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Show WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS By Edward C. Wayne Landing of U. S. Forces in Iceland Is New Move in Hemisphere Defense; Germany's Campaign Against Russia Gives British Chance for Air Attacks (EDITOR'S NOTE When opinions are expressed In these colnmns, they are those of the news analyst and not necessarily of this newspaper.) I (Released by Western Newspaper Tinion l iv-ypJffy ". .... i JL ill ill tjL-j.;':' . During; the Iraq rebellion and war, Americans stationed at the Iraq capital city of Baghdad prepared to defend themselves. As Old Glory is raised in the background men of the American legation staff start training drill with weapons furnished by British military mission commander. com-mander. But the British won this war before the Americans were called upon to defend themselves. ICELAND: Occupied by U. S. American naval forces have occupied oc-cupied Iceland to supplement and eventually to replace British forces there. This information was given congress by President Roosevelt, who explained that the move was taken "to forestall any pincers movement undertaken by Germany against the Western hemisphere." The occupation was accomplished with the full permission of the new Iceland republic which had declared its independence from Denmark in May. ON RUN: Or Defending? Crucial questions of the Russo-German Russo-German war were these: Did the Nazis actually have the Russians in a wild-disorganized retreat? re-treat? Were the Russians, instead, falling fall-ing back to the Stalin line in good order considering the magnitude of their army? BRITAIN: Her Chance The British were apparently keenly keen-ly aware that the preoccupation of the Nazis with the Reds on the East furnished them with their great chance of the war. Hardly had the attack against Russia been on for a week than the R.A.F. leaders announced mastery of the daytime air over the occupied regions and western Germany. Hardly did a day pass without large-scale daytime bombing raids, and the British plane losses did not appear great if, as the claim was made, they were using several squadrons of upward of 100 bombers each every day. There was a silence from German Ger-man sources about the accomplishments accomplish-ments of the raids, but the British, judging from their own losses from German air attacks, figured that their chosen objectives must soon be reduced to hopeless ruins. They felt that the Coventries on Europe's soil must be numerous. Heavy night attacks followed those SYRIA: And Ethiopia Britain also seemed on the threshold thresh-old of success in Syria and Ethiopia, Ethi-opia, and resolved to do something abcrut North Africa, because General Sir Archibald Wavell was relieved, a new commander, General Auchin-leck Auchin-leck sent out from England, and the whole African and Middle Eastern campaign seemed on the upgrade. The final crumb of Italian resistance resist-ance in Ethiopia melted away before be-fore the rains and the relentless British follow-up of victory after victory, vic-tory, and another menace to Britain's Brit-ain's Red sea and Suez position was removed. In Africa the situation was no worse than it had been, still apparently appar-ently a stalemate on the Egyptian border, with the Tobruk defenders still holding out. There were some indications that the British forces, strengthened by U. S. tanks and lend-lease airplanes, were beginning to lay the groundwork of a new advance ad-vance against Cyrenaica not only to relieve the Tobruk garrison, but to attempt to win a major victory against the Italo-Nazi forces. As to Syria, there were reports of an imminent Franco - British peace there, following in the wake of a continuous series of English victories and the steady fall-back of the Vichy defenders around the vital Beirut sector. All in all, the British seemed to be making what use they could of the Russo-German battle on all their various fronts, and with varying vary-ing success. There was a strong demand in London for an invasion attempt on the continent, but the apparent verdict ver-dict of the powers that seemed to be "thumbs down." Britain was unwilling to risk further fur-ther shipments of men and armaments arma-ments to the continent until a far more drastic preparatory air bombardment bom-bardment had been carried out. Britain wanted no more Dun-querques. Was the finish to be another defeat de-feat for the defenders as soon as the large cities were taken, as had happened hap-pened in Norway, Belgium, Holland, France? Or were the Russians willing, like the Chinese, to move back across vast territory and let space and winter hardships swallow up the Nazi effort? None of these questions could be by day, with only occasional and very light German reprisals and 'I all of these under cover of darkness. dark-ness. On the sea, also, the British seemed to be making some headway head-way against the U-boat menace, and the probability was felt that many submarines must have been diverted divert-ed to the Baltic, to serve against Russian vessels. answered accurately through the muddle of rival claims, yet there were hints here and there that tended tend-ed to show trends in attack and defense de-fense that might furnish a partial answer. The onslaught was terrific and news pictures released by the Germans Ger-mans showed the advance across battlefields filled with backgrounds of smoke, flame and destruction. The speed could be counted at about 350 miles in two weeks the very distance not only pointing to the terrific ter-rific power of the attack, but also to the difficulty of maintaining a service serv-ice of supply and "mopping up" over so many thousands of square miles. So much tended to show the Nazis swift and easy victors. Yet there were other indications, entirely aside from the official and biased communiques which bore on the MARSHALL: And Draftees Two vital questions on the home front were brought to the fore by General Marshall, chief of staff of the U. S. army: The keeping of selective service men past their 12-month training period. The question of sending them beyond be-yond the United States and her possessions pos-sessions as "task troops." The chief of staff made his case plain. The army, he said, was composed com-posed of three elements regulars, national guardsmen, and draftees. These, instead of having been kept separate, were all melted into one military whole, and to remove a part of these, the draftees, at the end of 12 months, would be to create LUST : V. S. Nurses Added to the Zamzam and the Robin Moor incidents was the torpedoing tor-pedoing of the Dutch steamer Maas-den, Maas-den, the survivors including a number num-ber of U. S. marines, bound for London Lon-don to do guard duty at the American Amer-ican Embassy, and American nurses, 15 of whom were saved, but two feared lost at sea. The young women were a group of Red Cross nurses who volunteered to cross the dangerous Atlantic to "man" a Red Cross hospital in London. Lon-don. The vessel was torpedoed on a Sunday, and nearly a week later a rescue vessel brought all but two of the nurses safely to London. The Dutch freighter was part of a large convoy bound for Britain, and what the fate of the rest of the convoy was could not be learned, but one of the nurses said: "The captain of the ship that rescued res-cued us looked scared to death when he saw his vessel boarded by a bunch of women. "The marines were wonderful." AMERICA: A Round Trip The luxury liner America was designated by the state department to make a round trip on the Atlantic At-lantic from New York to Lisbon and return, carrying deported diplomats both ways. At Lisbon will be gathered the American consular officials from Italy and Germany, and thpv vain utter confusion in the whole organization, organi-zation, he said. He asked that the part of the selective service law which limited the time and place of the soldier's service be taken away. Otherwise, he pointed out, the power of the commander-in-chief would become a meaningless thing, and detachments needed at certain points would be forced to lose their manpower. But the chief of staffs request, couched in such a way that it seemed an official request of congress con-gress by the war department, found considerable opposition, Senator McNary of Oregon, Republican leader, lead-er, stating that he was not only in opposition to the removal of the geographical geo-graphical restrictions in the draft act, but also was against the removal re-moval of the 12-month restriction as welL It was evident that Marshall's hope for an army of 2,500,000 trained men, able to move wherever the congress and the commander-in-chief deemed expedient, was not going go-ing to be won without overcoming serious opposition. eventual result and the theory of the Red defense. , There were reports from Nazi-friendly Nazi-friendly Vichy and Rome. The former for-mer reported half the troops of occupation oc-cupation withdrawn to the eastern front; the latter warned against expecting ex-pecting a swift and easy victory. The reports from Scandinavian sources of the evacuation of civilians from Leningrad and Moscow and Kiev; the speech of Stalin in which he urged the "scorched earth" defense; de-fense; the plans of Hitler to put Louis Ferdinand on the Russian throne all indicated that there might be a chance that the Russians Rus-sians were willing to drop back as slowly as might be, cede what cities and territory must be given up, and let the Russian wastes and the impending Russian fall and winter win-ter eat up the strength of the attacker. at-tacker. Few believed that the "Stalin line" would be anything but a stormy way-station for the German advance. ad-vance. But many believed that the "Chinese plan" would not only stem the Hitlerian attack but eventually defeat it. be brought back to New York. The German and Italian consuls, under a July 15 deadline to quit the country, were to be taken to Lisbon aboard the America with members of their families. There are 86 of the Americans, and with their families will swell the America's passenger list to a somewhat respectable amount. Prior to the eastward sailing there were at least two suicides among members of the German consular staff. One was ascribed to ill health, the other to despair at leaving leav-ing this country after 20 years' residence. MISCELLANY: Ottawa: There was evidence of a new political outcry in Canada for some form of draft or selective service serv-ice to take the place of voluntary enlistment, still in force in the Dominion. Do-minion. Washington: The White House confirmed the fact that Colonel Donovan, Don-ovan, after two unofficial tours of inspection of Europe's war centers, would be given a post of importance in the defense set-up. ARMY: Dive Bombing The army, which has relied on lofty bombers with an efficient bomb-sight, and low-flying attack planes to machine-gun infantry positions, po-sitions, finally decided it was unwise un-wise to let the navy do all the dive-bombing dive-bombing and was reported about to get some dive-bombers of its own and start practicing the art. The navy developed dive-bombing to hit fast-moving ships which were difficult dif-ficult targets for high flying bombers. |