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Show WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS Solomons Battle Cost Mounts Steadily; WPB Cuts 1943 Farm Machine Output But Provides Adequate Parts Supply; Winter Helps Russ Defenders of Volga (EDITOR'S NOTE: When opinions are expressed In these columns, they are those of Western Newspaper Union's news analysts and not necessarily of this newspaper.) i Released by Western Newspaper Union. Hi tA s Ms? i r at i ' f ' .v ' , i " X f u M " s - i r t I, - " " ? 4 With a picturesque South Sea island landscape as a backdrop, U. S. marines are shown taking bombs from a "bomb garden" concealed in the palm trees of Guadalcanal island. As operational flights against Jap ships, land forces and air bases in the Solomon islands have been stepped up, V. S. air forces have been increasingly employed. FARM IMPLEMENTS: 20 Per Cent Slash Farmers would not have new tractors trac-tors or new plows to hitch them to in 1943, but they would have plenty of repair parts to keep their present machinery operating. That was clear when the War Production Pro-duction board issued its drastic order or-der slashing the production of 1943 farm equipment to 20 per cent of the 1940 total, but permitting repair parts production to be 130 per cent of 1940 operations. Forecasting industrial readjustments readjust-ments in other fields, the WPB order or-der concentrated the new farm equipment output in the hands of small manufacturers in labor-shortage areas. Repair parts manufacture was left to the big producers. This decision de-cision represented a victory for these companies which had held out for retention in their own plants of all the repair parts production, thus preserving the identity of their specialized, spe-cialized, trade-name implements. It likewise represented a concession to the department of agriculture which had strenuously urged a heavy program pro-gram for repair parts manufacture, while it opposed any new machinery cut below 50 per cent of the 1940 output. RUSSIAN FRONT: Ally Winter Comes Winter was one ally that could give the hard-pressed Russians immediate im-mediate help. For days past the engagements surging around Stalingrad Stalin-grad in the northeast and Mozdok further south in the Caucasus had been a race against time. Thus when snow swept across the Don-Volga Don-Volga steppes the Russians knew their reinforcements had arrived. Significant was the German high command's communique that the Nazi drive in the Caucasus had been impaired by continued bad weather, and that the Russians had undertaken under-taken strong, tank-led diversion attacks at-tacks against the north flank of the Nazi thrust into Stalingrad. The strength of Marshal Timo-shenko's Timo-shenko's relief assault from the north was indicated in the communique commu-nique which said the Russian onslaughts on-slaughts had been undertaken with "fresh, strong infantry and tank forces." SUBMARINE MENACE: Will Get Worse' Rear Admiral Emory S. Land, chairman of the U. S. Maritime commission, warned the nation that "the submarine menace is going to be progressively worse this winter." Speaking before the Investment Bankers association, he said the menace would grow, because of winter's win-ter's bad weather and longer nights, giving U-boats better opportunity for concealment. SOLOMONS: Battle Cost Mounts Guadalcanal with the only good airfield within hundreds of miles controls the southern Solomons, plus a sizeable area in the South Pacific. Whoever holds and uses that airfield rules that area. The efforts of the Japs to regain the Guadalcanal airfield from its American defenders thus had strategic strate-gic implications affecting the entire southwest Pacific. If the Americans held, they could protect Allied supply sup-ply lines, keep the Japs checkmated and prepare to expand their offensive. offen-sive. The cost of the battle was high to both sides. As planes, ships and land forces jockeyed for favorable position, the United States reported the loss of two destroyers, the O'Brien and the Meredith. American Ameri-can planes retaliated by damaging a Jap cruiser and a destroyer and shooting down 12 enemy planes. Meanwhile, west of the Solomons, Allied bombers blasted enemy ships in New Britain's harbor of RabauX LABOR DRAFT: 62,500,000 Needed Drafting of men and women for war work to meet the employment-armed employment-armed service demand of 62,500,000 persons is "inevitable," Paul V. Mc-Nutt, Mc-Nutt, war manpower director, declared de-clared in testifying before the senate sen-ate military affairs committee. McNutt listed three essentials which forthcoming manpower legislations legis-lations must embrace: (1) Employers Employ-ers in any area must be required to hire all workers through a central bureau; (2) Methods of labor utilization utili-zation must be controlled to prevent employers from "hoarding workers"; work-ers"; (3) Individuals must remain on the job, or transfer to one more important im-portant to the war effort. . FEDERAL TAXES: 43,000,000 Will Pay More than 43,000,000 Americans became subject to direct federal taxation tax-ation when President Roosevelt signed the new war-time tax bill which congress has spent 10 months in compiling. Designed to produce revenues of close to 25 billion dollars yearly, the new law extended the tax load to all Americans making more than $624 a year. . Through the President's prompt action in signing the bill, 65 million dollars worth of higher excise taxes from liquor, travel, telephone service, cigarettes, telegrams tele-grams and other items went into effect ef-fect November 1. Payable next March 15 are record-breaking normal and surtax levies on 1942 individual and corporation cor-poration income. A special 5 per cent Victory tax on all income in excess of $12 a week will be deducted from pay envelopes' after January 1. FRANCE: 'Hour for Revolt' French workers seething at the Vichy government's attempts to draft labor for work in German war factories, heard three voices counselling coun-selling action. The first was the voice of Pierre Laval, who appealed for skilled French workers to co-operate with the Nazis so that "France won't be the victim of a German victory." The second was the voice of Gen. Charles De Gaulle, fighting French leader, who declared that "the hour for revolt has come." Previously De Gaulle had urged French patriots pa-triots to refrain from overt acts against German rule and to bide their time until the Allies invade the continent. Third voice was that of American Secretary of State Cordell Hull, who said it was "gratifying to see signs cropping out increasingly through France that the people are awakening awaken-ing to the conditions which Laval is attempting to impose on them." Meanwhile as Hitler had extended the time for Laval to deliver the workers, strikes and wholesale abandonment of jobs were reported by workers who hid out to avoid being sent to Germany. FORTS VS. MUSTANGS: Prove U. S. Air Power Axis air commands learned long ago to respect U. S. army Flying Fortresses because of their uncanny ability to bomb strategic points at high altitude. More recently did the Axis learn to fear American-built Mustang fighter planes. Both these aircraft scored spectacular spec-tacular success in a single day when Flying Fortresses struck a knockout blow at the German submarine base at Lorient, on the coast of France, while Mustang planes made history by flying all the way to Germany to blast the Dortmund-Ems canal area. The destructive results of the Lorient Lo-rient raid were reported by Vichy dispatches which reported 100 killed and 450 wounded and untold material materi-al damage. Lorient is Germany's chief Atlantic U-boat base. Here huge concrete shelters had provided a haven for raiders of Allied shipping. ship-ping. The Mustangs performed a feat no British-based single-motored fight, er planes have been able to achieve, by penetrating into Germany proper. prop-er. SMUTS: Predicts Nazi Doom Silvery-pated Jan C. Smuts, prime minister of South Africa, who helped plunge Kaiser Wilhelm's Germany into the tailspin of defeat in World War I, predicted a similar doom for Hitler's Nazi regime in World War II. Sole surviving member of the war cabinet of the last conflict still in high office, the venerable Smuts told the house of commons in London i S '' - ' ,1 iiiHir-'Ti 1 SiYnriiMi'MmiittmfrTiWriil GEN. JAN SMUTS M . . . folly to over prepare." that "the stage is set for the last, the offensive phase of the war for the United Nations." The German army is "bleeding to death in Soviet Russia," . he declared. de-clared. "Russia," he added, "is bearing more than her share of the common burden. Whatever help in whatever form we can give to Russia Rus-sia to sustain her in her colossal effort ef-fort should be given in fullest measure meas-ure and with utmost speed." Once the time has come to take the offensive and strike while the iron is hot, "it would be folly to delay de-lay and overprepare and perhaps miss our opportunity," he concluded. conclud-ed. Smuts predicted the war might continue two more years. EVICTIONS: Curbed by OP A Cracking down on landlords attempting at-tempting to evade rent control, Price Administrator Leon Henderson Hender-son ordered that no tenant in a rent control area could be evicted except under special circumstances, without with-out three months' notice. Mr. Henderson explained that some landlords attempting to evade rent control had forced tenants to buy the house or had sold it to someone else willing to pay monthly month-ly installments in excess of the legal rent. "Some of the sales," he said, "have teen nothing short of outrageous. out-rageous. Drastic action was necessary neces-sary in order to maintain the morale of workers in war industry and protect pro-tect the families of members of the armed forces who pay rent from the threat of overnight eviction for the war's duration." |