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Show Russian Help Welcomed Despite Communist Bogy Problem of Defeating Hitler Is Paramount; Dykstra Returns to Wisconsin University; Train 1,520,000 Defense Workers. By BAUKHAGE National F arm and Home Hour Commentator, VTXV Service, 1343 H Street, N. W., Washington, D. C. WASHINGTON. It was one of those Washington mornings when the clouded sky above' let in the damp, heavy heat and an aching glare on wall and pavement even though it shuts out the sun itself. The German armies were smashing smash-ing through Poland and into the Ukraine. With the Luftwaffe roaring roar-ing eastward for a change, British bombers were blackening skies and shaking the earth of northern France and industrial Germany. A British military and economic mission, we knew, was sitting down with the Soviet leaders in Moscow, offering them utmost aid in their fight against Germany. The papers were crying over a drop in American airplane production, produc-tion, still reporting strikes in defense industries and, very casually, at his press conference, the President had announced that the United States would aid the Soviets as much as possible. Later, I sat in the office of a perturbed per-turbed government official. "How," I asked, "can you reconcile recon-cile to the American people the anti-communist anti-communist feeling in this country and aid to Russia?" He paused and looked out over streets, black with staggered shift of government workers on their way home in another hour there would be another echelon of hurrying men and women, in another hour, another an-other recruits in the army of defense. de-fense. Americans Dislike Communism. Finally, he spoke: "Of course," he answered, "that is the problem we have to face. We know that most Americans feel as unsympathetic towards Communism as they do toward Naziism. And the subversive activities of the Communists Commu-nists in this country have aroused strong hatred against Moscow. Our attitude on tbt score has been plainly stated." Then my friend quoted the statement state-ment made by Undersecretary of State Sumner Welles, shortly after Hitler's speech declaring war against Kussia. Mr. Welles had stated: "... doctrines of Communistic dictatorship are as intolerable and as alien to our own beliefs as are the principles of the Nazi dictatorship dictator-ship . . . but the immediate issue that presents itself to the people of the United States is whether the plan for universal conquest ... . which Hitler is now desperately trying try-ing to carry out, is to fce successfully success-fully halted or defeated." Then the man across the desk from me said: "In other words, when your wagon gets stuck in the mud, you don't look too closely at the man who helps pull you out." What the government would like, I suggested, would be to have the Nazi gingham dog and the red calico cat eat each other up. "Perhaps," he laughed, "that would be the best solution. But it isn't "as simple as that The pup seems to have so much stronger jaws, in this case, that we believe it might be wise to furnish the cat with an extra claw or two." The trouble, I suggested, is selling that idea to the American people. He agreed; but he added that there were certain things which ought to be understood in regard to subversive subver-sive Communist activities in this country. Subversive Activities Overestimated "Let's take for granted," he said, "that we would have nothing to do, if we could help it, with the fellow who is helping us pull our wagon out of the mud. But we do want to get the wagon out, so there isn't much choice. "Now, as things are today, a Communist Com-munist is not likely to do as much harm as we may fear," the official went on. "There are three reasons for this statement: In the first place the government has subversive activities ac-tivities under much better control than is generally known. "In the second place, pressure is now being brought to bear effectively effective-ly on the labor unions to promptly remove all members of any subversive subver-sive organizations from their memberships. mem-berships. "Thirdly, in all probability, now that Kussia needs our help, the Party line will probably order any obstruction of the American defense de-fense program to cease. Communist Commu-nist leaders here have already indicated in-dicated that this is their new program. pro-gram. "And then, it can be definitely stated that the Communist situation in this country has never been as bad as certain publicity-seeking gentlemen gen-tlemen have painted it," the government gov-ernment officials seated across the desk concluded. Dykstra Returns To Wisconsin University C. A. Dykstra, president of the University of Wisconsin, has gone back to his campus and his cloistered clois-tered halls beside that shining lake in the Middle West. He did a historic job here in Washington, as director of the Selective Service system sys-tem and first head of the National Na-tional Defense Mediation board, two great jobs that required all, as Stevenson Ste-venson put it, that a man has of fortitude and delicacy. Mr. Dykstra, as readers of this column know, did not get his knowledge knowl-edge of men and government solely from books. He was a successful city manager of Cincinnati, he held positions of civic responsibility in Cleveland, Chicago, and Los Angeles. An-geles. But he was chosen to head the draft because of his deep and sympathetic understanding of American Amer-ican youth. When he left Washington, Washing-ton, I asked Mr. Dykstra for an exclusive ex-clusive two-paragraph valedictory, just for the Western Newspaper Union readers. This is what he said about his experience as head of selective service: "My experience with selective service convinced me that the young men of America are neither soft nor indifferent. They can be counted upon to give a good account of themselves. them-selves. Moreover, public acceptance accept-ance of selective service has proved to be much more favorable than was anticipated." Dykstra is an optimist, but not one who can't see the hole as well as the doughnut. "My experience on the Mediation board," he told me, "makes me optimistic that labor and management manage-ment are developing a better understanding under-standing and a more co-operative approach to a developing industrial jurisprudence. On the whole there has been a minimum of recalcitrancy recalci-trancy on both sides. The appointment appoint-ment of Davis is absolutely right." Train Workers For Defense Industry One record of achievement In the defense program has come out over a hundred per cent better than promised, and you hear very little about it. Much of the credit goes to a little, dynamic man, from out where the tall corn grows. He is John Studebaker of Iowa, commissioner of education, and he is the drive behind the federal pro-gram pro-gram of training for defense industries. indus-tries. Commissioner Studebaker promised prom-ised congress last October that the vocational training groups of the nation na-tion would produce 700,000 workers trained for service at lathe or bench by June 30, 1941. He now reports that 1,520,000 have actually been trained. Moreover, although the one-third more than the regular program pro-gram was undertaken, the cost of the Washington end was only about 1 per cent, and less money was used for the entire project than congress con-gress had originally appropriated an achievement in these days! The average cost of training, per man hour, was 21 cents, and 97 per cent of the total amount of money spent in the training was spent in the local community. That was part of the Studebaker idea keeping the training decentralized using the local lo-cal schools, shops, equipment and teaching force leaving the running of the program to labor, industry, and the local school officials. This not only proved efficient but it served to bring labor and industry together on a thousand advisory committees which were formed all over the country. Labor and industry indus-try each furnished 3,500 members of these committees. The rest were made up of consultants. Five hundred hun-dred systems provided the machinery machin-ery to carry out this task, and they worked 24 hours a day to do it. |