Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 25 June 1943 — Page 37

‘SATURDAY, JUNE 26, 1943

SECOND SECTION

Hoosier Vagabond

| SOMEWHERE IN AFRICA (By Wireless)—Before ending this tropical series I want to tell you a little about all the flying we did: The total distance was somewhere between 13,000 and 15,000 miles—every bit of it in Douglas cargo planes, with the seats replaced by hard tin benches along the sides. : We hauled everything from . generals to immense air compressors. Sometimes we would have so much freight that only a few passengers could. crawl in. on top of it. At other times we'd have 25 passengers and no freight. We always flew with bigger loads than would have been allowed back home. The work of the transport command in running those delivery routes all over the world is one of the war's most captivating stories, but for security reasons we are permitted to tell about it only in vague generalities. That's the reason these columns have seemed so jumpy at times—so unspecific about various places A-giown ‘below. This flying over wildest Africa isn’t haphazard at all, but so meticulously systematic that it is much like flying with Pan-American in peacetime.

Informality Is the Rule

SOMETIMES YQU FLY for several days with the me crew, and you all get well acquainted and beyme a sort of family, as on Panair. Life is very informal on these long trips. Colonels and privates sleep side by side, and anybody who wants to can walk up front and look over the pilot's shoulder. On one trip when we had been out over the ocean for several hours I decided to go up front and chin with the pilots for a while. The sight that greeted me when I opened the cabin door would have brought heart failure to an airline traveler back home. For one pilot was rolled up in a blanket on the floor,

Forced Savings

(Lowell Nussbaum is on vacation. This is the last of six articles on compulsory lending to the government.)

WASHINGTON, June 26.—The imposition of forced savings or forced loans by the federal government is , only a question of timing. ‘ We have the precedent for forced loans in the . Victory tax, pare of which will be refunded after the war. And we will have the machinery for putting into effect a full-scale compulsory saving or lending program when the cur-rent-tax-collection bill, with its 20 per cent withholding tax, goes into operation July 1. Thus the question congress will have to decide is whether the need for additional revenue now, the need for sopping up more excess purchasing power, and the need for creating a greater ; : cushion against post-war depres“ion by providing more individual purchasing power then, is so great that we are ready to abandon old practices of federal borrowing. For individuals, federal borrowing has’ been, and is, on a voluntary basis. Is this the time to throw overboard the voluntary : ' bond sales program, and substitute compulsion? Ey If compulsory saving is instituted, voluntary bond sales will all but cease. And what will happen to bonds already purchased voluntarily, if compulsory purchases are ordered?

Is This the Proper Time?

The war bonds bought by individuals can be cashed in within 60 days. Compulsory saving, taking a designated fraction of each wage or salaryearner’s income, 'is calculated to reduce the livng standard of almost every person. To maintain his old standard of living, would a taxpayer, after forced saving becomes effective, dispose of bonds he bought voluntarily? * Would this constitute such a great increase in

England

LONDON, June 26 (By Wireless).—Instructions have been issued by the British army and navy and the R. A. F. that no uniforms can be worn while campaigning for political office. The order applies not only to platform appearances but to all kinds of : campaigning. Only scattered byelections are to be held before the end of the war, but this ruling looks ahead to preparations being made for the first big general election since 1935, which is expected as soon as Germany is defeated. Unlike American conservatives, the British tories have followed liberal policies at times. For in-

stance, the conservatives advanced broad housing subsidies, social security, milk programs in the schools, and some quasi‘socialistic measures. relating to electric power and broadcasting.

Now the conservatives are showing adaptability

again, while the Labor party is going to seed.

s+ Look for Promising Youngsters

THE CONSERVATIVES are preparing to bring in a new political generation in the first election at the end of the war. The party has decided by resolution to break away from the practice of virtually selling seats to rich men, and to hunt for young men of ability regardless of wealth or connections. ~The tories are now casting about for R. A. F. fliers * ‘and other promising youngsters out of the services . t» run for parliament. The party's intentions seem to be against loading up wita young reactionaries,

| My Day

HYDE PARK, Friday—Now that it has finally appeared in the newspapers that my husband was here for last week-end, and that the queen of the Netherlands was our guest, I can say a little more about the ‘week-end than I was able to say before. I am here ,50 often’ alone, or with guests of my own, that it is quite easy to write about what"ever goes on without even .mentioning whether the president is here or not, for his visits are rare indeed. I only wish that they could be more frequent, for it is beautiful here now and I think © one needs, every now and then, when one is trying to solve great . problems, to feel the calm of - nature. around one. ~~. The queen of the Netherlands mornings lying or u Fug out under the big ‘reading

‘unions, and it is a frequent practice to put up retired

By Ernie Pyle

sound asleep, and the other pilot was snoring away in his seat, and the sergeant flight mechanic was flying the plane. But that’s nothing. Once in a great while they'll put the plane on the automatic pilot and the whole, crew will come back and chat with the passengers, just to see how nervous they act. These ferry crews! are doing a superlative job. You can always tell a veteran ferry-line traveler by what he carries and how he acts on the plane. Being an old hand at it now myself, I always carry a loose blanket and take a musette bag into the cabin. : As soon as we are in the air I push a few people’s feet aside, spread the blanket on the floor and lie down, using the musette bag as a pillow. Some of the more fastidious travelers even bring air mattresses. - It's going to cramp my style, when I get home and fly the regular airlines again, not to be able to stretch out on the floor as soon as we get in the air.

Rough Air Almost Constant

WHEN NATURE turns on the spring heat in the desert countries, it seems to boil its fury clear up into the skies, and the result is almost constant rough air. It took us six days to cover about 8000 miles from the Congo back to North Africa, and every one of those six days it was rough. I've never seen such continuous rough air in my life. One of our pilots on the long haul was Capt. Wayne Akers of Memphis. At one of the lunch stops he got out of the plane and said, “That even made me sick.” For some strange reason I never got sick once. during the whole trip, but plenty of the others did, and how. I think one of the funniest sights of the war occurred during one of those violent all-day rides’ —a British general and an American private kneeling | side by side on the floor, their heads close together over the same bucket, their ranks and their nationalities utterly forgotten in their common bond of wishing they were dead.

By Marshall McNeil

purchasing power that the anti-inflationary aims of compulsory saving could not be attained? Or would wholesale cashing in of bonds bought voluntarily be curbed adequately by governmental appeals? What effect would a wartime compulsory saving program have on government borrowing after the war? These are all parts of the question of whether this is the time to impose compulsory saving or a much broader compulsory lending program. There are those who insist this is the time. We must have the revenue now, they say, to help pay for the war; we must sop up more and more excess purchasing power if other anti-inflationary controls are to be effective.

Voluntary Buys Fall Short

THE VOLUNTARY bond sale programs Rave been good, but not good enough. Too many bonds, it is argued, are being shoveled into banks, there creating government bank deposits which are in themselves not only inflationary, but a threat to our banking system. With the 20 per cent withholding tax becoming effective soon, the treasury cannot expect individual voluntary bond purchases to increase. Moreover, the current tax collection bill will make improbable, if not impossible, flat income-tax rate increases in the higher and middle brackets, at least for 1944 and 1945, during which time the unforgiven 25 per cent of 1942 income taxes will be collected. The government's need for revenue, in the face of this situation, is not smaller, but greater. We are only now beginning to supply our own armed forces and the united nations with the munitions, they need. And our great offensive against the axis has not yet begun. The principle of compulsory saving or compulsory lending having been fixed, the machinery for collecting forced savings from income as it is earned having been created, now is the time, it is argued, for a full forced saving program. It is the only solution for our increasing wartime fiscal dilemma.

By Raymond Clapper

. because the British tories long ago learned that the

best way to stay in power is to take the punch out of the laborites by sponsoring reasonable socialservice measures. As a result the conservatives are expected to hold the bulk of their overwhelming strength in commons, and to control post-war policies. In the Labor party the process of ossification is taking place. That is considered one of the tragedies of British politics. The defeat of Herbert Morrison, who is head and shoulders above everyone else, in a grudge fight at the recent party conference, illustrates what the party is up against.

Unemployment May Be Key THE LABOR party is dominated by old-line trade

union officials for seats in parliament. Commons is used as a kind of honorary retirement farm. The old-line union leaders, like the American Federation of Labor graybeards in America, hold everything in a tight grip through union bossism. The result is that young men who want to find a place in British public life find the Labor party's gates locked and go elsewhere. One unfortunate possibility is that a more volatile new generation, unwilling to join the tories even as members of the more progressive wing, will have no place to go except to the extreme left wing. There is no Communist movement of any strength here, but the stratification of the Labor party, and its shrinking influence and dismal future, help create a situation in which the left-wingers might find themselves thrown together in a new and more energetic group. Much depends on how shocesstil Britain is in easing unemployment in the first post-war stages.

By Eleanor Roosevelt

relinquishes them. I got: the feeling that she much prefers to go strolling out by herself, choosing her ‘own tree to sit under, and is glad to be left alone. Here is another case, I think, where the burden of serious questions and the responsibility for final decisions, no matter how much advice and information may be sought, weighs heavily on the individual. The baby who has been staying with us for the last few .days, left us yesterday and I must say we miss him’ very much. Perhaps there is nothing as reassuring in time of war as contemplation of the kingdom of babyhood. Here is a perfectly unselfconscious and appealing person before whom the immediate world around him, bows down. Everything he does. is miraculous and he is to every human being who approaches him, the tangible promise of eternity. As long as we have babies we renew our sense of security that the world we know is going to survive. There is only one sad thing which comes to me every time I look at our own well fed and well cared for children, and that is the thought of what is happen-

ive 10 babies any dhe 1 the oseupied. souninics| in the Far East, day by day. |

Wealthy

Italians

Would | Like to Buy

~ American Dollars

XII_ITALIAN MORALE SINKS : WHEN WE left Italy, the price of a pair of all-leather

bootleg shoes—believe it or not—was about forty dollars, .

and wearing apparel was proportionately exerbitant. This was greatly resented by the Italian worker who could not afford to pay such prices. There were other ways of cheating the rationing be-

‘sides’ bootlegging.

In many reputable shops which were

too closely watched by the police to sell goods without receiving clothes coupons, the proprietors would frequently allow their customers to buy twice as many articles for a | given number of coupons than they were legally entitled

to.

Many of the very poor Italians, like servants, sold

their clothing tickets to the well to do, not for cash but

for old clothes.

Probably one of the worst wartime hardships the population of Italy had to suffer was the inadequate transport. The absolute elimination of private cars and the drastic reduction in the number of taxis swelled the mobs using the already overcrowded “public conveyances, like busses and streetcars, to such an extent that a ride in one of them was an ordeal to be dreaded. The busses stopped running at 10 o’clock at night, so

that all social activities in the evening—even going to the movies—had to be forgone unless one lived in the center of town. Most places

of amusement accordingly closed down before 10 p. m. Dancing, whether public or private, had been forbidden ever since Italy entered the war. It seemed to us that all this had a very bad effect on Italian

. morale, since the Italians, instead

of being able to forget their

troubles in harmless amusements,

had nothing to do but go home and grumble to neighbors about how the war was going to turn out--and how many more ‘sacrifices' they would have to suffer before it was over,

Counteract Grumbling

THE MINISTRY of Popular Culture set to work to counteract this grumbling. Jokes began to appear in all the newspapers, making fun of the shortage of fuel, food, clothing, and the closing down at early hours of cafes and other amusement places. The comic magazines Marc’ Aurelio, Il Travaso, and Il Bertoldo, notorious for their earthly humor, devoted entire pages to wittis cisms about wartime hardships. A typical newspaper cartoon showed a beggar standing in the street with outstretched hands. He was practically nude except for a pair of brand-new shoes. “Why should you beg?” a passerby asked. “You've been able to buy shoes.” The beggar answered: “That's why I'm bankrupt.” Another cartoon portrayed two very ragged hoboes talking together. One of them said: “A taste for alcohol brought about my downfall What was your weakness?” And the second replied: “A taste for eggs fried in butter.” One evidence of Mussolini's dissatisfaction with the public apathy toward the war was to be seen in his frequent changes of local party leaders. He was constantly trying to find local bosses who could arouse public spirit to a fighting pitch. The Fascist party

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leadership was also changed three times during the first three years of the war. The most puerile campaign that the Fascists launched was the one to stamp out foreign influence. It was aimed at extirpating anything, from words to clothes, that could be traced to British, American, French or Russian origin.

At least once a week the news-’

papers would print lists of unpatriotic words and give Italian equivalents, generally neologisms,

to replace them. = E-

Un-Roman Drive

SOLEMN DECREES were also passed, ordering, under penalty of imprisonment, and fine, elimination of all foreign names for hotels, cabarets, and bars. ‘The handshake was frowned upon as a foreign importation and un-Roman as compared to the open-hand Fascist salute. Orchestra conductors in the summer were ordered to wear white linen Fascist uniforms instead of the usual tails with stiff-bosomed shirts and collars of “British style.” ‘The Fascist youth took particular delight in the edict against women wearing shorts or long trousers, which were supposed to be a mode imported from Communist Russia and “plutocratic America.” The great sport of the Fascist youths was to find a girl so garbed and then chase her down the street or along the beach, trying to remove the offending piece of apparel. Eleanor had a bad experience one morning when Reynolds was sick and she dashed across the street in her house slacks to buy him some medicine. As she came out of the pharmacy, four Fascist youths in uniform were waiting for her and immediately tried to pull off her trousers. Slapping at them, Eleanor succeeded in defending herself, but only after the key buttons had been torn off. Crowds gathered and impeded her progress. She was nearly taken to a police station. Her explanation that she was an ‘American and therefore entitled to wear American styles saved her from further mauling. One of the gravest signs of bad

By William Ferguson

CNA 1S THE CHIEF AGR/CLUL TURAL CRELOITOR OF AMERICAS

WE ARE INDEBTED TO Ww THE CHINESE, DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, FOR A LARGE PERCENTAGE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT SRL/7:5 VEGETABLES, GRAINS AND ORNAMENTAL PLANS GROWN HERE TODAY.

WHO SAID IT 2 “I HAVE NOTHING TO OFFER ‘BUT BLOOD, TOIL, SWEAT AND TEARS.” ?

LLUNY EMP]

VAL VA IN LLL LIAL 14

;

Shoppers are shown here parading past the display windows of a principal department store in Rome, but buying was restricted by rationing, The price of a pair of all-leather bootleg shoes was about $40,

and the cost of wearing apparel

was proportionately exorbitant.

windows are taped to protect them from shattering during air raids.

Four Sons of ‘the Wol, members of Mussolini’s youth organization. Such groups, with their snappy uniforms and Fascist-inspired pseudo-enthusiasm, failed to keep the civilian morale from sinking.

morale on the Italian home front was the universal lack of confidence in the lira among the moneyed classes. This was reflected in the soaring inflationary prices of all kinds of property that would presumably have a permanent post-war value. Italians with capital to invest searched frantically for something comparatively safe, but one avenue after another was blocked by various government regulations. Many bought gold and silver ornaments and precious stones until the government put a halt to all such sales, because so much jewelry was being bought by Nazi tourists and taken across the Brenner Pass where its value to . Italy would be permanently lost. ” 2 2

Real Estate Boom

PERHAPS THE most popular wartime investment was real estate. As soon as Italians generally began to realize that an axis victory was in doubt, land prices began skyrocketing, since few owners of property had any desire to sell. The government— ever hungry for new sources of revenue—then made owners still more reluctant to sell by decreeing

that one quarter of the purchase price was to be paid in government bonds. Since the bonds could not be sold until after the war, this had the effect of reducing the cash value of the land by 15 per cent.

Yet with all the government price fixing and the close Fascist —and Nazi — supervision of all branches of Italian production, there were plenty of industrialists and big landowners in Italy who were making rich profits out of the war, They couldn't squander it on frivolities or luxuries because there weren't any to be had. And these wealthy people hesitated to give lavish entertainments in. their homes for fear of drawing unwelcome attention to themselves. “I am going to give a dinner party as soon as I move into my new. apartment, and I want you both to come,” one Italian woman said to us in the summer of 1941. “I can’t entertain where I am now because a Fascist informer lives in the same building and he would report me for bootlegging food, but in the new place I am moving to, even the portiere is antiFascist, so.I can risk a party now and then.”

In this photo, taken in 1940, the store

With most normal spending and

" investment channels closed to

them, people with money turned to the one thing that the govern=ment was not likely to requisition —art. Pictures, statues, antique furniture, tapestries, Oriental rugs, even coats of armor were sought after. . Prices doubled and redoubled, but even so, these objets d’arts were considered good investments since no one knew what the lira was really worth.

Leather Short

“I was going to invest in a dozen or so pairs of shoes to last me for the duration,” one man told Eleansr, “but my bootlegger tells me he’s having such a hard time finding leather that he can only let me have two pairs right now. So I'm buying some tapestries instead. They’ll still be worth quite a lot after the war.” During the year preceding the United States’ entry into the war, we were besieged by well-to-do Italians who wanted to sell us lire for dollars at a rate considerably higher than the official one. Since Italian-American financial transactions had been “frozen,” they did not want or expect to be paid for their lire until after the war was over, What they hoped for was to have a stake with which they could start life again no matter how badly Italy was beaten. It was insurance against a terribly rainy day. They always seemed to be disappointed when we explained that our very delicate pcsition as correspondents under constant surveillance of the OVRA made it impossible for us to enter into any such transac-. tions, besides all the other reasons. Some idea of the Italian public's lack of confidence in the axis’ chances of winning may be gathered from the facts that the rate on dollars went up after the United States entered the war! While we were interned in Siena, we ‘could have bought lire cheaper than at any time during the previous year. It was economic evidence that even Italians favored America against the axis as the winner in the final outcome.

NEXT: Caliber of Italy’s Armed Forces. (Copyright, - 1943, by Reynolds an? Eleanor Packard; published by Oxford

University Press; distributed by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)

Mexico's Old Fear of Vankes Imperialism’ Hampers War Effort of Our Southern Allv

By DON NEWTON

, CUERNAVACA, Mexico, June 26.

—We tend to think of Mexico as an appendage of the United States—a sort of 49th state. - But the deeper one travels into Mexico the more he realizes that

| Mexico is a foreign country, whose

Indians “look inward and whose literate classes look south or east. All that Mexico shows to the

United States is a bristling back stretching along the Rio Grande across deserts and mountains to the sea. In the state of Morelos, where fathers and grandfathers shouldered arms with Zapata and Villa, the small boys have a game called “Mexicano,” in which the .Americans- are the rogues and the Mexicanos are the Robin Hoods. Their .elders, who are inherently gracious people, - will contrive "to make you welcome, but as a customer, not a pal. Even in Mexico City whare they are more used to “Los Yankis,” there is a deepening fear -of Yankee imperialism. There is- widespread support of “Hispanidad,” which stands for a Latin-American confederacy aimed ne Uni ge 8

“Ibero-America” is far stronger in riches and potential manpower than is the United States. Before Mexico came into the war on our side through fhe policy of a far-seeing government, Hispanidad was the main prop of German propaganda here. Still there is fear of the United States, fear which prevents the Mexican government from putting Mexico on a more active footing in the war. The Accion Nacional, most effective advocate of Hispanidad, is allied in thought with the Sinarquists, agrarian - clerical - fascist group, the followers of Gen. Juan Andreu Almazan, who was defeated for the presidency by Gen. Manuel Avila Camacho; and of Gen. Plutarco- Elias Calles; some industrialists and bankers," and a few surprisingly un-Latin people. The. movement, which is outside of Mexico's one-party: system, has its. roots in the Latin Catholic church’s fear of American Protestantism. The labor movement, too, fears the United States. A Hberal politician told me: “Mexico has every reason to fear

United States jopesialion. We do!

velt is our friend, but we know that neither he nor President Camacho speak for all groups in their countries. The reactionaries are trying once more to split us apart.” That “Yankee imperialism” should

really mean more than German » J

provaganda is hard for the folks back home in the United Staves. to understand,

HOLD EVERYTHING