Wednesday, April 25, 1945

The Charlotte News

Wednesday, April 25, 1945

FOUR EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that the Russians had reached the heart of Berlin and that the First Ukrainian and First White Russian Armies had linked up northwest of Potsdam to complete the encirclement of the city.

Herr Doktor Goebbels announced that help was on the way and the city should therefore hold out. "Important forces" were speeding to their rescue.

Berliners, wait five more days and you will receive help—from a Luger and a little cyanide.

German officers were reported to be utilizing the Berlin subway system to pop up behind Russian lines, seeking to cut off Russian communications.

The Russians had reached the Elbe River along a 22-mile front between Riesa and Torgau, northwest of Dresden.

About 200 RAF heavy bombers made a direct hit on the chalet at Berchtesgaden with a 12,000-pound earthquake bomb, hitting also Hitler's "Eagle's Nest" fortress atop Kehlstein Mountain, five miles from the chalet. It was the first direct attack on Hitler's hideout. It was believed that a 22,000-ton bomb may have been deployed in an effort to burst through bunker walls and possibly kill the Fuehrer and his staff, should they have been present, as they were not. (The story actually refers to the Berghof, the chalet; the "Eagle's Nest" remains intact today, a tearoom for Hitler and his guests.)

On the Western Front, the Eleventh Armored Division of the Third Army advanced fifteen miles to within eighteen miles of the Austrian border, reaching the Danube, within 79 miles of Berchtesgaden. The 71st Division advanced thirteen miles to reach a position two miles west of Regensburg and to within six miles of Valhalla. A twenty-six mile advance was made to within two miles of Kelheim on the Danube, 55 miles northeast of Munich and twelve miles southwest of Regensburg.

General Patton was making a beeline for the redoubt, in which it was believed Hitler and the German High Command might now be situated. The Third Army had gained 106 miles south and southeastward since the start of the offensive. His tanks and infantry had overrun 2,100 square miles of Germany the previous day.

The British advanced into previously besieged Bremen. The Canadians fought to within four miles of Emden, facing German naval guns.

The Ninth and First Armies waited at the Elbe to effect junction with the Russians.

The Seventh and French Armies moved to the Swiss and Austrian borders while beginning the encirclement of Munich. The Tiger Tenth Armored Division of the Seventh took Oberbalzheim, 67 miles southwest of Munich and 97 miles from the Brenner Pass. Other units were 48 miles from Munich.

The French captured Lorrach, three miles northeast of Basel, reaching the Swiss frontier, and, to the east, captured Singen near the western end of Lake Constance, the western edge of the Bavarian redoubt.

It was announced that the proclamation of V-E Day, as well as of the linking of the British-American and Russian forces, would come from the Big Three heads of State, not from Supreme Allied Headquarters and General Eisenhower.

In Italy, the Eighth and Fifth Armies had crossed the Po River in pursuit of disorganized Germans fleeing to the north. The American 10th Mountain Division, having advanced 55 miles in two days, established the first foothold beyond the Po, followed by units of the Eighth Army. There was no indication as to the precise location of the crossings.

The Seventh Division of the Tenth Army on Okinawa advanced grudgingly to the village of Ishin, threatening the eastern flank of the Japanese defense line before Naha. It proved the first break since the offensive had begun the previous Thursday, following an initial gain of 800 yards.

The Third Amphibious Marines had overrun three more islands, Yagachi, Heansa, and Kouri, encountering opposition only on Yagachi. The actions completed the occupation of the islets around Okinawa.

About 100 to 150 B-29's attacked Tokyo, losing four planes, completely destroying the Hitachi plant. Reconnaissance showed that five of the city's 35 wards were completely destroyed and another 13 heavily damaged.

The High Court of Justice in Rome sentenced a convicted spy to be shot in the back for his role in the arrests of numerous Italians who were subsequently tortured by the Nazis.

President Truman ordered the seizure by the Navy of the United Engineering Co., Ltd., in San Francisco, regarding a jurisdictional dispute of the union, having caused a work stoppage on several ships. It marked the first time that the Government had seized an operation because of a jurisdictional dispute.

The 48-nation San Francisco Conference to charter the United Nations got underway in San Francisco at 4:40 p.m., Pacific Time. The primary responsibilities for forming the charter would fall to the foreign secretaries of the Big Four, Secretary of State Stettinius, Foreign Commissar Molotov, Foreign Minister Anthony Eden, and Chinese Foreign Minister T. V. Soong, brother of Madame Chiang.

Only a half-hour program was scheduled this date, with opening ceremonies featuring President Truman's radio address and speeches by California Governor Earl Warren and San Francisco Mayor Roger Lapham.

A man in Niagara Falls, N.Y., pleaded guilty to assault, was fined $25. The man thought that the woman he had assaulted was his wife, who had been absent from the home for some time. He became worried, went in search, found the other woman, began beating on her. His wife asserted that the action proved that her husband loved her. So impressed was she that she paid her husband's fine.

On the editorial page, "Can We Do It?" asks the question with regard to whether the bold plan of President Roosevelt for domestic reconversion to a peacetime economy, the creation of 60 million jobs, the building of homes for veterans, the encouragement of veterans to open small businesses, education reform, farm improvements, sustaining farm prices, disposal of 15 billion dollars worth of war surplus property, increased social security under the Wagner-Murray-Dingle bill, which included a separate national health care program, reciprocal trade agreements, regional development such as with the proposed Missouri Valley Authority, housing and slum clearance under the Wagner-Ellender bill, a permanent Fair Employment Practices Commission, and reduction of taxes, could all be accomplished by President Truman, an opponent of deficit spending.

"Thankless Job" finds it not surprising that the newly appointed elderly Acting Superintendent of the Morganton State Hospital was debating whether to accept the position. His role was not envious, with a shortage of doctors and staff and an inevitable period of lack of proper care ahead for the patients until the new State Board could implement the proposed improvements to the facility.

"Through the Nose" seeks to comfort Americans paying high taxes during the war with the report on British taxation, starting at 32.5% and ranging quickly to 50 percent for taxable income above $666, with only a $320 exemption for an individual, $560 for a married couple. The Briton with a $5,000 annual income paid $1,855, whereas his American counterpart paid $975, with a rate of taxation of 23 percent for the first $2,000, and $500 individual exemptions, twice that for a married couple.

Added to the higher income taxes in Britain were high excise taxes, including 12 percent on necessities on up to 75 percent on designated luxury items.

All American taxes, Federal, state, and local, amounted to 34 percent of national income; in Britain, they were 43 percent.

"Make a Note" remarks on the fact that there was a ring around the date April 30 on The News calendar. At first, the editors had forgotten why the ring was there, then recalled that it was the date for the local primary election. It was easy to forget for the fact that the political season had been remarkably lacking in any form of dissension among local candidates.

There was not much point, it finds, after all, in getting too upset about an election not involving liquor, the tariff, states' rights, or bingo.

But, nevertheless, it exhorts readers to circle April 30 with a ring, so that they would not forget to vote in such a lackluster election.

There was, of course, another reason for noting and circling that date, one far removed from Mecklenburg County in North Carolina, yet impacting it and every other county and parish and province throughout the civilized world: it was Walpurgis Night, 1945, with a big Ring around it.

The excerpt from the Congressional Record finds Senator John McClellan of Arkansas supporting an amendment to the Selective Service Act renewal, as proposed by Senator Arthur Stewart of Tennessee, to mandate that the military provide to 18-year olds drafted into service a minimum of one year of training before sending them overseas for combat duty.

Reports had been surfacing that young men were being sent into combat with only four to eight months of training, despite at least implicit previous assurances from Congress that no one would see action among the young conscripts short of a year of training, Senator McClellan expressly not laying blame on the military, for his recognition of the changing exigencies of war.

Senator McClellan would chair the Senate Rackets Committee between 1957 and 1960, investigating organized labor, with focus on the Teamsters Union of Jimmy Hoffa. Senator John F. Kennedy served on the committee and Robert Kennedy was its chief counsel.

Drew Pearson, in San Francisco, indicates that about twelve million American servicemen would be eagerly attentive to the conference. So would their wives. So would the war-weary peoples of Europe. The conference would determine the next twenty years, he predicts, of world affairs, whether there would be another world war or not.

Mr. Pearson suggests that the seeds had already been planted for the next war, but had not yet taken a firm root. Groups within the State Department and the British Foreign Office, in the latter case being the same group which had formed the notorious Cliveden Set prior to the war, were already starting to make overtures toward building up Germany to act as a bulwark to Russia; the American admirals were insisting that America have possession of certain strategic islands in the Pacific to act as bulwark on that front, creating, however, suspicion on the part of Russia that such a build-up could threaten its Eastern frontier.

Russo-American relations were being complicated by the Army and Navy, which had opposed President Roosevelt's enunciated policy of allowing the Pacific islands to be held in United Nations trusteeship so that the member nations could have airstrips and naval portage on the islands. Admiral Ernest King, chief of the Navy, publicly expressed his difference with this policy, alerting the Russians to problems within the American chain of command which could compromise their interests. Russian intelligence had it that Admiral King wanted to build up the Pacific bases as a hedge against the Soviets and that he opposed the Russians entering the Pacific war, wanting the Americans to finish the job.

While General Marshall and General Eisenhower were not in accord with the Admiral's position, some of the other military leaders were.

The apparent division had likely given greater power to Russian generals who were desirous of flexing their muscles acquired during the war, bucking the authority of Stalin. Former Foreign Commissar Litvinov, who favored international cooperation, was no longer heard from in Soviet inner circles; Foreign Commissar Molotov had less power than earlier in the war.

The Russian generals were believed to have been responsible for having initially planned for Russia to send only Ambassador Andrei Gromyko as the Russian representative to San Francisco, to dilute the importance of the conference and its outcome. President Truman had convinced the Soviets to send Molotov.

The Soviet generals were also thought to have originated the demand that the Ninth Army withdraw on April 13 from the Berlin suburbs so that the Red Army could be first to enter the city.

Mr. Pearson promises a subsequent column on backstage matters brewing at San Francisco, showing how the State Department, on April 15, had reversed President Roosevelt's policy of a tough peace for Germany.

As we have remarked previously, 27-year old John F. Kennedy, recently discharged from the Navy, was present as a journalist covering the conference.

Marquis Childs comments on the consideration underway in Congress on the Reciprocal Trade Agreements bill and the Bretton Woods proposal to establish the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. The Administration was asking that the measures get no further than the committee stage until after the San Francisco Conference. Mr. Childs thinks this move dubious for allowing the Congress to escape responsibility for the bills while the 45 nations met on the West Coast.

It represented an important first step for propping the political aims of peace, and the nations attending the conference would be eagerly awaiting the decision of the Congress on these vital measures designed to maintain stable world currencies and prevent the kind of worldwide depression post-war which had stimulated the coming to power in Europe of the Fascists and Nazis and led to World War II.

A perennial letter writer to The News, a steady supporter of President Roosevelt, writes her own eulogy for the late President, finding that the harsh critics of his performance may have hastened his end.

An OPA employee in various local offices of the agency from 1941 to 1943, by this point a resident of Charlotte, provides an account of the mistakes and shortcomings of the agency during the war. OPA's designated role had been to maintain stable wages and prices to prevent runaway inflation. He concludes that OPA should be weeded to eliminate its chaff, to obtain the root of the problem and dig it out, that the surest way to do so was to cut its appropriation in half.

In one example he raises, an attorney in Florida on staff had read in an inspector's report of the stores that small "bush" snap beans were at the price ceiling and large "pole" beans above the ceiling. The attorney looked up the regulations but could find nothing on "pole" beans, asked the inspector, who told him they were snap beans. The regional staff examined the issue but could not determine the matter. They called Washington to be informed that the inspector had been correct all along. Pole beans were snap beans.

But we still do not know how high the pole had to be to reach the ceiling of the stores, or whether it could reach the eggs as well. Someone ought tell that smart-aleck little girl in Boonton, New Jersey, probably still waiting for the answer there in 1943.

Quickly, Dame Little Girl, tell us the connection, should you know to know so much, between the Berghof, as referenced above, and this. There is one, perfectly apparent should you have read the editorial appearing on the page. But, it does require putting the bun in the box and baking it awhile. Remember, however, that no vine is a brood before its time.

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