The Pittsburgh Press (January 2, 1943)
Japs warned –
Wake bombing only ‘sample’
‘Green’ U.S. fliers attack; 2 stowaways aboard
By Frank Tremaine, United Press staff writer
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Japs warned –
Supply lanes blocked –
Bombers raze Tunisian ports
Axis shipping diverted from Bizerte, Tunis
By Edward W. Beattie, United Press staff writer
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3 Jap supply ships, sub hit; new wedge made in Guinea
By Brydon C. Taves, United Press staff writer
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U.S. planes attack Jap ships at Kiska
Washington (UP) –
The Navy announced today that U.S. planes again attacked Japanese cargo ships in Kiska Harbor in the Aleutians Friday and shot down one of six enemy “Zeros” which attempted to intercept the attack.
No U.S. planes were lost, the Navy said. Clouds prevented complete observation of results.
On the same day, U.S. dive bombers dropped bombs in the vicinity of Kokumbono on Guadalcanal in the Solomons, where Japanese headquarters are believed to be located. Kokumbono is seven miles west of Henderson Field.
Other U.S. planes continued their almost daily bombing of the Japanese air raid in the Munda area of New Georgia Island, 150 miles northwest of Guadalcanal.
All U.S. planes returned undamaged from the Munda raid.
Gas will be used in war, arsenal officers predict
First such attack by Axis will find America well prepared to reply in kind
By Walker Stone, Scripps-Howard staff writer
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I DARE SAY —
Men without letters
By Florence Fisher Parry
Home front complainers must seem shrill and futile to the war machine, intent upon its own intricate and colossal functionings.
On the other hand, it would be folly to disregard the feelings of those countless men and women who, having given up their sons and lovers to the war, claim the right to speak their grievances, their hopes, and their demands.
In the 15 years that I have been writing this daily column, the mail that comes in to me from readers has served as an uncanny barometer of public trends of thought, and I have come more and more to depend upon these letters as the truest of all indications of what is thought and felt and deemed important by the rank and file.
Since Pearl Harbor, there has been an overwhelming change in the hearts of the people. Cynicism, which so dominated the mood of the people before our entrance into the war, has dropped entirely away, and the return to the most basic emotions is manifested in the letters I now receive.
They come largely from the fathers and mothers of boys in our Armed Forces, and from their sweethearts and young wives; and I find that in these letters there is to be found a growing resentment over frequent failure of our government to get mail to and from the fighting front.
Now we know that whatever breakdown is occurring is certainly not due to those faithful servants of the express and postal services. We must assume that they are doing all they can. We must look elsewhere for the guilty ones upon whom we may attach the blame.
The guilty
And we need not look far. The guilty ones are you and I and the whole home front. We have not made way for the extra burden upon the mails.
Every day my postman brings to me a burden of mail which has weighted his mailbag, sagged his shoulders and slowed his capacity to serve. Of this mail, I should say that not one-twentieth of its weight is made up of actual letters. Most of it is advertising matter. One-half of it is not even read.
The actual letters themselves are featherweight in comparison. And as we all know, it is the letters, the letters only, that count.
But even these letters, however important, are still too long and thick. They exhibit, still, a wastefulness of paper, and could be reduced to one-half or one-third their bulk by thoughtful conservation of writing paper, and the use of thinner and more closely writing pages.
Now we know that the government is tied down like Gulliver by the red tape involved in the conduct of its intricate clerical business. Just how many reams of documents each one of us receives each year out of Washington is a matter for the professional computers to estimate; and since the government is congenially wasteful, we cannot hope for a reduction of paper tonnage in this department of our mails.
The true picture
But something should be done, and quickly, to ease the growing congestion.
Let it be, then, in Heaven’s name, the junk and trash of unnecessary advertising matter, and a sane omission of unnecessary letters among those of us on the home front.
Most personal letters are too long, just as most telephone conversations are too long. Now would be an excellent time for us to improve our style in writing by seeing how economically we can phrase our letters, reducing them to capsules of information and endearment.
Voluminous letters are simply unpatriotic, unless they are directed to our absent warriors now so desperately in need of word from home. Let these letters only continue to be long and frequent! Burden the mails with them! Let them be ever-flowing, overflowing.
We are not getting now, nor will we ever get, the true picture of the loneliness and heartache of our boys now in this war. They sim0ly won’t admit to us how they really feel. Their home training has been against it.
Fearful of being misjudged, afraid to be thought unequal to “taking it,” the weakest of our boys are making attempt to cover up the terrible homesickness which overtakes them.
Now, nothing can help this ailment so much as letters, letters, letters!
I have before me a letter. This is what it says in part:
I get my son’s letters from England and Africa, but so far, he hasn’t got anything from me and I write every day. He writes:
Don’t send me anything but letters, but send them.
The Government tells us in every one of its morale-building agencies to keep on writing letters to our boys; but what good does it do if they do not receive them? I know by my son’s letters that he is homesick for word of us and has had nothing to help that homesickness but letters. He writes:
What I want to say most is … and then the rest is all blacked out.
Maybe the Army does not want us to know how homesick they are.
I wish, Mrs. Parry, you could start some campaign that would make it more likely for our boys to get letters! We’re writing them all the time and we’re getting their letters pretty regularly, never mind where they are. But what happens to ours? Please try to help us.
A MOTHER.
Victory depends on new oil fields, House group says
War demands of one million barrels a day require more wells and stringent economy in domestic use of present supply, committee reports
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Japs take veteran of 15 years in Army
Sgt. George Sotak, 41, a soldier in the U.S. Army for the past 15 years, is a Jap prisoner according to word received here by the serviceman’s sister, Miss Anna Sotak, 1507 Eckert St.
Sgt. Sotak was previously reported “missing in action” in the Philippines, the sister said, he has served in various parts of the world with the Army.
Two brothers, Andrew, 25, and John, 42, recently joined the armed services.