The Charlotte News

Monday, October 19, 1942

FOUR EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: It was right outside the frontier hut, poor John Ellington took three slugs in the britches. He said to his wife, "I can draw faster than any o’ them sons of Japanese. Don’t dare blink as I pull my six shooter and fire." Then, he glanced around and down, felt a little sick. His Army induction thus to retard; for butterball jerky had lifted himself up by his own pulled finger.

Thus we learn from the front page today.

Moral: When drafted into World War II, simply go and do your duty and come home again if you can. But, by all means, do not try to show off your markmanship first, or later, to the wife.

But, even worse, one does not go on a three-state robbery, rape, and shooting spree, as did apparently Irwin Kadens, Army deserter in Illinois, caught by the FBI, confessed to over 50 robberies and other crimes.

It appears Army life and war preparation were somewhat stressful.

At least, there was nothing about flying saucers.

Two Americans who had fought under General MacArthur in the Philippines during the winter and early spring had not surrendered with the rest when Bataan fell in early April. Instead, the two embarked on a 1,500 mile journey taking over five months, finally reaching Australia healthy and safe, running their boat part of the way on coconut oil. In microcosm, it represented the tenacity, steadfastness to purpose, and endurance of the sort which won the war. Both men, Captain William Lloyd Osborne and Lieutenant Damon Gause, should not only have been congratulated but decorated for their effort. And both in fact subsequently did receive the Distinguished Service Cross.

The Norwegian government-in-exile reported that Nazi morale was at a low ebb among the occupation troops stationed in Norway. Refusal en masse to obey orders to go to the dratted Russian front, refusal by others then to carry out orders to execute the mutineers, desertions, even suicides, were now becoming prevalent. The Big Muddy’s quicksand was, ever quickeningly, sucking the elan vital from the little Nazis’ Will.

From New Guinea, presumably Port Moresby, successful Allied raids were launched on Japanese ships harbored at Buin on the island of Bougainville in the northernmost area of the Solomons. The object was to interrupt and delay Japanese supply lines, the Allied-dubbed "Tokyo Express", providing regular materiel and reinforcements to Guadalcanal.

From the ravages of the five-year war, a two-year drought, spring frosts, and legions of locusts and rabbits further depleting the thusly scarce crops, China was reporting six million people dying of starvation, another eighteen million seeking egress to escape the death throes gripping the Japanese-occupied portion of the country.

On the editorial page, Dorothy Thompson harmonizes with Raymond Clapper’s choice of music on Friday, that urged by Chinese Foreign Minister T. V. Soong, the formation of a political executive council among the Allies to sustain cooperation politically and to plan a cohesive strategy for post-war peace.

In a piece culled from Encore, Dent Smith seeks to rebut the wisdom of the proverbial average Joe who continually bemoans the excesses of the wealthy while he struggles to make ends meet day to day. Says Smith, the sentiment undermines Joe’s own position for the wealthy provide jobs and plenty of taxable income, primarily and secondarily, through the incomes they thereby create, which in turn spin the wheels of commerce steadily. In other words, Mr. Smith favored the notion of trickle-down economics over share-the-wealth socialism.

Both sides of the matter thus presented, we suggest, are far too facile to be worth much discussion. In such diametrically opposed forms, that of college introductory economics, contrasting theoretically along a bright line, both sides fail and a depression inevitably results. Enter the New Deal.

It takes more than a basic economics lesson to understand economy and the human dynamo which drives it, its impact on daily individual existence, in turn impacting the energy with which the individual’s response contributes to and stimulates the collective heaving of the ho, that of the average Joes among the wealthy, the middle class, and the subsistence dwellers. For there is far more to daily life than merely earnin’ a livin’. Just ask Joe.

Raymond Clapper stresses General Marshall’s and Secretary of War Stimson’s warnings that 20 percent of the Army’s composition were unfit to serve physically, many of whom being simply too old to heave their ho. Mr. Clapper finds fault with the Administration for having waited until the previous week to issue a call to Congress to initate legislation for the drafting of 18 and 19-year olds.

Such were, and still are, the realities of war, that the brunt of the fighting must fall on the young. And thus the leaders, the older generation, must be completely certain of the right purpose for such a commitment before ever making it. And they must listen to the opinions of the older voters in the society before making it. Thus was the case in World War II, and, despite the slow start and all of the second-guessing in the process of its waging, the war was won. That is the way of it.

Starting the war prematurely on the premise of preempting a larger conflict, but doing so while ignoring the will of the people, will always insure practical defeat. For, at base, no rational society wishes to go to war unless its security is genuinely threatened; and for that threat to become genuine, there must be more than speculation on the intent of a perceived enemy. There must be documented action demonstrably contrary to international law and contrary to the security of the country. To wage war on flimsier evidence not only predetermines the probable loss of the war from the outset but engenders disrespect on the world stage for the country, while having undesirable ramifications on the domestic front. Those who copy in their personal behavior the manifestations of the government, will have the tendency then pre-emptively to attack the neighbor they have despised for years and of whom they have been suspicious as to just what might be going on over there in secret silence.

Let’s find out. Maybe, they have weapons of mass destruction.

Framed Edition

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