The Charlotte News
Saturday, August 19, 1950
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that MacArthur headquarters indicated that, based on unconfirmed prisoner-of-war reports, four Communist divisions, with as many as 50,000 enemy troops, might be regrouping for a new assault against U.N. lines in the north-central front in Korea. The report said that pressure on Taegu had eased, however, after three days of the heaviest fighting thus far in the war. The North Korean Fourth Division in the Changnyong area had been so decimated as to render it no longer a fighting division. The enemy had lost an estimated 2,200 men on Thursday along the whole defense perimeter, the largest single day's bag of the war.
At some points north of Taegu and in the Changnyong sector, enemy troops had fallen back, permitting the U.N. forces to advance four to six miles without serious opposition.
Meanwhile, North Korean forces continued probing action along the Naktong River front, seeking soft spots to try again to take Taegu. Otherwise, a virtual news blackout had been imposed from the front.
Before the blackout, however, a report had come of a surprise landing on Friday by South Korean troops in North Korean-held territory on the west-coast island of Tokchok, 35 miles west of Inchon—preparatory to the September 15 landing at Inchon to retake Seoul and cut off the rear of the enemy. It was also disclosed that South Korean troops might be operating as guerrillas behind enemy lines.
In the second largest air strike of the war, ninety American B-29's dropped 800 tons of bombs, 60 of the planes, dropping 550 tons, again hitting Chongjin, 60 miles from Siberia, striking the Mitsubishi iron works. Fighter planes set a new record for the war, with 350 sorties on Friday, mainly against ground troops.
The allies provided North Korea with warning via leaflets that ten major cities, including Pyongyang, were about to be bombed. The leaflets told civilians to flee from military targets into the mountains.
The Army estimated that North Korea had lost 50,000 troops thus far in the war and that South Korean losses had been 37,800 as of three weeks earlier. American casualties would not be announced until the figures had no value to the enemy, with the last announcement having been two weeks earlier when 2,100 casualties were reported. North Korea had been conducting wholesale conscription, calling up all men and women between ages 18 and 40.
Senator Alexander Wiley of Wisconsin commented during a radio program that Congress had been informed that 200,000 Communist Chinese troops, primarily North Koreans who had been trained in Manchuria by the Russians, were being moved toward the Korean border. He predicted that if general war broke out, Korea would be evacuated and the U.S. troops transferred to more strategic locations, and that then the atom bomb would be used.
Former Ambassador to Russia between 1946 and 1949, General Walter Bedell Smith had been named by the President to succeed Rear Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter as director of the CIA. Admiral Hillenkoetter had requested leave to resign months earlier so that he could return to Navy duty. Press secretary Charles G. Ross clarified that the change had nothing to do with the alleged failure of intelligence regarding the invasion of South Korea.
In Liege, Belgium, two gunmen were being hunted for the killing of Julien Lahaut, 66, Belgian Communist Party head and veteran member of Parliament. He had been shot the previous night at his home. The killing came a week after M. Lahaut's verbal protest at the swearing in of Prince Baudouin, son of formerly exiled King Leopold III, during a joint session of Parliament.
In Sydney, Australia, quadruplets were born, one at a time, between Thursday and Saturday nights.
Cape Hatteras remained on alert to the Atlantic hurricane which was moving northward during the late morning hours this date, 350 miles east of Brunswick, Ga. The storm was expected to pass to the east of Hatteras on Sunday. Small boats were advised to remain in safe harbor and ships were told to avoid the storm.
Let's set sail right into that sucker and see what it's like.
Tom Fesperman of The News reports of a 26-year old woman who fell through a second-floor bedroom window 40 feet during a nightmare, suffering fractures to both of her arms and one leg, plus lacerations to her face and possible internal injuries. She had been sleeping next to an open window with a screen. Other roomers in the house said that the woman frequently had wild nightmares during which she screamed.
On the editorial page, "Playgrounds and Politics—II" continues the report on the Latta Park controversy and the attempt by one City Council member to amend the zoning ordinance to provide that the City Council would in the future need approve construction of any park buildings after recommendation by the Park & Recreation Commission.
The piece again finds the ordinance to be spiteful in nature and recommends that the Council defeat it when it would come up for discussion and a vote the following Wednesday.
"New Jersey Experiment" tells of New Jersey having conducted an experiment under which 28 female prison inmates at a time rotated in service of the State mental hospital patients to make up for lack of adequate personnel. Some 300 inmates had participated in the program and the results had been good, with no reports of abuse of patients and most of the inmates electing to stay in the service of the hospital after their release from custody rather than seek another job.
The piece remarks that, while the North Carolina State hospitals had adopted a policy of seeking personnel carefully, with an eye toward their intelligence and responsibility, should the war cause a shortage of qualified personnel as had World War II, the experiment might lend itself as a temporary remedy.
"Editorialettes" provides several fillers, such as adopting a New Year's resolution,
which would not await New Year's, to turn off the radio whenever
"Goodnight Irene"
And so on
Have a good time this weekend at the beach, Mr. Editor.
Drew Pearson's column is again written by Tom McNamara and Jack Anderson. They discuss Washington District Attorney Morris Fay's testimony to the Senate investigating committee looking into the wiretapping by the Metropolitan Police lieutenant of Howard Hughes and others allegedly at the behest of Senator Owen Brewster in 1947, the Senators finding Mr. Fay equally culpable with the lieutenant. Mr. Fay had, in October, 1947, complimented the lieutenant for his service and then proceeded to consult with his assistants who were prosecuting the case against the lieutenant before the Grand Jury. He was informed by his assistants that they could not see where the lieutenant had divulged the information received via the wiretap, critical for its criminality under the statute.
Senator Claude Pepper of Florida, however, found nonsensical the claim that the wiretap would have been conducted without the information subsequently being shared, to which Mr. Fay responded that he agreed but that the prosecutors had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he did so.
Senator Matt Neely of West Virginia was especially critical, saying that Mr. Fay had prejudiced the investigation by indicating that the Grand Jury investigation had not been a "whitewash", the allegation of which being the reason for the Senate investigation. The Senator regarded wiretapping as being right behind murder and treason in egregiousness and asserted that anyone conducting it or approving it belonged in jail.
Members of the Senate Banking & Currency Committee, Senators John Bricker and Ralph Flanders, in questioning recently a representative of the Agriculture Department, could not figure out whether cotton had a minimum price ceiling or a floor, or the floor of a ceiling and not the floor. Senator William Fulbright interjected that the representative had not said that a minute earlier, to which Senator Burnet Maybank said that he did not know what he had said but that it was what it was.
Presidential assistant John R. Steelman warned union and management officials that Government seizure of the railroads was not a solution to the 17-month old wage dispute. He also said that the Government would not permit a strike in the current emergency. He instructed that it was his responsibility to help them settle the strike but not the Government's responsibility to run the railroads.
Joseph Alsop, in Korea, tells of the harsh conditions under which the U.N. troops were fighting, usually facing superior numbers and having to scale heights against enemy fire in blazing heat against tenacious enemy troops. Furthermore, the lack of reinforcements meant that undermanned and mauled divisions had to stay in the field indefinitely.
The conditions made the business-as-usual attitude displayed behind the lines unbearable. Luxury liners needed for troop transport continued to cater to tourist trade, both in the air and at sea. The gravity of the situation and the true numbers of casualties were being concealed from the people at home.
The problem appeared to have injected itself to battle planning, as exampled by the Chinju battle of August 6-9, on which he had just reported on Tuesday and Thursday. The Marines and Army regimental combat teams who won that battle through sacrifice of blood and expenditure of maximum effort then had to retire from the ground won. The real reason for the battle, which wound up gaining little, if any, ground, was, as one officer put it, because the U.N. forces "needed a victory". But the morale built up by such an action seemed negligible and possibly even a net loss, as the North Koreans could take heart even in a loss. For the enemy had fielded only one undermanned division against forces outnumbering them by 33 percent, having as much as a 5 to 1 advantage in tank and artillery power plus complete air superiority and superior supply and transport.
The North Koreans had fifteen divisions in the field, but air bombardment would eventually cause problems of supply and gradually diminish their strength, making the job more manageable for the allies.
The facts remained, however, that it was a very big job and that not enough strength was yet present to accomplish more than holding operations at significant cost in blood. Even after the crisis would pass, it would still take a lot of strength to finish the fight. So, he concludes, it was "downright treasonable" to conduct operations behind the lines as business-as-usual and politics-as-usual.
Robert C. Ruark again publishes a letter from the same correspondent as the previous day. This time, he had discussed food in Korea from his prewar experience there. Chickens and thus eggs were scarce, as were cows and milk. Pigs were hard to find, though wild boars could be had, if not a very delectable source of food. Ducks provided good food and pheasants did as well when they could be had.
G.I.'s should keep a watch over
their dogs, he advised, as Koreans liked dog meat, and hung
Strawberries were good but the season was past. There were also good apples but the enemy during its retreat would grab them all. Chinese cabbages were available and could be used for a kind of sauerkraut which demanded, however, an acquired taste.
The liquor was not good, a type of
moonshine which was not potent, based on rice wine or saki, hard to
drink
Tom Schlesinger of The News, in his weekly "Capital Roundup", tells of Senator Clyde Hoey disfavoring the appointment by the President of a diplomatic mission to the Vatican, for sending a diplomat to a religious organization, not a government. Senator Frank Graham said that he needed more information regarding how the move related to maintaining world peace.
The White House had quietly dropped James Pinkney of Davidson College from consideration as chairman of the Civil Aeronautics Board. Some thought that it was because of his reactionary politics, manifested by his support of Willis Smith in the recent Democratic Senatorial primary against Senator Graham.
Congressman Carl Durham, chairman of the Joint Atomic Energy Committee, denied that Arkansas had been selected as the site for the new hydrogen-bomb plant, as reported by the Arkansas Gazette.
Senator Hoey was glad to see the defeat in the Democratic primary of Senator Glen Taylor of Idaho, running-mate to former Vice-President Henry Wallace in 1948 on the Progressive Party ticket. Senator Hoey routinely walked off the Senate floor whenever Senator Taylor had spoken.
Senator Hoey voted 11 out of 13 times contrary to the CIO position, while Senator Graham had a perfect record on labor. Mr. Schlesinger provides the record also for the rest of the state's Congressional delegation.
Paul Green, author of the outdoor drama "Faith of Our Fathers", on the life of George Washington in celebration of the Sesquicentennial of the nation's capital, said that the performances two weeks into its presentation were much better than they had been on opening night, as the actors had to be cultivated because the production could not afford the million dollars for professional actors.
He also criticized Hollywood and the
movies generally for betraying the children of the country by
"painting to the world a false picture that this is a nation of
money grubbers." Sam Goldwyn, Darryl Zanuck and other
producers, he said, were "soulless" men who catered to
mass
The war had revived the issue of shortage of V.A. hospital beds such that it was likely that the V.A. hospital slated for Charlotte, canceled the previous year, would be revived.
The Congress had passed 186 bills during 1950, with 41 signed during July.
The Senate had moved into new, temporary quarters while work, begun the prior summer, was completed on the regular Senate chamber. They would meet for the remainder of the year in the old Supreme Court chamber used as the original Senate chamber until 91 years earlier. The House, while its renovations continued, would move into the House Ways & Means Committee room of the old House Building.
That information is provided so that you will know where to go should you have business before either body.
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