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

Die kleinen Staaten sollen sich den Sowjets ausliefern –
Roosevelt als Moskaus Zutreiber

vb. Wien, 8. Februar –
In einer Hinsicht kann Stalin mit seinen Helfershelfern in London und Washington zufrieden sein: sie geben sich alle Mühe, den Bolschewisten die Hasen in die Küche zu treiben. Das gilt nicht zuletzt für Roosevelts Bemühungen, Litwinow bei der Anknüpfung diplomatischer Beziehungen zu den iberoamerikanischen Ländern vorzuarbeiten. Manche dieser Staaten, die ja sozial in sich nicht festgefügt sind, haben früher schon peinliche Erfahrungen mit bolschewistischer Wühlarbeit machen müssen, die von Moskau geleitet wurde und die meisten von ihnen haben daher niemals Sowjetvertretungen zugelassen oder ihnen nach kurzer Zeit wieder den Stuhl vor die Tür gesetzt, sobald sie sich als Agitationszentralen der bolschewistischen Weltrevolution betätigten.

So war es auch in Uruguay. Montevideo war früher ein beliebter Stützpunkt der Sowjets. Jetzt muß die uruguayische Regierung wieder eine Gesandtschaft der UdSSR. aufnehmen. Der dollarschwere Außenminister Guani, eine der wichtigsten Figuren Roosevelts auf dem südamerikanischen Schachbrett, hat nach einem Besuch in Washington die entsprechenden Schritte unternommen und sucht nun, diese Handlungsweise in eigentümlicher Form zu rechtfertigen. Er gab zu, daß die Sowjetgesandtschaft in Montevideo früher eine Verteilungszentrale für Agitationsstoff in Brasilien und Argentinien war und es nunmehr wieder sein würde. Als waschechter und getreuer Demokrat sei er aber „der Forderung des Volkes nachgekommen.“ Es dürfte sich dabei aber weniger um das uruguayische Volk handeln, als um das „auserwählte Volk,“ dessen Hampelmann Franklin Roosevelt ist, Guani folgt also auch diesmal der Stimme seines Herrn und nicht der seiner Nation; ganz ähnlich liegen die Dinge im Fall Kolumbien. Was von Roosevelts „Politik der guten Nachbarschaft“ zu halten ist, haben die Länder der westlichen Halbkugel in den letzten Jahren zur Genüge erfahren, so jetzt wieder Paraguay, das mit dem Besuch einer USA.-Landwirtschaftskommission beglückt wird. Sie soll für „Anpassungen“ und „Umstellungen“ in der Agrarwirtschaft Paraguays sorgen, also auch diesen Staat dem Dollarimperialismus unterwerfen. Man kann sich also unschwer vorstellen, was der jüdische Publizist Walter Lippmann, der dem Roosevelt-Klüngel nahesteht, meint, wenn er den Völkern Osteuropas empfiehlt, sich auf eine „gute Nachbarschaft“ mit den Sowjets einzurichten. England und die USA. müßten diesen Nationen:

…den bestimmten Rat geben, sich Rußland anzupassen und die Vorstellung aufzugeben, daß sie irgendwelche antibolschewistische Kombinationen mit Hilfe der Westmächte oder Deutschlands zustande bringen könnten.

Sie seien überhaupt nicht in der Lage, militärischen Widerstand zu leisten, „und Großbritannien und Amerika werden nicht eingreifen, um ihnen zu helfen,“ wenn sie das begreifen, würde ihnen Moskau „ein guter Nachbar“ sein.

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U.S. Navy Department (February 9, 1943)

Communiqué No. 275

South Pacific.
On February 7 and 8, U.S. ground forces on Guadalcanal Island lengthened the forward line along the Umasani River. Consolidation of our recently established position at Titi was completed. Thirty-four Japanese were killed and one prisoner was taken during these operations.

On February 8, U.S. air forces bombed Japanese positions at Munda on New Georgia Island.

Brooklyn Eagle (February 9, 1943)

Enemy quits Guadalcanal; U.S. perils vital Jap bases

Resistance ended, says Knox – Tokyo admits evacuation

Yanks down 18 fighters over Gabes

Blast docks at Sousse – 8th Army offensive reported by Vichy

Funds barred to Roosevelt’s planning board

Insane patients escape hospital during fire

100 at large after $1,000,000 blaze sweeps asylum in Indiana, killing woman attendant

Waving broom shows sub swept 4-ship Jap convoy

Byrnes to air new crusade on prices, wages

Stabilization chief will broadcast tonight on inflation war

USS The Sullivans to honor 5 naval heroes

Washington (UP) –
The five Sullivan brothers who fought and died together on the cruiser Juneau when it was sunk in the Solomons will fight again.

Their name will be perpetuated in a new destroyer – USS The Sullivans.

President Roosevelt, the Navy revealed today, has approved the unusual name to honor the sons of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas F. Sullivan. The parents, who yesterday visited the Todd shipyards in Brooklyn, are making a national tour of war plants.


Navy expects to right Normandie this year

It was a year ago today that the former luxury liner Normandie, taken over by the Navy as a troop transport and renamed the Lafayette, caught fire and capsized at her Hudson River pier at the foot of W. 47th St.

She is still on her side, although Navy officials said 12 airtight bulkheads were in place. An additional 31-ton bulkhead is needed. Capt. W. A. Sullivan, in charge of salvage operations, said he expected the ship to be righted “sometime this year.” Seventy-five percent of the 100,000 tons of water that flooded the ship have been pumped out and 3,000 tons of metal have been removed.

Tire recapping curbs to be lifted March 1 by OPA

The Pittsburgh Press (February 9, 1943)

Ernie Pyle V Norman

Roving Reporter

By Ernie Pyle

At the frontline in Tunisia – (Feb. 9)
We drive our jeep in under a tree, camouflaged it by covering it with limbs, and then walked up the side of a hill for about 500 yards. Half a mile to the south of us, the battle for Ousseltia Pass in central Tunisia was going on.

We stopped in what is known as a forward command post, from which a battle is directed. This one consisted of a tent 20 feet square, well hidden under a tree. However, the whole tent had been dropped down and simply lay like a tarpaulin covering the officers’ bedrolls and bags. All the work was being done around two field telephones lying in their leather cases on the ground ten feet from the tent.

The rocky hillside was covered with little bushes and small fir trees. The sun was out and the day was rather warm. There were no papers or desks or anything – just three or four officers standing and sitting on a hillside near two telephones on the ground. One officer had a large map case. That’s all the paraphernalia there was for directing the battle.

Our troops were on top of a ridge about a quarter of a mile above us. The enemy was in the valley beyond, and on a parallel ridge a mile farther on. We could walk up and look over, but we couldn’t see anything. Both sides were well hidden in the brush. Every minute or two our nearby artillery would fire, and then half a minute or so later we could hear faintly the explosion of the shells far away. An officer said:

Nobody’s doing much damage right now, but at least we’re getting in ten shots to their one.

Now and then a louder and much nearer blast interrupted us. When I asked what size gun this was, an officer said it wasn’t a gun – it was enemy mortar shells exploding. I supposed they were three or four miles away, but he said they were falling only 800 yards from us.

Once in a while we could hear machine-gun fire in the distance. A young second lieutenant stood near the phones and did all the talking over them. In fact, he appeared to be making all the decisions. And he impressed me as knowing his business remarkably well.

The highest officer around was a lieutenant colonel, but he seemed to leave everything to his lieutenant, and at every signal of approaching planes, he ran to a nearby foxhole and stayed there till the planes had gone. Other officers commented about him in terms not meant for mixed company, but the young lieutenant said nothing.

The phone rang every few minutes. Other command posts would be calling in to report or to ask instructions. Now and then the chief post, some 15 miles back, would call and ask how things were going. Officers and enlisted men kept appearing from down below or over the hill, asking about things. One sergeant came to inquire where a certain post was, saying he had two jeep tires and a tire for an antitank gun that he was supposed to deliver.

Another sergeant, wearing an overcoat, came up the hill, saluted formally, and reported that a certain battery setup was ready to fire. They told him to go ahead. A phone rang. The captain of an ack-ack battery said the enemy had his range and asked permission to move. He was told to go ahead. All the conversation was informal and unexcited.

A phone rang again. An officer at another command post was asking for a decision on whether to move forward. The young lieutenant, apparently not wishing to give direct orders to a higher officer, solved the problem by putting his words in the form of advice, sprinkling two or three “sirs” in every sentence. I thought he handled it beautifully.

Now and then the lieutenant would phone some other post. All the posts have code terms such as “Hatrack” and “Monsoon” and “Chicago.” I’ve just made those up as examples, since naturally I can’t print the real codenames.

Once the lieutenant phoned to a rear command post and told them to send more trucks to a town where two trucks had been disabled that morning. Several times he phoned other posts to check up on a colonel who was wandering around the battle area in a jeep. You could tell they were very fond of the colonel, and that he apparently paid little attention to danger.

There were no planes in the sky when we arrived, but that morning the Germans had been over and bombed and strafed our troops badly. The command post had called for air support, but somebody at the other end said the planes were busy on other missions and:

You’ll just have to grin and bear it.

The men around our post spoke cynically about that remark all afternoon. They would say:

Grin and bear it, eh? Well, we’ll bear it but we won’t guarantee to grin.

But in the late afternoon, our planes did come. First, we didn’t know they were ours, so we all took to the foxholes. Finally, after they had flown overhead a couple of times without doing anything, somebody yelled:

They’re definitely ours!

So, we came out. The planes circled for about 10 minutes hunting for the correct spot in the bush-covered mountainside. They seemed to take their time at it, to make sure, and then finally they started peeling off one at a time and came diving down at a hillside a mile away.

They’d dive and then wheel back high into the sky and dive against. Apparently, there was no enemy attack, for there were no black puffs around the planes. We could hear their machine guns, and their cannon shells bursting.

They kept on diving and shooting for about 15 minutes. Pretty soon an officer came running up the hill and said:

Do you see that? Those damned Germans are mixed up and strafing hell out of the Italians!

When we told him they were our planes, he said “Oh!” and went back down the hill.

Völkischer Beobachter (February 10, 1943)

USA.-Kapital auf Wanderschaft

dnb. Vigo, 9. Februar –
Eine der interessantesten Begleiterscheinungen des Krieges ist die Massenabwanderung des USA.-Kapitals in die benachbarten Länder. So werden zum Beispiel mexikanische Banken mit Anfragen überschwemmt über Anlagemöglichkeiten nordamerikanischer Kapitalien. Bezeichnend hierfür sei, wie aus Mexiko gemeldet wird, daß kürzlich ein USA.-Multimillionär mit einem Riesenvermögen in Banknoten nach Mexiko gekommen sei. Dieser erklärte der Presse unumwunden, daß er keine Lust verspüre, weiterhin lediglich für Onkel Sam zu arbeiten. Die Steuern seien:

…derart ungeheuerlich, daß irgendwelche Gewinne nicht mehr in Frage kämen.

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

Communiqué No. 276

North Pacific.
On February 8, Liberator heavy bombers (Consolidated B-24) and Mitchell medium bombers (North American B-25) dropped bombs on the enemy camp area at Kiska and on installations at North Head. Seven float-type Zeros were observed on the water but no attempt intercept was made. All U.S. planes returned.

South Pacific.
On February 9:

  1. Airacobra fighters (Bell P-39) strafed and sank an enemy barge off Hooper Bay in the northern Russell Islands. A number of floating drums of fuel oil were destroyed in the same vicinity.

  2. During the evening, a force of Marauder medium bombers (Martin B-26), with Airacobra and Lightning (Lockheed P-38) escort, bombed Japanese positions on Kolombangara Island in the New Georgia group. Results were not reported.

  3. During the evening, Dauntless dive bombers (Douglas), with Lightning and Wildcat (Grumman F4F) escort, attacked Japanese positions at Munda on New Georgia Island. A large fire was started.

  4. U.S. ground forces on Guadalcanal Island advanced to positions one-half mile west of the Segilau River in the vicinity of Doma Cove. On the northwest coast of the island, U.S. troops advanced to the northeast as far as Visale. No opposition was encountered. A large amount of enemy equipment was captured.

Brooklyn Eagle (February 10, 1943)

U.S. fliers sink 2 Jap warships, hit six others

Enemy destroyer units balked in 3 forays against Guadalcanal

U.S. will order farm deserters back to plow

Byrnes also reveals plan to furlough Army men at peak of season

WLB grants 4¢ raise to transit men

Washington (UP) –
The War Labor Board today granted a general wage increase of 4¢ an hour for 10,000 employees of the Philadelphia Transportation Company.

The wage award exceeded the 15% increase since Jan. 1, 1941, which could be granted under the Little Steel formula because, the board explained, of the unreasonable difference between wages of the Philadelphia workers and those in comparable cities.


Red Cross ship rescues 14 sailors 11 days adrift

Lisbon, Portugal (UP) –
After 11 days adrift, 14 crewmen of an American merchantman, which was torpedoed in the Atlantic off the Azores, were rescued Monday by a vessel chartered to the International Red Cross and were taken to Horta on Tuesday, the Portuguese Red Cross said today.

Wallace never sausage nerve as Clare’s beef on ‘globaloney’

Washington (UP) –
Vice President Wallace took issue today with Rep. Clare Boothe Luce (R-CT).

Mrs. Luce, in her maiden speech to the House yesterday, said Wallace’s “global thinking is – no matter how you slice it – still globaloney.” Wallace’s proposal for “freedom of the air,” she said, was not likely to prevent another world war.

Wallace, in a statement that did not mention Mrs. Luce by name, said:

I am sure the Republican Party is not against either freedom of the seas or freedom of the air after the war is over. I am also sure that the vast bulk of Republicans do not want to stir up animosity against either our Russian or English allies at the present time. None of us wishes to use those methods of preparation for World War III which will make World War III inevitable.

Mrs. Luce, whose announced intention of making a speech yesterday attracted an unusually large number of House members, said the policy of freedom of the seas had been detrimental to the American Merchant Marine.

She said that when the shooting stops, the British would be prepared to develop international airways, “perhaps with Lend-Lease planes.” All post-war air aims, she continued, are beclouded by Allied ignorance of the wishes of Russia.

30% pay boost seen for many in 48-hour week

Byrnes offers pledge that exorbitant prices will be slashed

Editorial: Weeding out seeds of bigotry from textbooks is timely job

What we recently remarked in commenting upon the coming celebration of Brotherhood Week, in this community and throughout the nation, about the fruitful work of the National Conference of Christians and Jews, in promoting practical cooperation among American citizens of different religious views, is again rendered timely by the latest report made by that group.

It summarizes what has been accomplished, by typically American methods, over a 10-year period during which time Hitlerism was occupying the spotlight on the stage of history, preparing the explosion which is now rocking the world. Quietly, persistently, patiently, and in the true spirit of religious brotherhood, representative American Protestants, Catholics and Jews, clergymen and laymen, educators and theologians, have labored to weed out the seeds of bigotry, and of traditional but unjustifiable religious and racial prejudices and suspicions and errors, from the textbooks used in our public, private and religious schools and colleges.

It is in those schools that the minds of children and youth have either been well-nourished, and fertilized for good, or on the contrary, were biased or misdirected. In the Nazi and fascist and Japanese systems of education, so-called, they were indoctrinated and shaped for the worst possible ends of evil philosophies and creeds. The report should be read and studied widely. It is too voluminous and detailed to be more than briefly dealt with here; but, in general, and to stress the fact that is most important, it shows that through the prolonged labors of all three of the groups cooperating, great progress has been quietly accomplished.

Admittedly, much remains to be done; particularly, it would seem, in regard to anti-Negro bias in some sections of the country; but where a task that once seemed beyond the reach of any agency save drastic legislation – which might readily have provoked more difficulties than already existed – has been so wisely advanced, to such a high degree of success, the future progress of that task may be regarded as assured.

Many of the best-known educational groups have worked with and supplemented this pioneering enterprise of the National Conference of Christians and Jews, such as the National Education Association, the National Catholic Education Association, the American Jewish Committee, and others. In addition to removing, or greatly modifying or interpreting, outright offensive passages, and passages readily misunderstood, or provocative of offense though offense may not have been intended, it is encouraging to learn from the same report of the preparation of new school books placing greater emphasis upon constructive community relationships.

All races, and the chief religious creeds of the Western world, have played a great part in the making of America, and will play an even greater part in our future when brotherhood becomes more and more of a practical reality, rather than an abstract theory to which too many of our people, in the past, rendered lip service only.

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Editorial: Guadalcanal

The Japanese evacuation of Guadalcanal after five months of bitter resistance is a triumph for American arms. It means that the Japs apparently have decided that further efforts to hold this point as a basis from which to harry the American shipping lines to Australia would be too expensive. So, they have swallowed their pride and moved out.

Whether Guadalcanal now will be used as a base from which to pursue the Japs north, island-by-island, is a secret of our strategists. That it will be expanded, at least for use as a base from which to harass Jap centers in those seas, is practically certain.

And certain it is that the name of Guadalcanal will go down in history as the point at which American fighting men first took the offensive in this war, first demonstrated conclusively that they could outfight a foe vastly better trained, nearer his base of supplies and fired with the zeal that comes with success.