Kankakee Valley Post, Volume 11, Number 8, DeMotte, Jasper County, 9 January 1941 — WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS President Scores ‘Peace Offensives’ And Urges Additional Aid for Britain; Nazis Pour More Troops Into Rumania; English Bombers Pound Invasion Ports [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS President Scores ‘Peace Offensives’ And Urges Additional Aid for Britain; Nazis Pour More Troops Into Rumania; English Bombers Pound Invasion Ports

By Edward C. Wayne

SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE—A picture released by the German censors, purporting to show French newspaper men being shown the effect of German cannon fire on the Maginot line fortifications. The line, upon which France once pinned its faith against invasion, is now a bad memory of the past for those in occupied France.

(EDITOR’S‘NOTE—When opinions are expressed in these eolnmns, they •re those of the news analyst and not necessarily of this newspaper.) j by Western Newspaper TTntnn >

PEACE: r V. S. Offensive As the U. S. administration moved ever more vigorously toward aiding Britain, isolationists groups in senate and house started individual “peace offensives” which the President had scored in no uncertain terms in his radio address Sunday before New Year’s. Back of them all was the familiar theme of asking the U. S. to demand that Britain and Germany state their war aims and that this country make one last effort to bring the two chief warring nations together before the world as it now exists falls apart. The theory bgck of it all seemed to be a feeling on some of the administration’s heartiest opponents that President Roosevelt still would like to see himself in the role of peacemaker, or) any basis. But the President himself indicated that there could be no negotiations with the Axis powers bent on “conquering the world” by the use of gangster tactics. The demand of Knudsen that manufacturers work for “victory,” and by this evidently meaning a British victory, was seen as enough indication of the true temper of White House feeling in the matter. Editorially, the anti-British American press this domestic “peace offensive, ' and the Anglophile press editorially condemned it, saying that normally intelligent senators and congressmen were allowing themselves unwittingly to be made tools of Hitler. Defense Capacity America’s productive capacity for defense is rapidly expanding to meet the nation’s armament needs. According to the defense commission, the nation’s arms output has reached 2,400 aircraft engines, 700 planes, more than 10,000 semi-auto-matic rifles and 100 tanks a month. The commission added that more than a million persons have been put to work in the last two months and that “several million more” will be needed by next November. GREECE: Note Anxious There were two schools of thought as to the reports that Germany was sending anywhere from 100,000 to 500,000 soldiers into Rumania via Hungary. • School No. 1 figured that these troops were aimed to be shot into Greece through Bulgaria, thus attempting to keep Italy going, and thus perhaps hulling Russia and Turkey into the southeastern end of the World war. School No. 2 it out that this latter eventuality was just what Germany sought to avoid, and that the troop if any, were largely a “smoke screen” to cover a severe invasion attempt on the West Front. j The British evidently belonged whole-heartedly to School No. 2, for they followed up Ihe unofficial holiday truce by hurliing an average of 100 bombs a minulte on the invasion ports, giving therjn a taste of war from the air that I they hadn’t had since October. Early advices from England’s

scouts on the continent seemed to indicate that the objective had been attained, and that any invasion attempt .would have to be postponed again. At the same time the British put into volume production a new type of torpedo boat, said to travel 70 miles per hour, barely touching the tops of the waves, highly maneuverable, and carrying all sorts of armament, including one cannon and several torpedoes. Purpose of this boat is to be a counter-moye against any troop-car-rying barges that may seek to cross the channel. BRITISH;! Get Second Wind The campaign in Egypt, which saw the British capture upward of 35,000 and huge quantities of war material while hurling the Italians not only out of foreign territory but well back within their own Libya, reached a point where the British sat still for a while, apparently catching their “second wind.’ r Sit-down point was Bardia, where a state of siege was declared, and the British, under General Wavell, apparently decided to shell the defenders into submission with artillery from land and sea and bombs from the air rather than to risk heavy casualties in a direct assault on the well-fortified town. Bardia is said to be defended by 20,000 Italians, and while cut off from outside help or supplies, and apparently doomed to fall, showed signs of being able to hold out for a while. Prisoners who deserted from within the town and ran the gantlet of fire to the comparative safety of surrender, said Bardia was a hell-on-earth. y s They described the havoc wrought by British fire, and felt themselves well out of it all, Rome was slow to admit British successes, .but there were signs of sweeping further changes in command. These mostly came from British sources, which announced that as the Italian air force was fighting more vigorously, they assumed that Italy once more had fired a general and hired a new one. : DIPLOMACY: Beats the Punch Diplomatic circles did a bit of shadow-boxing around a supposed plan of President Roosevelt to widen the neutrality area to include Ireland, thus permitting British-aid-car-rying American vessels to run to west Irish ports. The diplomats themselves said nothing, but the newspapers in the dictator nations opened fire on this proposal before it was made, and their barbs 7 shot in all directions and across all oceans. German papers threatened America with everything, practically including a declaration of war if the move was made. The ships would be sunk without warning, they said.’ They called it Britain’s “dirtiest trick” that the English have tried to foist on America. ■Following this the Rome press followed suit, going ever further, and promising Ireland that the Axis powers would give Eire full aid if she were to go to war with Britain. And this shot fell into Ireland and set the Irish almost at each other’s throats again.

QUAKE: Rut No Sabotage New England and a large part of the surrounding country was treated to a pair of earthquake shocks, one of the few disasters in recent months that hasn’t been investigated by the FBI or the Dies investigators or both. jW, Most remarkable was the prediction of one quake expert that the shocks felt are just a preliminary, and left New England sitting on the anxious seat. For this scientist predicted that within eight months the earth’s fault will really settle, and that a truly disastrous quake will occur. " New Englanders, who have smugly sat back for decades looking over at sunny California, studying their own gloomy climate and saying “well, anyway, we don’t have earthquakes,” are now revising their slogans accordingly. And such is their confidence in college professors that New England won’t be “sitting pretty” until the eight months have passed away—without a quake! NLRB: i Gets ‘Red' Tag The Smith committee of the house iof representatives tendered its final report, branding the National Labor Relations board as “avowed enemies of constitutional government,” and recommending not its disbandment, but a thorough house-cleaning. The committee approved the President’s naming of Dr. Harry A. Millis and Dr: William S. Leiserson to the board, and the ousting of Edwin S. Smith. Rep. Howard W. Smith’s group turned its chief barbs~against Smith. Ending 17 months of investigation , of the NLRB, the committee recommended and charged: 1. Prompt dismissal of all members of Communist “front” groups. 2. Sweeping .revision of the Wagner Labor Relations act. 3. Institution by congress of an investigation; of the entire field of labor relations. The report tied up Smith with Harry E. Bridges, the stormy petrel of labor on the West coast, charged it with “wrecking labor and employers alike” and of having pronounced “C. 1.0. sympathies.” TRIAL BY BOMBS: Air War Continues For periods of as much as two days no German planes appeared over England. Then in a lightning raid a devastating blow is struck. One such blow was on the .port of Liverpool and another at Manchester. Damage was admitted heavy. The British, on the other hand, conducted nightly raids, and sought to make them on the same giant scale. Their most serious blow was on Mannerheim, home of the huge I. G. Ferbenindustrie, one of the largest plants in the world. The bombings were not confined to Germany, however, but strung out from northern Norway to Italy. One nfght R. A. F. planes flew as far as Venice, dropped bombs and returned. Neutrals also felt the effects of the air war. Several towns in both Northern Ireland (Ulster) and Southern Ireland (Eire) were struck. Civilian casualties were recorded as well in Switzerland. Otherwise on the war front: C. German Junker planes were reported carrying Italian soldiers from the east coast to Albania. It was denied any German troops were being ferried. C. The British submarine, Swordfish, which attained a notable record, was missing with its crew T of 40 and considered lost. C. The house of parliament again was struck by a bomb. C. Hitler told his Nazi soldiers in a New Year's message that the “year 1941 will bring the greatest victory in our history.”