London, Feb. 4. 'HE Russians have begun a new bid to smash through the Mannerheim Line, and it is being conducted with a scientific precision that is astonishing the Finns, telegraphs Reuter's Special Correspondent on the Finnish-Swedish frontier.
The waves of aeroplanes, intensity of the artillery barrage, swarms of tanks, and the regular advance of the infantry reveal ce-ordination which was lacking in previous Russian attacks.
Soviet troops playing the main part in the attack in this sector are estimated at about one division of infantry, supported by an enormous number of tanks. The battlefield, now a chaotic inferno of churned-up and bloodstained snow, is fairly open country between lakes Muolaa and Kuolama, both frozen hard. The first onslaught is believed to have made considerable inroads into the Finnish lines, but the Finns recovered, launched carefully-timed counter-attacks, and regained their positions, 1f it proves that the Finns have broken the back of the Russian offend sive, they have every reason to be optimistic about the defensive qualities of the Mannerheim Line.
The Finns' greatest recent success was gained north of Lake Ladoga where the Soviets are fighting desperately at a number of points to escape the traps in which the Finns are trying to isolate them. Near the shore of the lake itself, a large body is reported to be making a grim struggle against a ring of Finnish machineguns, which is preventing them from rejoining their main body.
Italian planes have been among fighters doing defence work in the past few days.
Twelve Russian planes were shot down in various parts of Finland during yesterday's air raids.
Russian planes flew over south-east Finland last night and dropped a few incendiary bombs on the port of Bange, but the damage was insignia ficant.—Reuter,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.