The Pittsburgh Press (December 24, 1943)
Eisenhower named chief of Allied invasion force
Roosevelt also reveals Briton will head troops in Mediterranean area
Bulletin
London, England –
Gen. Sir Henry Maitland Wilson is succeeding Gen. Dwight d. Eisenhower as Allied commander in the Mediterranean Theater. Gen. Sir Harold R. L. G. Alexander, Gen. Eisenhower’s deputy commander, takes over command of the Allied armies in Italy. Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery, commander of the British 8th Army, will command the British forces under Gen. Eisenhower.
Hyde Park, New York (UP) –
President Roosevelt today announced the appointment of Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower as commander of the forthcoming Allied invasion of Europe.
In a Christmas Eve radio address to the nation and men of the U.S. armed services around the world, Mr. Roosevelt said as a result of the international conferences at Cairo and Tehran, Gen. Eisenhower, now Allied commander for North Africa, had been giving the task of leading the new “combined attack” against Germany.
Mr. Roosevelt, who indicated the “zero hour” was near, also revealed that U.S. Armed Forces overseas number 3,800,000 and will rise to more than five million by next July.
Gen. Eisenhower, the President said, will be succeeded in the Mediterranean by a British officer whose name will be announced by Prime Minister Winston Churchill.
Gen. Eisenhower will have command of “air, sea and land power” in tackling Germany from new “points of the compass” and he will be assisted by Lt. Gen. Carl Andrew Spaatz who will command “the entire American strategic bombing force operating against Germany.”
Mr. Roosevelt, speaking from his Hyde Park home where he was spending Christmas for the first time since he entered office, reported at length on his recent overseas conferences, saying that the United States, Great Britain, China and Russia were in agreement that after the war “international force” would be used if necessary to preserve peace.
He also struck at those who see the war’s end near at hand, saying, “We shall have to look forward to large casualty lists” and that the end is “not yet in sight.”
In telling the news of Gen. Eisenhower’s new command, the President painted in general terms the plan of global battle that came out of the talks in the Middle East with Mr. Churchill, Premier Joseph Stalin and Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek.
He said in discussing plans for Europe:
The Russian Army will continue its stern offensives on Germany’s Eastern Front, the Allied armies in Italy and Africa will bring relentless pressure on Germany from the south, and now the encirclement will be complete as great American and British forces attack from other points of the compass.
Mr. Roosevelt announced dramatically:
The commander selected to lead the combined attack from these other points is Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower. His performances in Africa, in Sicily and in Italy have been brilliant. He knows by practical and successful experience the way to coordinate air, sea and land power. All of these will be under his control. Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz will command the entire American strategic bombing force operating against Germany.
Gen. Spaatz now commands the U.S. strategic bombing force in the Mediterranean.
Gen. Eisenhower thus assumes the role approximate to that occupied by Marshal Ferdinand Foch, who late in World War I was appointed generalissimo of Allied forces.
The appointment left the American top command unchanged. Gen. George C. Marshall, fresh from conferences in the Pacific, remains as Army Chief of Staff in active charge of the nation’s global war plans. Adm. William D. Leahy continues as Mr. Roosevelt’s personal chief of staff.
Mr. Roosevelt promised Gen. Eisenhower’s successor in the African and Mediterranean Theater:
…that our powerful ground, sea and air forces in the vital Mediterranean area will stand by his side until every objective in that bitter theater is attained.
Hailing the Cairo and Tehran Conferences as being eminently successful, the Chief Executive said the four powers rejected the enemy doctrine “that the strong shall dominate the weak.”
But at the same time, we are agreed that if force is necessary to keep international peace, international force will be applied – for as long as it may be necessary.
Seemingly as a warning to nations that refuse to cooperate with the Allies, the President added:
It has been our steady police – and it is certainly a common-sense policy – that the right of each nation to freedom must be measure by the willingness of that nation to fight for freedom.
Mr. Roosevelt far from ignored the war in the Pacific, saying that he and Mr. Churchill had settled with the Chinese Generalissimo not only “definite military strategy,” but had also discussed “certain long-range principles which we believed can assure peace in the Far East for many generations to come.”
He explained:
These principles are as simple as they are fundamental. They involve the restoration of stolen property to its rightful owners, and the recognition of the rights of millions of people in the Far East to build up their own forms of self-government without molestation.
The President emphasized that “essential to all peace and security in the Pacific and in the rest of the world is the permanent elimination of the Empire of Japan as “a potential force of aggression.”
He said:
Never again must our soldiers and sailors and marines be compelled to fight from island to island as they are fighting so gallantly and so successfully today.
The President was blunt and harsh in his treatment of “cheerful idiots in this country” who hid behind their isolationist policies, and he was plain-spoken in spiking theories of a quick victory.
He said:
The war is now reaching the stage where we shall all have to look forward to large casualty lists – dead, wounded and missing.
War entails just that. There is no easy road to victory. And the end is not yet in sight.
Back in this country only a week after five weeks overseas, the President said he found upon his return “a tendency in some of our people here to assume a quick ending of the war – that we have already gained the victory.”
He added:
And, perhaps as a result of this false reasoning, I think I discern an effort to resume or even encourage an outbreak of partisan thinking and talking. I hope I am wrong. For, surely, our first and most foremost tasks are all concerned with winning the war and winning a just peace that will last for generations.
The massive offensives which are in the making – both in Europe and the Far East – will require every ounce of energy and fortitude that we and our Allies can summon on the fighting fronts and in all the workshops at home.
Mr. Roosevelt obviously directed this passage about the need for greater effort in the “workshops at home” at strike threats for higher wages and the preoccupation of some industrialists over reconversion to peacetime production.
His demand for greater effort and his attack on those who think the war is nearly over underlined a statement made earlier this week by a high Washington official who forecast American war casualties during the next 90 days three times as great as the present total of about 131,000 for the entire war so far.
The announcement of Gen. Eisenhower’s appointment also fitted in with the prediction of tremendous casualties in the next 90 days because the Allies are apparently near the point of opening the long-awaited “second front” probably at more than one point along the coasts of Europe.
The President said he would talk more about the Cairo and Tehran Conferences when he delivers his State of the Union message to Congress in about two weeks.
He added:
And, on that occasion, I shall also have a great deal to say about certain conditions here at home.
That meant plainly that the President will again take up the cudgels publicly for support of his anti-inflation program which is now under attack from many points in Congress and out.
In disclosing the new invasion command for Gen. Eisenhower, the President did not overlook Gen. Marshall, who was reported erroneously some time ago as slated to be “global commander” of the Allies.
He said:
To the members of our Armed Forces, to their wives, mothers and fathers, I want to affirm the great faith and confidence we have in Gen. Marshall and Adm. King [U.S. Fleet commander], who direct all of our armed might throughout the world.
Upon them falls the great responsibility of planning and strategy of determining when and where we shall fight. Both of these men have already gained high places in American history, which will record many evidences of their military genius that cannot be published today.
To read Christmas Carol
When the address is over, Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt will welcome the people who live on their estate. The President will preside at a family dinner tonight and when the dishes are cleared away everyone will gather in the living room. There the President will read them Dickens’ Christmas Carol as he has done on other Christmas Eves.
For Christmas Day, the Roosevelt family had a slightly different custom from most people when it comes to opening presents. They exchange their gifts in the afternoon instead of early Christmas morning.
With seven young grandchildren in the house, however, chances are that not all gifts will remain under wraps until the afternoon ceremony around the tree in the library.
President to carve
After the gifts are opened tomorrow afternoon, the President will preside and carve at a family turkey dinner.
Mrs. Roosevelt traveled with the President from Washington. The family group assembled here included their daughter Mrs. John Boettiger and her three children, Eleanor, Curtis and Johnny; Lt. and Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt Jr. and their children, Franklin D. III and Christopher; Lt. and Mrs. John A. Roosevelt with their children, Haven and Ann; Mrs. James B. Roosevelt, widow of the President’s half-brother, and two friends, Maj. Henry Hooker and Mrs. Trude Pratt.