America at war! (1941--) -- Part 2

African wrecking ground gets hard luck bomber

Spare Parts was gallant lady, but she insisted on getting into mischief on raids

Pro-U.S. policy believed aim of Argentina

New president showing desire to restore constitution
By Allen Haden

$298,946 paid Bing Crosby

SEC reveals earnings from recordings

‘Chuteless parachute developed for Army

Steel output lowest since December 1941

‘Irreplaceable loss’ of 50,000 tons caused by coal strike

U.S.-born Japs fail to swear allegiance

Los Angeles, California (UP) –
Four hundred and fifty American-born Japanese at the Poston, Arizona, relocation center refused to swear allegiance to the United States, according to testimony recorded today by a Dies subcommittee.

Of the 630 questioned, only 24 were women. All were over 17 years of age. None will be permitted to work outside the camp. There are 11,000 Nisei at Poston.

Ernie Pyle V Norman

Roving Reporter

By Ernie Pyle

NOTE: Before the heavy fighting in Tunisia which led to the Axis surrender, Ernie Pyle took a little side jaunt around Africa – a mere 13,000-mile trip. Only now has he had time to write the story of that trip. This is the second article.

Somewhere in Africa –
As you travel west and then south away from Tunisia, your feeling of leaving the war behind increases in direct proportion to the miles you travel.

In Algeria, you still feel the war, for you are surrounded by the flow of supplies and troops and equipment moving toward the front. You feel no danger, but you have that exhilarating surge that comes of great activity around you.

In Morocco, the atmosphere is different. There is still great activity there, but it is so far from the front that you feel a definite wall between you and what is going on up there in Tunisia. It’s sort of like the warmup before the big game.

But south of Morocco – well, you seem only to be forever practicing. Our camps throughout the rest of Africa are sort of normal affairs. You have a daily job to do and it’s the same every day. Your job is vital, and yet there’s nothing to fight. You feel a sense of frustration; you’ve finally reached the ball park, but you can’t see the diamond.

Ashamed of living so well

All through Africa, I ran onto this same feeling. Morale was perfectly good and people were doing their jobs and doing them well; but everybody had in the back of his head the burning yearning to get up north where the shootin’ was going on.

Down below, some of the permanent bases are almost like country clubs. There is little difference between life there and life at an American posy in peacetime. Dozens of times I’ve heard soldiers, all the way from privates to colonels, express a feeling of shame that they were living so well.

I know how they feel, and I sympathize. Yet they shouldn’t feel ashamed. For their jobs are vital. They’re doing a work that must be done or else their fellowmen at the front could not survive. Everybody can’t be on the firing line.

And as for living well, I certainly see no harm in it if you’re equipped to do so, and can do it without taking anything away from anybody else. It seems to me that living miserably just out of sympathy would be a ridiculous affectation.

‘Always gotta do something’

This impatience with a static camp life is just a manifestation of the normal American necessity to bust out and do things.

One day, I was talking with the commander of a camp far in the jungle, a camp we were closing because it was no longer needed. The camp was near a famous and bad rapids.

The commander said:

I guess it’s a good thing we’re leaving here. Take those rapids as an example. People have lived around for thousands of years, and nobody has ever tried to shot the rapids.

But if we stayed here another month, sure as hell some soldier would go over those rapids in a barrel. That’s just the way we are. Always gotta do something. That’s the best thing about us.

And I know of another case of farawayness-from-the-front getting under some soldiers’ skins. This also happened at one of our tropical camps.

Four soldiers couldn’t stand the peacefulness any linger, so they bought two dugout canoes, stocked up with provisions, hired two native boys to help, and started by river to Cairo – a little matter of 5,000 miles.

By tom-tom teletype

The soldiers were gone three days before they were caught. The order for their capture, incidentally, was carried upriver through the jungle by native tom-toms, beating out the message from village to village, on orders of the Army.

The boys’ commander told me that personally he would have liked to give them medals, but rules are rules, so he had to order them court-martialed for desertion. They were let off with a month apiece, and now are transferred to another camp. They still haven’t got to the fighting line, but their ex-commander bets they’ll get there eventually.

Millett: Don’t cry girls, you have chance to meet many men

By Ruth Millett

President Roosevelt’s remarks at a dinner for the President of Paraguay
June 9, 1943

May I take this opportunity to say what I have had in my heart for a long time. We are very happy to have President Morinigo here, because we have great reasons to be grateful to Paraguay for the magnificent stand they have taken and for the solidarity of their armies.

I shall never forget, not so long ago – it seems many years at the conference in Rio de Janeiro, we needed positive action. We had all agreed on the one subject – on that action for solidarity: breaking off relations with the Axis powers.

At that time at that meeting, the Foreign Ministers of Paraguay, acting on instructions from their President, stepped forward at just the right moment and the right timing, and pledged Paraguay in this great effort of all the Americas – the thought of the hemisphere – that we should break off relations with the brigands of modern civilization.

Paraguay acted in accordance with an old slogan of mine, “Do not only the right thing, but do it at the right time,” and thereby gave heart to all of our sister Republics. From that time on we have had closer dealings with Paraguay than ever before in our history.

I do not have to speak, outside of this room perhaps, about the great bravery, the plain, the sheer bravery of the armies of Paraguay. Throughout all these years – many, many years, more than centuries – the soldiers of Paraguay representing their nation can, I think, be called the bravest soldiers in all the Americas, because they have had the thought of maintaining their independence as the first thought in all their minds. They have lost thousands of the best blood of Paraguay in battle, and they have come through with their independence.

The General and President, as I put it, is one of the most distinguished generals of that magnificent army. We think of him not only as the President of the Republic, but also as the leader of the armies of Paraguay in their latest war. We hope they will not have to go through wars of that kind again. We hope that all of the Republics will work together to see that they do not have to defend their independence any more.

During these years, because of geography, it has been very difficult for us to go to Paraguay. We thought of it as an interior Republic, far up one of the greatest rivers of the continent. And yet, with the advent of airplanes, and the advent of better roads, we look forward to the day when more Americans can go there, and go there as a natural and logical part of their visits to the other countries of the hemisphere.

I hope that those relations – not merely communication, but trade and everything else that goes with it – are going to increase. We think that we have broken the ice, not only in our Pan-American or diplomatic relations, but also in regard to getting to know each other better.

And so I hope that in the years to come Paraguay and the United States will become closer personal friends than we have ever been before. Toward that end this government – the government and President – are going hand in hand; and may this association be carried out more greatly, more usefully- spiritually, economically, materially, in every way.

We recognize Paraguay very definitely as one of the great Republics of the Americas.

And so it gives me great pleasure to propose a toast to His Excellency the President of Paraguay.

U.S. Navy Department (June 10, 1943)

Communiqué No. 405

South Pacific.
On June 9, during the afternoon, Flying Fortress (Boeing B‑17) heavy bombers, escorted by Warhawk (Curtis P‑40) and Lightning (Lockheed P‑38) fighters, bombed Japanese positions at Munda on New Georgia Island in the Central Solomons. No U.S. losses were sustained.

North Pacific.
On June 9, during the day, nineteen more of the enemy were killed on Attu Island. In addition, five prisoners were taken.

The Pittsburgh Press (June 10, 1943)

PANTELLERIA SHOWDOWN NEARS
Nazi broadcast reports Allied landing on isle

Waves of bombers batter stepping stone to Italy; Axis garrison will capitulate, Malta says


Raiders blast 36 Axis planes

Pantelleria almost blown from sea, fliers say

ICKES SLAPS FINE ON MINE STRIKERS
450,000 to pay dollar a day for five days

$2,250,000 fund marked for charitable use by fuel czar

Try invasion if you dare, Berlin crows

But Nazis rush defenses, Rommel taking over in South France

U.S. Air Force in Britain doubled in last 2 months

Gen. Eaker says number of planes to be increased two-fold again by September
By Walter Cronkite, United Press staff writer

Mass draft hits fathers in September

Toughened ‘time schedule’ devised; 18-25s to love job deferment
By Blair Moody, North American Newspaper Alliance

Congress races coal deadline

Anti-strike law ready for new vote

Didn’t consider Hannah married, promoter says

Mrs. Dempsey and he were merely friends, divorce witness says

Chaplin and Joan Barry settle her paternity suit

Film comedian to give girl $2,500 immediately and $100 until further court order

Roosevelt signs pay-go tax measure

Washington (UP) –
President Roosevelt today signed the pay-as-you-go income tax bill providing for a 20% withholding tax to start July 1 and forgiving 75-100% of a year’s tax liability for all persons.

I DARE SAY —
The brushoff

By Florence Fisher Parry