OCR Text |
Show BehindJII THENlfel By PaULMaLLoIQ Released by Western Newspaper Union. WASHINGTON. Mr. Churchill's estimate of six months for the end of the war in Europe i3 generally accepted here, although no official has said anything aloud about it. having grown tired of guessing. The weather has been of a kind thus far which would discourage even an optimist. It is what the British, with characteristic understatement, under-statement, call wretched. True the Patton drive is meeting with success, but the nature of it, as so far developed, plainly indicates indi-cates its limited objectives which are the Metz forts. With good fortune, for-tune, it will merely approach the Siegfried line at that point and still be a long way from the Saar valley, which is the source of coal and iron for the war industries. With the weather likely to become be-come steadily worse through the winter, Mr. Churchill seems to be counting mainly on a spring drive. Also the estimate of "Assistant President" Byrnes that Antwerp would be restored and ready this week leaned too heavily toward wishfulness. There is much dredging dredg-ing and mine clearing to be done before this supply base which is essential es-sential for fullest operations is ready for use. You can take your pick of the rumors ru-mors about Hitler being in the bug- , house, hospital, f ::y;R''lt in hiding, at his tth suPPscdly favor-$' favor-$' f ite phobia, chew-nS chew-nS rugs, or any of the other sec ftv 'J&l ond hand stories h out of Germany C' 'C' except the offl-r.7'', offl-r.7'', ' ''! c'a explanation p J&$ handed out by the i German news ' lefovtKifmmi,- iw-fufi h'mi agency as an ex- i if i cuse for the Adolf Hitler . , , Himmler special broadcast the one that Hitler was too busy to speak. None of the real authorities here had anything they would call valid information at the time Himmler spoke, although much circumstantial inside evidence was available to support doubt about the official Nazi explanation. ROCKET GUN WARNING In case anyone is cuddled up under un-der the bed in fear of the German rocket gun, which the war department depart-ment officially announced just before be-fore election might soon hit these shores, he can come out now. The statement was in the nature of a warning, just to get officialdom on record in case anything along that line did occur, but actually the possibility of any real damage to us from that source is remote. It is true enough the V-2 now has a radius of about 300 miles and there is no known scientific impediment impedi-ment to prevent the expansion of this radius up to 3,000 miles eventually. eventu-ally. But this ordinarily ' would require re-quire years of development, and anyway the war department, was not speaking of this vague future possibility, possi-bility, years distant, maybe never. The official statement relates to present day rocket-radius possibilities pos-sibilities and said the bombs would have to be launched from submarines or ships. Germany has a few submarines left, but most of the docks for them are gone and a submarine could hardly carry more than one or two of these larger type bombs. A large scale attack from these is impossible. As for an attack by surface ships, the United Nations control the ocean and it would be difficult if not impossible im-possible for a surface vessel to get out of a German harbor and approach ap-proach these shores without detection. detec-tion. Certainly no large scale fleet attack is within the realm of any current imagination. DELAY IN TEACE The peace, for instance, cannot take final form before spring. State Undersecretary Stettinius already has said nothing much can be done about new negotiations until after the first of the year. He was speaking speak-ing of another meeting at the undersecretary under-secretary level. Since then there has been talk of the top men getting together, and some new9 on that matter Is likely to develop shortly. But the schedule seems to provide negotiations through the winter and announcement of final agreement agree-ment in the spring cither just before or after the time Mr. Churchill told the British he ex pected the war to be over. The "one-tenth" of disagreement it Dumbarton Oaks, by the very delay de-lay in reaching a settlement, is assuming as-suming larger proportions, which l verifies the observation carried in this column at the time that the proportion pro-portion of "nine-tenths agreement," as officially announced, must have been measured by a yardstick on the words of the text. It is apparent that the peace of the supposedly new world into which we are coming will depend mainly upon the practices and relations of the victorious nations. th onea which have the arms. |