Catastrophe

Across the damp, dark face of southern Russia, a vast and portentous victory took shape. At a mile an hour, the front rolled towards the Black Sea. Fifty German divisions were in retreat. Hushed, frightened Bucharest babbled of peace.

Along the 500-mile-long front, from the Dnieper's mouth to the Carpathians, four Red Armies hacked their way forward. Their prime objective: the web of railroads over which the enemy could be reinforced--or retreat. This week, all but one inferior escape line into Rumania had been cut. Birds of ill omen hovered over the fringes of the German-held steppe --air transports were dropping fuel and supplies to stalled trucks and tanks.

Marshal Georgy Zhukov's men battled in the streets of Tarnopol (see map). This 400-year-old town is a gateway to the great fortress of Lwow; the key to the fate of the German armies in the Ukraine. To hold it, the Germans rushed in huge reinforcements (a Red scouting plane saw a column of 400 tanks), emplaced guns on a hill dominating the town, fought for every house.

Marshal Ivan Konev's men captured the Luftwaffe's key base of Uman. The Germans were still digging trenches when the Russians struck, had no time to destroy immense supply dumps, fled half-clothed. This week Konev's Army was pounding on the German defense wall on the Bug.

General Rodion Malinovsky's Army splashed into Kherson and on toward Nikolayev after a spectacular overnight thrust. In the flooded plain, the cavalry bore the brunt of battle. Shrewdly, Malinovsky sent a myriad of raiding units--a tank or two, tommy gunners, horsemen--into the steppe to sow panic. They did their job well: Moscow said nowhere was chaos greater than in this sector.

This week a fourth Army--presumably General Feodor Tolbukhin's--crossed the lower Dnieper, struck beyond Kherson. Said Moscow in jubilation: the defeat was becoming a catastrophe.

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