Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 15 June 1943 — Page 11

“TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 1943

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~ Hoosier Vagabond

(Ome of a series on a 13,000-mile Hight made before. 3 tell.) 5

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SOMEWIERE IN AFRICA (By Wireless) —Here’s Looe lesson in not believing everything you hear. in*Nerth Africa last winter there was a report from people who should know that more than 50 per cen of our cops in tropical Africa were down with et malaria. We just accepted it as . true. But when I went to Central Africa’ 'I found that malaria among our soldiers was less than 1 per cent! And dysentery is even lower. The false rumor was based on one single detachment of troops. They were the first to hit Africa last spring, they were in an infested jungle, they were with- . out mosquito nets for the first ? four days, and practically the Whole camp came down with malaria. The percentage was actually greéter than the rumored 50, yin that one case. | But that was soon over, and today that place is as healthy as any other. And nowhere else have we ever had a serious run of the fever. Actually, the general health of our troops in the tropics is better than in the average camp at home, army’ doctors say. It's because we exercise such extyaordinarily careful protection over our men’s health. ou can’t travel around Central Africa without feeling a trémendous pride in the army’s medical and sanitary corps.

Quinine. On Daily, Diet

LET'S GO to another part of Africa—a place so deep that it takes days of flying to get there. Right from our camp you can hear the throb of tom-toms all over the country at night. The soldiers only have to take a boat ride to shoot crocodiles. The place is practically the capital of malaria and dysentery.

Yet the Americans thrive there. The answer lies

Canada

Lowell Nussbaum is on vacation, This is the first ‘of three articles on Canada’s manpower situation.

OTTAWA, June 15.—If you were running a grocery store here and were too short to fight but stout enough to suit a farmer whose hay was about to spoil in his fields outside Toronto—off you'd go to cut that hay. © Youd shut up your shop and work for a farm

hand’s wages. Your customers would find a one-legged grocer farther down the street. All such things happen on the sayso of one public official. Thus, drastically, Canada orders around civilians—retail business men and the housewives they serve as well as labor—in a new, compulsory transfer of manpower to more essential jobs. Citizens get their marching orders, symR bolically, from a national selective ;- Mr. Mitchell service and employment officer. Canada’s total mobilization of her 11,500,000 people for their whopping war effort, spread over a domain bigger than that of our 48 states, subjects every last Canadian to soldier-like discipline. For refusing to accept job transfer a civilian can be sent to do forced labor along with conscientious objectors who keep up military roads. An employer ‘holdout, keeping a man subject to transfer, is liable ‘to fines up to $2000 per infraction. These double-barreled : regulations now abply to men of the military call-up classes who have been rejected, deferred, or discharged by selective service, and are doing less-essential work—in which Canadians include all retail stores.

Will Register Women AND MINISTER OF LABOR Humphrey Mitchell,

top manpower official, told me the controls will be

extended swiftly to other men and to women, as they are needed to make the most of Canadian manpower. “With expansion of our armed forces, intensification of industrial production, and the urgent need for farm production,” said Mitchell, announcing the

England

SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND, June 15 (By Wire-~ less).—American bomber and fighter pilots operating out of England with whom I have talked while visiting several stations of our 8th air force caution against taking Pantelleria as a standard in judging future air operations against Germany. They point out that Italy's air defense was so weak as to be almost nonexistent. Germany's air defense, on the other hand, is growing more intense all the time. Maj. Gen. Ira C. Eaker reports that the 8th air force is expanding rapidly and will double its size between now and. October. Fuel, crews, bombs and maintenance are adequately co-ordinated. All this is a better gauge than the events in the Mediterranean as to how soon Hitler can be defeated. Important as Africa was, and as the new Mediterranean successes will be, still that all concerns the periphery of the enemy, the tentaclés of the octupus rather than its heart, which ; must be reached before we win the war. | ~ The quality of American bomber crews is being demonstrated. I have met numbers of these men who are finishing the required number of missions, . which means they will be relieved for instruction work back home. Most of them have carried .their missions through without protection of fighter

planes.

It's a Fight Al the Way

AT ONE heavy-bomber station 1 met a Liberator pilot, Lt. David Arnold, just after he had received a message that he was the father of a baby boy in Los Angeles. He has completed 22° ons, and with’

good luck will soon be graduated out. ; These men in their ‘early ‘20s take heavy ships out withous. fighter protection and fight their ay to their

‘My Day

HYDE PARK, Monday.—The country is too lovely | these days ever to leave if; bub back we go to New ~ York city this afternoon. A cool breeze blew across ‘my porch this morning and the roses on my desk have blossomed ou 8 in full bloom, I never heard f the frog chorus in the evening or the bird chorus in the morning more full throated and tri- ¢ umphant than it has been these last few days. How can the world be so beautiful and so horrible at the same time? Since it is anonymous, I am going to quote you a letter which ~ strikes me 2,85 really amusing:

By Ernie Pyle

in. spraying and burning and oil the swamps, using mosquito netting, watching all dirt and filth, and taking 10 grains of quinine a day. They had an astonishing example there of American sanitation. But the army nurses were living temporarily in the nearby city, in a hotel—a big, modern, lovely place. And ‘every single one of the nurses came down with dysentery--one 8f them died-‘while only three of the soldiers out in the swamp got dysentery. Those three cases were traced to eating occasional meals in town, at the same place the. nurses got theirs. An army doctor told me the other day that probably every one of our soldiers in that area does have malaria germs in him, but the daily quinine keeps them from becoming active. I asked him, then, how long it would take the germs to die after leaving malarial country. “If we were to be ordered home tomorrow,” he said, “I'd have the boys continue their daily quinine for six weeks. By that time all the germs would be out of them.” A few people can’t take quinine. It gives them a bad skin rash, and too much ringing in the ears.

Tropics Get You Down

A FEW of our men have cracked up under the tropical strain and had to be sent home. But they are very few. The average man gets along all right in the tropics if he is careful, keeps regular hours, and doesn’t drink too much. It is true that the tropics sap your energy. You just don’t have the old git-up-and-git you had back home. You feel sleepy, of a morning, you're a little dopey most of the time, you welcome the siesta after lunch. You're less efficient than back home. In one of our camps where. soldiers were doing hard manual labor such as mixing concrete, they tried both an hour and a half and two hours and a. half for the Ilunch-and-rest period. Hospital figures showed the two-and-a-half-hour noon rest was necessary. So that’s what they're on now. But of course they're young. Now me, at my age, I have to rest all day.

By Marguerite Vir

new orders, “the time has arrived when all men of military age still empioyed in non-essential lines of work, must be transferred to employment where their services will tell directly in our war effort. “We will enforce the orders and the penalties literally. We will take measures to provide fair minimum wages. Should anyone experience a pay cut— well, he should ‘be glad to assume an obligation whereby he achieves an approach to parity with the service of the man who is fit for military duty.” There's practically no more private hiring of men or women between 16 and 65, due to a permit system. You cannot look for work, or for an employee, without first getting the selective service and employment office’s okay. You cannot fire, or quit, without giving seven days’ notice to the public office. If you want help and know that Mary Jones would be just right and available, you cannot speak to her about it; you must ask the office. You can say Mary Jones has applied for a work permit, if you happen to know it, but whether you get her depends, because of labor priorities.

Farm Labor Kept Busy

FARM LABOR was literally frozen last fall, without exception; then agriculturists were “induced by various means” to move “into the bush” and work at logging. At the end of that off-season task, the agriculturists were required to move back to the farms. Thousands of gold miners were transferred permanently to nickel and other hase metal mines. No one can move, without an extraordinaty permit, from a mine, farm or basic steel job. Professional people such as chemists, are handled by a different board, also have been given directed employment in industry. In short, the new job transfer orders simply climax the hitherto gradual extension of Canadian control over civiliam manpower—a control so complete that the American finds it hard to believe even when he sees it. It is pretty close to conscription for non-military service.

NEXT: Price, wage and w work controls win popular compliance.

By Raymond Clapper

targets and back. Ask them what they think about on the way over, and they answer that they think

about how to fight their way back to England. Their

formations are so compact that enemy fighters coming within range must stand the fire of many machine guns, sometimes more than a hundred. I have seen many Flying Fortresses and Liberators patched from the holes left by numerous bullets that did no harm to the crews and didn’t hamper the return of the ships. But on some missions we have taken heavy losses in bombers, even though more enemy fighters were knocked down in the process. Saturday, in raiding Bremen and Kiel unescorted, we lost: a record of 26 bombers. Even though the enemy fighter losses average, as Gen. Eaker says, four or five to one, the loss of one Fortress and its crew of 10 or 11 is not to be compensated for by knocking down a one-engine, one-man fighter plane, or even three, or four of them.

Nazis Fight in Own Flak

SOME AIR FORCE men said’ they believed it would be better if our bombers had long-range fighter

escort to the targets and back. They say enemy,

fighters hover around to ‘begin their attack while our,

bombers are frozen on their bomb run over the target.’

The Nazi pilots often fight in their own flak. They j also hover to pounce on’stragglers crippled by flak.

American bombers: could ‘be escorted on most mis-! sions by P-38s, the twin-engine Lightnings. = These. But

are the only fighters having sufficient range. we are using most of our Lightnings in Africa now, leaning here on the new P-47 Thunderbolt, which fis, an excellent altitude. fighter but lacks the range to’ accompany deep bonibing missions. : If we are going to rely on bombing to break Germany’s back in preparation for invasion, the case made by our airmen for more Protection of this vital weapon seems unanswerable.

By Eleanor Roosevelt

office help in their plages of employment? Too bad you cannot meet them personally! : “They seem to think they have a personal right to some privacy in this country and it is high time they put men into office who will respect their personal right! Can you not say something, Mrs. Roosevelt to console these ladies with fine sensibilities? Please explain to them that all their affairs are now the affairs of the public and that they must be patient until they are able to elect men into office who will respect their rights to any -privacy. Poor ladies! (Signed) “JUST A LISTENER!” Whoever would have thought that any. pay-as-you-go tax bill would lead to such strange thought? I have never found the public especially interested in {of private affairs as they are represented in the answers to questionnaires. It takes a little dressing up to make people pay attention, and that is not usually done hy siected officials.

Times

5

Black Shiris Fared

Badly in

‘Helping’ Franco to Revolt

(Continued from Page One)

Mussolini was anxious to throw his troops into more important battles. He thought it would be quite a feather

in his black cap if Fascist forces could take Madrid after

the Moors, Foreign Legionnaires, Falangistas, and Royal-

ists had failed.

Franco was reluctant to give any such opportunity to

the Italians.

He was already suspicious of aid from

Rome and Berlin and feared what it might cost him later. But owing to the shortage of trained Spanish manpower

were then brought up from

beginning. of March.

at his disposal, Franco finally acceded to Fascist pressure. The Black Shirts who had helped to take Malanga

the south and concentrated

at the snow-covered pass just north of Siguenza in preparation for an exclusively Italian offensive.

It was the

The drive started and the advance was so easy for the first few days that the Italians became careless. The

deep snow on either side of the road made it hard for the

flanking troops to march over the rough, mountainous

terrain, and since these troops met no Republican forces

highway. By the time they miles froni their immediate objectives, Guadaljara, they were lined up in a trainlike formation, making no attempt to protect the fields on either side.

Planes Grounded

THE REPUBLICAN army in Madrid had rushed up reinforcements to meet the Italians on the Guadalajara road. It had been raining throughout most of the drive, but now the storm turned into a terrific downpour, grounding the planes on whose support the Italian commanding officers had counted. : The Republican planes were able to take off from their concrete runways on the Madrid airfields and encountered no resistance whatever in the air. The Italian infantry, bunched together on the road, made a target impossible to miss, and the Republican pilots mowed them down by the hundreds. The fascists tried to withdraw, and in the confusion of the retreat the Republican infantry closed in on all sides and took thousands of prisoners as well as enormous amounts of war booty. We were both in Salamanca (Franco's headquarters) at the time. We were having dinner in the Grand hotel when we were joined by an English-speaking major with a blue sash around his waist—meaning he was a member of the general staff. He was obviously delighted about something. Eleanor asked him if he had fallen in love. “Almost—with those Reds,” he said in a low voice. “They have given those eye-ties a terrific trouncing.” This major was far from being the only one to be outspoken about

in the mountains, they were pulled back to the main

reached Brihuega, about 15

the Italian setback. Even Franco and his generals did not conceal their satisfaction. They had long been chafing under the patronizing attitude of the Italian military leaders and conseqyently were pleased at this blow to Fascist prestige. Spanish rebel officers in the bars of Salamanca toasted the valor of the Spanish Republicans and declared that the defeat at, Guadalajara would ' show Mussolini that Spaniards—even though Republican Spaniards—were not to be so easily annihilated as Ethiopians. Nothing more was seen or heard of Italian troops for a while after

Guadalajara. Mussolini withdrew .

most of the Black Shirt troops and many of the high officers concerned in the Guadalajara battle in great anger and, in defiance of Badoglio, subsequently replaced them with better-trained soldiers of the regular Italian army.

Germans Helped

MEANWHILE, the Germans were also ‘lending a hand. The Germans never sent any infantry, though they did contribute technicians of all kinds. During the Bilbao campaign, the Italians and Germans took over most of the artillery work. The Italian infantry, aided by whippet tanks, also participated on a large scale. As in Malaga, the Fascist columns which helped to take Bilbao did not enter the city itself when it fell on June 19, but circled around through the outskirts, By the time that Santander was ready to surrender, the Black Shirt officers were determined not to make any more back-door entrances. And when Santander fell on August 26, the Italians marched in through the suburbs and continued down all the principal streets of the city. This

ANIL)

KEVYNOLDS wn

Blackshirt troops in Spain, untutored jn war were mowed down by the hundreds by Loyalist planes, when they marched, as shown here, in open sight and without taking any Pauiins against a surprise attack.

time, even the Spanish newspapers were compelled to pay them tribute for the part they had played in this campaign. We had the impression that the Spaniards were much more friendly and got along much better in every way with the Germans than they did with the Italians. Most of us agreed that this was because the Germans sent a much smaller contingent, composed exclusively of experts. Also, it was quite obviqus that the Germans had been carefully instructed on how to behave in Spain, and, contrary to their Teutonic character, remained very much in the background. Besides, the Germans didn’t have a. Guadalajara to live down. All the international grievances on the Franco side were patched up in time for the final victory parade in ‘Madrid on May 11, 1939. We sat in the press gallery in front of Franco's reviewing stand, which * was carefully surrounded by his trusted Moorish guard. For five hours the troops marched by

in the rain. All the Italians in Spain took part.

Paraded Strength

ALL THEIR heavy artillery and many of their tanks were paraded forth, It was all right because the

word had gone around that all this materiel was being left behind and all the men were leaving. Overhead, Italian and German planes maneuvered in trick formations. They, too, were to be left behind, but the pilots were to go. The keynote of the parade was Spanish strength, but to the foreign correspondents it was a menacing display of Italo-German solidarity. From a simultaneous recognition by Rome and Berlin of

into a concrete political entity with military overtones. Franco had succeeded in winning the war with the aid of axis men and materiel. He had succeeded, despite predictions to the contrary, in arranging for the departure of his military guests. Both Italy and Germany were charging merely second-hand prices for the materiel, but the real payment was to be made on a politico-military basis in the future: Spain was to aid the axis in the war to come, Actually, Franco proved a tougher bargainer than either Mussolini or Hitler, as he shaved down the first installments to nothing more than moral support, despite axis efforts to drag Spain into the war shortly after Italy’s entry.

the Franco government, the Italo- -

German collaboration increased to a general agreement regarding European problems - outside of Spain, This agreement, born during the Spanish’ civil war, turned

(Copyright, 1942, by Reynolds and Eleanor Packard; published by Oxford University Press; distributed by United Fea tures Syndicate, Inc.)

TOMORROW:

“Crisis of August, 1939.” . :

JOB'S DAUGHTERS T0 INSTALL QUEEN

Miss Bette Comly will be installed as honored queen of Bethel 18, Order of Job's Daughters, at 8 p. m. Thursday in the Irvington Masonic temple. Other officers to be installed are: Ruth Ann Robison, senior princess;

Thé press and. the radio as :

Barbara © Myers, junior princess; Thelma Ellis, guide; Margaret Rennoe, chaplain; Carolyn Belle, marshal; Betty Teal, recorder; Betty Belfry, treasurer; Barbara Dahl, first ger: W: Group, second messenger; Eugenia Schoen, third messenger; Marjorie ‘Gilmore, fourth messenger; Marian Mutz, fifth messenger; Sue Randall, librarian; Mae Ellen Wright, musician; Carolyn. Ely, junior custodian; Joy Haines, senior custodian; Bette Crose, inner - guard, and Carolyn Kleifgen, outer guard. Installing officers will be Doris Jeanne Spiess, Virginia Myers, Virginia Comly, Rita Mae Dale and Betty Springer. Mr. and Mrs. Everett Cathcart are guardian and assistant ‘guardian.

ENGINEERS TO HEAR CHINESE OFFICIAL

Calvin C. Chang, liaison officer for the Chinese government, will speak on “Wartime China” as guest of the American Engineers forum

‘meeting at 6:30 p. m. tomorrow in|}

ihe Sentral Christian church. din-

the axis from a newspaper phrase

Seized Japanese Equipment Helped Shatter Attu

This is the fourth of a series of five eye-witness articles desecribing the American victory on Attu Island in the Aleutians. The writer, Sherman Montrose, is an Acme Newspictures cameraman whose pictures . are distributed through the wartime pool of the various Photographic agencies,

By SHERMAN MONTROSE Times Special Writer HOLTZ BAY, Attu, June 15.— Four days after American forces landed on a little unnamed beach on the northwest side of Attu, to drive on Holtz Bay in a flanking movement, their goal was within their grasp and their objective within sight. Final phases of the bitterly contested battle of “Bloody Point” began with navy guns laying down a terrific barrage on enemy gun positions on both arms of Holtz Bay, then a sweep up the mountain by troops under Col. Frank Culin and Maj. Frank Hart], ‘After a two-day pounding by artillery, machine guns and mor-

tars, the enemy fire was sporadic|

and inaccurate. A few machine guns still swept the ridge, and anti-air-craft bursts hit high. A threeincher lobbed ‘in shells, but : the troops moved in. A warship moved majestically

guns blinking: like neon lights in the

fog, fore and aft aglow. with salvos|. from the

through which our troops stood firm, refusing to fall back an inch. One machine gunner, high on the skyline, kept the rat-a-tat going

continuously while at least a dozen

A-A’s broke directly over his head. But the .only effect was to cause him to shake his head to clear it from shock. He kept. firing.

Over the Top

Once over the top, the advance to the floor of the valley was swift and sure. Again fresh positions were dug. The crest of “Bloody Point” was a shambles—attesting to the ferocity bf the fight for its control. In the light of the next dawning, darks rings from shell fire dotted the snow and tundra. Empty shell cases littered the ground. Japanese who fought until they died in their dugouts and fox holes were crouched in weird positions. This was the beginning of the end of “the Japanese in the Holtz Bay area. Their rout was complete. From commanding positions on the

SPARS Train In Luxury Hotel

PALM BEACH, Fla, June 15 (U. P.).—Palm Beach's $10,000,-

across the entrance to Holtz Bay,| 000 Biltmore hotel long linked

with ease, luxury and playtime, ‘was ‘opened as a VU. S. coast guard training station today when more than 150 SPARS moved’in.

Previously, SPARS were trained with WAVES at the U. S. naval

training school in the Bronx, New York city. A complete break

|1t is a total victory.

ridge, U. S. troops swept the valley into the Japanese encampment on the west arm, and two days of action consolidated that position. Swiftly, preparations were made for the next thrust, across the valley to, and up, three ridges controlling fire into the east arm where the Japanese second encampment lay with machine guns and at least one anti-aircraft battery.

Japs Were Licked

But the heart- had been taken from the enemy. Their defense of the second stronghold was feeble by comparison with the first. An intricate system of combat and , communication trenches the Japanese had labored so long and carefully to build aided our troops in reaching a stream on the far side of the valley, from which the final push was made. The Japanese. had dismantled their battery of three 77-millimeter dual-purpose anti-aircraft guns and hidden the blocks, but these were quickly found and the guns turned in their direction. Captured “knee” mortars were moved to the front where they were put info effective use.

and we had it in quantities, but the on the vanquished ‘intrigued the

victors. Once again the navy and the air

‘force came in on the final blows.

But in the end, it was the foot soldier who got ’em out. ‘And when the Japanese staged a final do-or-die bayonet attack on this series of ridges, it was the infantry that pushed them back. One week after landing, almost to the hour, Col. Frank Culin, commanding our section of the action, announced :

“Holtz: Bay area is now secure. This force has

Our own equipment was better, | novelty of turning their: own guns:

the east arm without opposition, Five officers were found hiding in an underground shelter and were killed. One battery of anti-aircraft guns was taken near the airport.

" Forces Joined

. ; Patrols from ‘Col. Culin’s ‘forces working toward: Massacre Bay established contact with patrols: from the outfit coming from the opposite direction. These were the battles of “Bloody Point” and. “Massacre Ridge.” No battles, these, involving massed thousands of troops, but the kind of action. facing American. troops everywhere they are to meet, the Jap on his own ground. In these the American’ soldier has to be a Dead-Eye Dick, a&n-In~ dian scout, a Bob Feller with. a grenade, a Paddock running ‘with full : And that’s just about what tie is.

HOLD EVERYTHING