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Show LABOR: Green 'Collecting' WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS By Edward C. Wayne Air and Naval Raiders Harass British As Greeks Hold Off Italian Invasion; Nazi-Soviet Talks Yield Little News; Dies Asks Funds for 'Sabotage' Probe (EDITOR'S NOTE When opinions are expressed in these columns, they are those ot the news analyst and not necessarily of this newspaper.) I (Released by Western Newspaper i GRECO-ROMAN: ! Round One to Greece There seems little doubt any longer long-er that the Greek victory over Italian Ital-ian forces has been as nearly complete com-plete as any action could be so early in a war. Fascist forces were reported fleeing from Koritza, setting set-ting fire to their supplies in this, the main base of the central attack. Italian stories that only 362 men were killed in the campaign hardly gibe with eye-witness reports by reputable correspondents of two things huge piles of bodies in the mud of the Pindus mountain passes huge concentration camps filled with Italian prisoners of war who are being widely quoted. Their reports of Italian attitude toward the war so encouraged England Eng-land with the opportunity of deal- er, and had pleasure of picking up 65 survivors, many wounded. Jervis Bay went to the bottom of the ocean with her gallant commander, com-mander, who had one arm shot away during the engagement Over England, German bombers are using a new technique, making more difficult still the task of antiaircraft anti-aircraft fire and the work of fighters. fight-ers. They fly over the country in waves, traveling single file, which Indians discovered centuries ago was a good defensive formation. First raider drops its bombs, and succeeding ships get a view of scene below in the glare of the first explosions ex-plosions and see better when and where to let go. Flying is done at 30,000 to 35,000 feet. In many cases, however, British report bombing is done on "time tables" when there are cloud formations, forma-tions, the bombers flying certain mathematical distances from flying fields and then letting their cargoes go without any aim whatever. That Britain is generally feeling the pinch was seen by reports of further restrictions in rationing. However, nothing as drastic was reported re-ported as the apparently authentic dispatch from Berlin that dog meat was made legal human fodder. DIPLOMATS: Home and Abroad Diplomats, both domestic and foreign, for-eign, came into their own as far as the spotlight was concerned. In Berlin they buzzed about the capital like flies; Molotoff, (for whom bombs have been named) arriving with 33 guards and associates; lesser less-er lights from Italy and the Balkans hovering about the outskirts of the main Hitler-Molotoff talks, with even a sprinkling of Japanese lurking about where they wouldn't have to rub elbows too closely with the "hated "hat-ed Russians." It was another case of the mountain moun-tain laboring and bringing forth a mouse at least as far as the dispatches dis-patches went, though there may be, " V 1 i ; f : JOHN L. LEWIS Mr. Green 'collects'. The American Federation of Labor La-bor quarrel with the C. I. O. was rapidly reaching its climactic stage with the President of the United States announcing that the achieving of a permanent labor peace as an aid to the defense program would be one of the first agenda of his administration's third term. William Green, collecting the spotlight spot-light as a result of his championship of the Roosevelt candidacy, immediately immedi-ately responded that he was willing to make a peace sans Lewis. John L. Lewis was given a roaring roar-ing demonstration as the C. I. O. unionists un-ionists gathered for their third annual an-nual convention in Atlantic City. At the opening of the meeting he told delegates he was "stepping down" as their leader and he urged a "new unity" for the organization. Lewis had declared hewould resign if President Pres-ident Roosevelt were re-elected. All commentators agreed, however, howev-er, that labor peace would be a very good thing if as and when it could be achieved. SABOTAGE: And Mr. Dies Three explosions shattered powder pow-der plants in one hour; a crane fell over in a shipyard; a bridge fell apart on the West coast; fire attacked at-tacked other plants, and the cry of "sabotage" was raised in the land. The G-men, private and public detectives de-tectives and Dies committee investigators inves-tigators have been running around at full speed trying to make miniature minia-ture Black Toms out of each of these, or trying just as hard to disprove dis-prove that they had anything to do with foreign agencies. Mr. Dies, however, asking a million mil-lion dollars of government money for a full probing of the situation, said he was going to publish a "white paper" giving names, addresses and full details of all the foreign consular consu-lar agents, Russian, Japanese, German Ger-man and Italian who are engaged in subversive activities, and whom he blames by implication for the chain of occurrences of damage and disaster to industry. He recalls other events, like the war department fire which nearly destroyed the U. S. code books, and promises that he'll follow the smoke and find the fire. Friends of the Dies committee pointed to the logical character of his hypothesis, that the Axis powers and partners would be very glad if disaster should overtake U. S. defense de-fense preparations, seeing that Mr. Roosevelt has promised Britain a fifty-fifty share in the whole job. DICTATOR METAXAS Rough going for Italy. ing a crashing blow to Fascist morale mo-rale that she sent big bomber squadrons squad-rons to Taranto and smashed a goodly part of Italy's fleet. Italy denied much damage except to one ship, so British sent over observation planes, took pictures, and reported the details. Two capital cap-ital ships apparently permanently put out of action, four other smaller small-er ones. Stories of the Greek successes over the Italian forces further were borne- out by the tone of Italian broadcasts and dispatches, telling of "reorganization" of the Italian drive; appointment of a new commander; com-mander; also the Greek reports of attacks inside Albanian territory. Credit for the Greek victory was given to several factors: Greek knowledge of the terrain; enterprise of guerrilla bands; skill with the bayonet, and surprise machine-gun and artillery attacks on enemy columns col-umns in difficult mountain passes, plus sudden onslaughts of bad weather; also Premier John Metax-as Metax-as has been watching fellow-dictator Mussolini for some time. Add to this stories from prisoners that they had no heart for the war and had been promised a relatively bloodless invasion, and one got a pretty good picture of the opening of the Greco-Roman war. There were no surface signs that Italy was quitting, however, but might be steaming ahead for a more determined effort. BRITAIN: Feels Heavy Blows The war has become more bitter for England, with Germany heavily increasing aerial attacks on cities, raining bombs on London and industrial indus-trial centers like Coventry. British, ever frank in admitting losses, reported Coventry in ruins, thousands slain and wounded. London Lon-don damage was said to be terrific. ter-rific. Losses at sea are staggering, and a raider on the loose in mid-Atlantic smashed into at least one large convoy. Germans first announced entire convoy sunk, along with Rangitiki, armored merchantman, and Jervis Bay, an auxiliary cruiser, cruis-er, which were protecting other ships. Apparently this claim was made when numbers of SOS signals were heard and then news of convoy suddenly sud-denly ceased. But British finally came through with the news that of 39 ships, 9 were missing, and later two of them showed up. Naval hero was the commander of the Jervis Bay which boldly steamed to meet her stronger enemy, ene-my, forcing raider's fire on herself, and permitting convoy to scatter. Scandinavian skipper in convoy was so stirred by such bravery that he refused to flee to any great distance, dis-tance, returned to scene hours lat- AMBASSADOR KENNEDY Talk out of turn? and probably is a lot under the surface. sur-face. Out of it all has come to the public eye only the broadest platitudinous pledges: Germany (with her Italian axis partner somewhat in the background) back-ground) promises various powers that, if they are good, they will get something. Germany and Italy will rule Europe. Eu-rope. Russia will get expansion room anywhere she wants as long as it doesn't interfere with European situations. situ-ations. Diplomats took this to mean at least a part of India and also perhaps Iran and portions of Tux-key Tux-key if she misbehaves. Japan will get the rest of Asia, at least the southeastern part, and Russia and Japan are urged to get together at once about the rest of it In this country two diplomatic names stood out. Kennedy and Bullitt. Bul-litt. The former was surrounded by a halo of rumors that he would resign re-sign following his "talk out of turn" in Boston. While denying much that was in the Globe interview, he continued con-tinued to preach along about the same general lines, omitting his references ref-erences to the death of democracy and the advent of national socialism in the United States. Bullitt was being as signally rumored ru-mored as Kennedy's successor. All he would say was that he wanted to resign to "speak and write" about conditions', and that the President had asked him to remain in public life, and that he was considering the matter. WAR OF THE WEEK: Siam vs. Indo-China Vichy announced Siam (Thailand) had gone to war with Indo-China which brought to a new front a miniature min-iature war which nevertheless, will bring a very real death and destruction destruc-tion to the populations of the countries coun-tries involved. The Siamese, a dark brown race of small stature, are of Japanese and totalitarian leanings. The Indo-Chinese, Indo-Chinese, larger and yellower, are one of the orphans of the Battle of France. The war is another diplomatic outgrowth out-growth of the movement of Japan in southeastern Asia, and brings just one step nearer to the Philippines the Tripartite Powers. AMERICAN SCENE: In Brief C The United States has freed credits cred-its for Martinique, French possession posses-sion in the Indies, and will allow the purchase of $50,000, mostly in foodstuffs. The move is the first in a series by the U. S. to create a better relationship, to insure against the Nazis getting hold of U. S.-built planes on the beach there. C. Signs of differences of opinion in high circles on national defense were noted. There was a continuance continu-ance of the controversy over the Garand vs. the Johnson automatic rifle. Knudsen said he thought the auto industry might throw itself into plane manufacture with speed and efficiency. Some leading auto men joined plane makers in disagreeing with him sharply. O. British moves to get extension of U. S. credit for war purchases were started in this country, with every evidence that the effort will meet with the approval of the administration. ad-ministration. C. The duke of Windsor, in first of 14 interviews with Adela Rogers St. John, purporting to tell the story of his abdication and his love for the duchess, blames President Wilson for the present war, saying that a ruler of a country cannot compete with foreign diplomats. Wilsoi, he said, should not have attended ' the making of the Versailles pact |
