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Show WEEKLY MEWS ANALYSIS By Edward-C. Wayne Italian Army's Chief of Staff Resigns As Greeks Drive Further Into Albania; Nazis Pour Into Rumania Amid Chaos; U. S. Aid Held Vital to British Victory (EDITOR'S NOTE When opinions are expressed In these columns, they are those of the newt analyst and not necessarily of this newspaper.) (Ptl3irt by Western Newspaper Union. DUCE'S GAMBLE: Stakes Are Raised In Athens, wives of the German legation staff are knitting for Greek soldiers fighting Italy, Berlin's Axis partner There were other indications indica-tions Germany was in no hurry to come to Mussolini's rescue in Al-, Al-, bania. It was said Hitler had ad-. ad-. vised against the campaign and since the Duce had gone ahead anyhow, any-how, he should be given time to consider the consequences of effront to the leader. Mussolini apparently was doing penitence. Already he had relieved one commander in the field, another at home and ordered more Fascist legions committed to the Balkan campaign. There were other, more practical reasons, why his drive first bogged down and then turned into retreat. These were: British aid in the air and sea, which made hazardous his lines of communication; unwise anticipation an-ticipation of mechanized units in mountain regions; insufficient use of the Italian air corps; Greek strategic stra-tegic ability which made the most of Italian losses. "Resignation" of Marshal Pietro Badoglio as chief of the Italian general gen-eral staff was also announced officially of-ficially in Rome. This fact gave some Indication of the tough going of Mussolini's plans for a "quickie" war in Greece. Badoglio was re- creed, milk supplies curtailed, imports im-ports of fresh fruits banned and fewer meat shipments forecast. Shipping losses were estimated at 4,500,000 tons a year. It was 600,000 tons a month at the height of the U-boat campaign in 1917. Partial British answer to this was found in R. A. F. bombings of submarine bases in France and Belgium. British Brit-ish war on German production also was made in bombings on a score of continental cities. The Way Ahead Eyes of all were on the rate of production of planes and munitions in the United States. Here may be the final test, if the British can hold out to mid-summer. American planes sent to Britain in October numbered 281. Scheduled for November No-vember were 390. For January the figure is 350, and 400 by April, to be increased to 900 by January, 1942. Also by that time it is considered con-sidered a fair estimate that the U. S. will have 50,000 planes of its own. But an "all-out speed-up" would even revise these figures upward. RUMANIA: Death and Terror In 1923 a Polish mystic in Rumania Ruma-nia formed a fascist, anti-Semitic movement under the name of League of the Archangel Michael, later to become the Iron Guard. His followers wore green shirts. At the same time in Germany an Austrian beer hall orator launched a similar campaign known as National Socialism. Social-ism. His followers wore brown shirts. In 1938, the Iron Guard, admirers of their German counterpart and allegedly financed by them, were outlawed by King Carol following a long list of bombings and outrages. out-rages. Corneliu Zelea Condreanu, the Guard leader, was imprisoned. Later it was announced he had been shot dead while trying to escape. Three months ago German pressure pres-sure pushed Carol from his throne and put the Iron Guard in control. But the green-shirted legions yearned for revenge. They attained that revenge when a band of several hundred forced their way into a fortress prison, took from cells 69 anti-guardist leaders and executed them. Included was Gen. George Argesauto, premier at the time of Condreanu's death. Civil War The Bucharest government of Premier Gen. Ion Antonescu quickly quick-ly expressed disapproval in the name of party discipline. The premier pre-mier is titular head of the Iron Guard. Even with strict censorship censor-ship it was learned that there had been wholesale resignations of army officers in protest. But the assassinations assas-sinations continued and units of the I "" i is' y 'x tx A. yyt " FARM SHOW: Girl Is Winner At the forty-first annual International Interna-tional Livestock Exposition and Hay and Grain show in Chicago, the major event for junior cattlemen and farmers was won by Evelyn Asay, of Mt. Carroll, 111. It was the junior steer competition and Miss Asay carried away honors with her Hereford steer Sargo. Then Sargo went on to even greater great-er glory. He was picked as the Grand Champion steer of the exposition, expo-sition, the highest honor in cattle-dom. cattle-dom. Later he was sold to the Firestone Fire-stone Tire and Rubber company at the fancy price of $3.30 per pound. This cash and the money won in prizes by the animal will be used as a down payment for a farm for the Asay family, according to Evelyn, who was hailed as the toast of the show. Iowa State university was the winner win-ner of the collegiate judging contest, con-test, scoring 4,430 points out of a possible 5,000. Texas A. & M. college col-lege placed second with 4,409 and Ohio State university third with 4,394. SIAM AT WAR: Anotlier Invasion In the World war Siam (Thailand) fought on the side of the Allies. Several Sev-eral thousand troops were brought to France, but military experts after aft-er estimating their combat possibilities, possibili-ties, assigned them to truck driving in the Paris district. Now Siam has attacked France, troops invading parts of helpless Indo-China. The French garrison there, split in allegiance to the Vichy and De Gaulle governments and beleaguered by the Japanese, are not expected to put up a strong defense. Objective There is little cause for war between be-tween the two countries and the original attack came only after the usual "border incidents" which easily eas-ily can be inspired or imagined. Actually the behind-the-scenes sponsor is believed to be close affection af-fection between Japan and the present pres-ent Siamese government led by Premier Pre-mier Gen. Laung Bipul Songgram, and all eyes are glued on Singapore, Singa-pore, near-by British naval base, the chief British strong point in the Far East. Singapore is impregnable impregna-ble from the sea, but believed vulnerable vul-nerable by land. Should Japanese and Siamese forces unite in Indo-China, Indo-China, it would pave the way for joint movement by land against Singapore. U. S. Reaction Washington looks upon Singapore as the best restraining influence in the Far East on Japan. News of the Siamese attack brought immediate immedi-ate reaction here. Announcement was made of an additional loan of $50,000,000 to the Chinese Nationalist National-ist government, with an additional $50,000,000 to be made available later. DRAFT REJECTIONS: Not Fit to Fight About 15 per cent of the first 14,-500 14,-500 men who answered the initial summons under selective service, are back home, judged by army physicians as sub-standard physically. physical-ly. All the men previously had been passed by their local draft board physicians, but army doctors were more thorough and used X-rays. Chief cause for rejection was substandard sub-standard teeth and eyesight. The high rejection percentage was a surprise to the army. They had expected a rejection not higher than 2 per cent. Immediate steps were taken to call additional men from each draft board where a man was rejected before being inducted. MISCELLANY: C A third recent major airline disaster dis-aster occurred in Chicago when a large United Air Lines passenger plane crashed V. illing eight and injuring in-juring eight. The plane was descending de-scending for a landing and was only five seconds' flying time from the Municipal airport runways when its engines stalled. It fell, crashed into a house, a garage and an electric power line and then slammed to the ground. Preliminary investigation investiga-tion indicated ice on the wings may have caused the crash. i ' X . I i I , i ' ' " 1 3 BENITO MUSSOLINI Is he doing penitence? placed by Gen. Ugo Cavalero, until recently commander of the Italian forces in East Africa. Italy's most famous soldier, Badoglio had been chief of staff for 15 years and had ' been in supreme command of all three branches of the fight forces of Italy. The Mediterranean The first major encounter of the British and Italian navies was off Sardinia. British planes sighted tiny spots in the ocean, identified as Italian Ital-ian warships. They radioed the word back to the fleet and the British, Brit-ish, led by the battleship Renown, went into action. Planes joined the melee. The Italians finally threw up a smoke screen and got back under the protection of shore batteries. bat-teries. There were conflicting claims, but the British declaration that its navy controlled the Mediterranean seemed to hold weight. The British told a story: "The American navy," it said,' "prefers whiskey, the British navy rum. But the Italian navy sticks to port." ENGLAND'S CRISIS: Food and Planes More and more it became apparent appar-ent that the weeks just ahead may decide the ultimate victory for Adolf Hitler. That he is well aware of this is seen in the intense bombings being administered to British industrial indus-trial areas. Supplies is the key, and Hitler hopes to so cripple British production produc-tion that the anticipated spring drive will be made easier. Certain it is that he is obtaining some results, although British censorship has hidden hid-den the extent of the industrial damage dam-age in Coventry, Birmingham, Bristol Bris-tol and Liverpool. On the other hand, Arthur Greenwood, Green-wood, minister of production, admitted ad-mitted losses when speaking to commons. com-mons. Also an increase in U-boat activity was admitted to threaten sea traffic, upon which Britain must rely for the major share of its foodstuffs. food-stuffs. Stricter rationing was de- GEN. JOHN ANTONESCU He expressed "disapproval." army and Iron Guard clashed. Later Lat-er 30 of the Iron Guardists were reported re-ported "suicides." Hitler had little to lose in the quarrel. Both the army and Iron Guard are pro-Nazi, the army however how-ever not approving of anti-Semitism. Amid the internal chaos, trainloads of German troops poured into Rumania Ru-mania to "keep order." Germany badly needs Rumanian oil and wheat, and the Rumanian mountain passes lie across the path of the Nazi push to the east. Hitler was easing his route while the Rumanians Rumani-ans quarreled. |
