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Show WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS By Edward C. Wayne U. S. Counters Diplomatic Blitzkrieg With World-Wide Economic Warfare Having Trade Control as Objective; Russians Slow Tempo of Nazi Drive (Released by Western Newspaper Union ) fiji $ " , U"' ' P. U I M , Dm! , -JU. vxl til ; T - - i tS "'fvCt ' : - - " - - J J" ,x i-- - isl1l.. l ii I Lmt, fir ,, tj NEW YORK CITY. Here's an example of what the gas "curfew" along the eastern seaboard really means. Murray Jupitor, owner of the gas station, takes off his working clothes when night time comes around. Despite the piled up cars behind him he refused to sell a customer in keeping with the recommendations of Secretary of Interior Ickes The sign tells the story . . . "No Gas Till 7 a. m." GASOLINE: Curfew Starts The gasoline curfew, ordained by Secretary Ickes at the request and instance of the oil producers and dealers in the eastern United States, was started on short notice, but seemed doomed to failure, and some form of rationing seemed certain to be adopted. Scarcely anybody except some few oil dealers and some government govern-ment officials believed that the closing clos-ing of gas stations from 7 p. m. to 7 a. m. seven days a week would accomplish anything except two things: It would throw out of their jobs some 100,000 filling station operatives opera-tives and it would change the gasoline-buying habits of the people of the affected districts. Trucks, many of them carting goods in the national defense, were to be exempted; also taxicabs, and the buses, most of which today are diesel-operated, nearly all carry 20 hours' supply of fuel, the curfew not hampering their operations whatever. what-ever. Ickes expressed hope was that the curfew would make the populace conscious of the shortage, and hence inclined to co-operate in a restricted use of the fuel. But most believed it would simply mean that those taking long trips would drive by day instead of at night; and that most city dwellers using their cars to and from work and for pleasure driving at night would see to it that they had a full tank at 7 p. m. RUSSIANS: Slow Tempo Most of those who conned the Russo-German war scene believed that the Russians had slowed the German advance down to less than a walk. A realistic Russian source claimed 1,500,000 German casualties on the long war front since the attack started, and closed with these words: "and if our losses have been greater, what of it?" DIPLOMACY: War Bitter It seemed hard to believe that with 9,000,000 to 11,000,000 human beings bitterly engaged in a death struggle on the Russo-German fronts, that battles of diplomats and economists could stand out in the Important news of the day, but such indeed was the case. Germany was engaged in a well-defined' well-defined' diplomatic blitzkrieg against Pan-American solidarity, and many believed that the entire fabric of Japanese moves in the South Pacific Pa-cific were not only Nazi-inspired, but executed unwillingly by Nippon in obedience to direct orders from Berlin. The effort obviously seemed to be so to engage the attention of the United States at half a dozen different dif-ferent points that America's entry into the war would be postponed to the last possible moment. Or, if that entry could not be avoided, the Axis intended that the first attention of the United States should be directed toward the East Indies, thus holding our fleet away from the Atlantic. There was conceded to be little change that the outbreak of border war between Peru and Ecuador, the attempted Nazi coup in Bolivia, the ditto in Argentina, and the strained relations' with Mexico were not part and parcel of a gigantic diplomatic, propaganda and espionage campaign cam-paign against Pan-American solidarity. soli-darity. Though it might be said to have failed, it nevertheless engaged our attention for more than a month. Then came Dakar back onto the front pages again, with a Nazi demand de-mand upon Vichy which seemed not only aimed at bases in Dakar, but a new effort to enroll the French fleet as a direct German-Italian instrument in-strument of warfare. These were big stakes, and the entire en-tire trend and sequence of them almost al-most dwarfed the fighting on the Eastern front, particularly since it continued to be difficult to gain any accurate picture of what was going on in the active fighting. ECONOMIC: War Outstanding That statement gave the picture of a nation of 172,000,000 people pretty well geared for war, willing to fight, and seemingly possessed of huge quantities of arms and ammunition. It was nearly a repetition of the Chinese answer to Japan's attack, resulting in a stalemate war now well into its fifth year, with the present pres-ent front little changed in a long time, and Chiang Kai-shek reputedly reput-edly having a larger organized army on the front than the Japanese by two or three to one. The Japanese casualties admittedly admitted-ly had been heavy, the Chinese' admittedly ad-mittedly much heavier "but what of it?" Russian sources were, however, claiming much more than this. They were claiming not only the actual destruction of German division after aft-er division; they were asserting that there was a definite Nazi withdrawal in the central, or Smolensk region, made necessary by flanking and "cut-through" movements. Gloomiest anti-war correspondents, correspond-ents, some of them far from the front, pictured the German advance lines within 130 miles of Moscow, but few there were who believed that there was any real capture of territory as close to the capital as that, partly because of the complete failure of the Nazis to bomb Moscow Mos-cow with any effectiveness. Russia claimed that some of the .ot-down bombers showed a gasoline gaso-line content that told of having come from far-distant bases. A real capture cap-ture of territory within 130 miles of Moscow would make possible landings land-ings and take-offs and sustained flights over the capital. Hardly of secondary importance to the diplomatic blitzkrieg launched in the Far East and Pan-America by the Axis was the world-wide economic eco-nomic war engaged in by Pan-America, Pan-America, the United States and Britain Brit-ain against the Axis, now more sternly than ever against Japan. There were analysts who felt that the outbreak of war between Germany Ger-many and Russia was directly caused by the success of the economic eco-nomic blockade, plus the fact that Russia either would not or could not trans-ship sufficient needed goods from Japan, nor furnish enough of her own. Despite the huge losses of the British at sea, it was pointed out that ships sent to the bottom simply meant goods not reaching England it did not mean that any of this material was reaching Germany. The economic war, therefore, not only launched the Russo-German war, but also the renewed move by Germany to attempt to corral the French fleet, to replace her surface raiders which were either sunk or bottled up, with which Germany might hope to reopen some trade route now that the Japan-Russia rail method had been halted by the war. Other observers saw in the success suc-cess of the economic war' against Germany a definite sign that Germany Ger-many could not win even if she won a complete victory over Russia without with-out one further victory an actual taking of the British Isles and with it the British fleet. For as long, they said, as the sea-lanes were open only to British cargoes, and as long as Axis powers pow-ers were denied the use of the oceans, then the needed materials never could be obtained, even by the utter conquest of the entire continent con-tinent of Europe. There was a jubilant character in the Moscow dispatches that could not be overlooked, and the lack of detail from German sources, and the fact that the identical claims were put forth each day concerning the identical territories painted a picture of strong Russian resistance.' The tip-off as to the situation came from Adolf Hitler's own newspaper, news-paper, the Voelkischer Beobachter, which said: "We have found in the Red army an enemy who battles with dogged tenacity, who surpasses all previous opponents in fighting temper. "Many of us believed that after the first waving of the German sword the enemy in the East would collapse like a colossus on feet of clay. But the Soviet armies are deT fending themselves with dogged resolution, res-olution, still throwing new material into the battle." CONN ALLY: On Foreign Relations The elevation of Sen. Tom Con-nally Con-nally of Texas to the chairmanship of the senate foreign relations committee com-mittee brought forth from the senate sen-ate veteran of a quarter of a century cen-tury the foUowing brief statement of policy: "Our foreign policy must be vigorous vig-orous and positive. We must not be truculent, but we must let other nations na-tions know that we have rights we will fight to maintain." |