had to hold if he hoped to try again.

In the Wehrmacht's scheme of defense Rzhev was the main forward hedgehog protecting the Germans in north or central Russia. For 14 months Red armies had hammered the city, until last week had never managed to break its defenses. According to the Russians, Hitler himself once told his generals that Rzhev's fall would be equal to the "loss of half of Berlin."

Southeast of Rzhev other Russian columns captured Gzhatsk, the German position nearest (125 miles) to Moscow, and converged on the railway-junction town of Vyazma. Its fall would enable all the Red armies on the Central Front to combine for a drive toward Smolensk. The whole German position in central Russia was crumbling away.

Strategically, the Russian victories last week were as big as any that have been won in the entire winter offensive, save that at Stalingrad. But comparatively few German troops were killed or captured. This suggested that the Germans had previously withdrawn the bulk of their forces, and that they were still "shortening the line," sacrificing precious geography in order to save their armies.

Berlin had assured the German people that Adolf Hitler intends to strike again at the Russians this year. His armies in the north last week were acting as though they hoped only to find a line where they could stand and hold the Russians beyond the borders of the Greater Reich.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.