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Show WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS By Edward C. Wayne Reports of Czechoslovakia!! Unrest And Nazi Claims of Important Gains Highlight News of European Fighting; Russia Says Enemy Needs Oil to Win (EDITOR'S NOTE When opinions are expressed In these columns, they are those of the news analyst and not necessarily of this newspaper.) I fppipaipH by Western Newspaper TT"tft" ) ' RUSSIA: Adding Machines While Berlin had been making its adding machines ring out to them joyous accounting of the utter Soviet So-viet collapse of resistance to the south, asserting that 665,000 prisoners prison-ers had been taken, and "some 300,-000" 300,-000" had been slain, the Russians still painted a different picture. Berlin had announced that "Russia "Rus-sia has been all but knocked out of the war and the real turning point has come." At the same time Russia had reported re-ported a sort of "inland Dun-querque" Dun-querque" on the southern front, claiming that Marshal Semeon Bud-enny Bud-enny had succeeded in withdrawing considerable of his army, and that of 15 Russian divisions admittedly trapped in the Kiev battle, 10 divisions di-visions had escaped, and the other five "were in a position to give a good account of themselves." Two towns had been named by the Russians as the critical points, one Achtyrka, and the other Kont-stantinograd, Kont-stantinograd, where Marshal Timo- UNREST: Spreading Reports of unrest in Italy succeeded suc-ceeded to stories of uprisings in most of the occupied countries of Europe, and the latest dispatches along this line came from the London Lon-don radio describing conditions in Czechoslovakia, second of Europe's countries to be taken over by the Nazis. It had been announced that Rein- 1 hardt Heydrich, former chief of police po-lice in Berlin, had been placed in charge of the protectorate of the Czechs, succeeding Baron Von Neu-rath. Neu-rath. Reports were, it had been stated, that there had been mysterious , breakdowns in factories, explosions in munitions plants, train derailments, derail-ments, and that friction between Czechs and the German authorities was becoming "open.' Heydrich, London reported, would Immediately set up courts martial with power to mete out death sentences sen-tences for anti-Nazi activities. Berlin sources reported an atr-tempted atr-tempted revolt by part of the army in Czechoslovakia had been uncovered uncov-ered and at least 24 persons executed exe-cuted for their part in it. At the same time Berlin declared that two residents of Germany itself had been condemned to death for listening to foreign radio stations, the first capital penalties exacted for this crime. Also it had been reported that 22 more executions in occupied countries coun-tries had been carried out. A Brussels paper had reported 20 of these in connection with the belief be-lief by the authorities that Communists Commu-nists had stolen explosives from a storage place in northern France, and had used them to attack French trains and German army transport trucks. One of the Germans sentenced for radio listening had been publishing pamphlets against Hitler, it was said, while the other was a Polish woman working for a German doctor. doc-tor. She was accused of using her employer's radio for her nefarious and illegal listening. PROFITS: And Patriotism Profits, or restriction of them, had been linked to patriotic war efforts by Secretary of the Treasury Mor-genthau Mor-genthau in a proposal for a bill for a profit-ceiling of 6 per cent on invested in-vested capital. This had received a warm reception recep-tion in certain capital circles, and not so warm in others. Senator George of Georgia, head of the senate sen-ate finance committee, bitterly at- . . . , L1'":.vlJ MARSHAL TIMOSHENKO A tough job for the marshuL shenko had been reported as attempting at-tempting to separate the German forces to permit trapped troops to escape. Two .of the divisions the Russian communique dated the same as the German had said, had completed their junction with the Timoshenko forces "only that morning." The Russians admitted the Crimea was cut oft" from the mainland, but asserted that defense lines had been holding firm both from frontal attacks at-tacks and from an air-borne invasion inva-sion from the rear. In fact the Russians claimed that the positions of her troops in the Crimea and at Odessa constituted a menace to the German right wing which the Nazis were fighting desperately des-perately to remove. The Germans listed, in addition to the Kiev-southern successes, which they had maintained were complete and in the mopping up stage, drastic defeats of Russian naval forces, the "dooming" of Leningrad, and that it was "too late" for effective aid from the United States or Britain. North American and British help for Russia, said the German statements, state-ments, ignoring the reports of British Brit-ish planes actually on the front and fighting, "is on paper and will stay there if Russia must depend on transport through Iran and through Arctic seas, or through Siberia. OIL NEED: ' Seen by Reds The Soviet, declaring that the advent ad-vent of heavy snows will be a deathblow death-blow to Nazi hopes of quick victory, pointed to the all-out German drive toward the Caucasus as a sure sign that Germany needs oil to win the war. The Moscow News had published an article saying, in part: "It is only on the east front that winter plays a big part, and on the west front, where Hitler has unsolved un-solved problems, the need of oil is terrific. "He is playing for big stakes in this furious drive toward the Caucasian Cau-casian oil fields. "Effective action east and west is essential to foil Hitler's attempt to keep his war machine going." The paper further stated that Germany Ger-many had used up two-thirds of her oil reserves in the war against Russia. Rus-sia. ITALY: Italy, according to reports both from Rome and from Alexandria, showing both sides of the picture, had been suffering heavily in late weeks of the war. It was a "black" sea-month for Italian vessels, said the British African Af-rican command, claiming that sinkings sink-ings had totaled more than 200,000 tons, that four liners of more than 20,000 tons each, and each of them capable of carrying 5,000 German troops to Africa, had been put out of commission. In addition 23 troop and supply ships were claimed to have fallen victims to British patrols. At the same time Rome admitted that the war was cutting into her bread, heat and spaghetti supplies. Bread was rationed more severely, spaghetti cooking has been reduced by hall, and rationing of shoes and clothing was soon to be announced, Rome said. The cabinet had met under Mussolini, Mus-solini, and had approved a set . of laws which would throw practically all the nation's capital into war bonds. SENATOR WALTER GEORGE "Lei the ink dry" tacked the proposal on the ground that it would "result in incalculable hardship to legitimate business, would disrupt defense production and crush, and kill small business." He urged congress to "let the ink dry" on the $3,500,000,000 tax bill before entering into another, larger larg-er revenue producer on a basis to take all. of the profits of business save 6 per cent. Most senators and representatives had been slow to comment, contenting content-ing themselves with saying they'd like to "think it over," and to "know more about it." It was when the word had gone out that Morgenthau had been drawing up such a bill, and when senators began to believe that it must have White House approval ap-proval that Senator George launched his attack. SHIPS: The launching of 14 ships all on the same day at U. S. shipyards had marked an epoch in American shipbuilding, and was hailed by the President with congratulatory telegrams tele-grams sent to each launching. He revealed that this was part of a program that by next spring would see two vessels going down the ways every day, and by the end of 1943 would see the United States having built at least 1,600 merchant vessels to help regain the mastery and .freedom of the seas. The nation hailed the day as "Liberty Fleet day," and the launchings occurred not only all up and down the Atlantic seaboard, but also at Pacific shipbuilding ports. Said the President, in a transcribed broadcast played on a recording machine at each launching: "We Americans as a whole cannot listen to those few Americans who preach the gospel of fear who say in effect that they are still in favor of freedom of the seas but who would have the United States tie up our vessels in our ports. That attitude atti-tude is neither truthful nor honest." |