Monday, December 15, 1947

The Charlotte News

Monday, December 15, 1947

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that in London at the foreign ministers conference, it was anticipated that the end of the conference would occur forthwith unless Soviet Foreign Commissar V. M. Molotov modified his stance on reparations to Russia from Germany, to defer them until after Germany recovered its economic stability and also that they not be based on production but rather from factory equipment removed from Germany. On Friday, Mr. Molotov had declared flatly that Russia was demanding the ten billion dollars of reparations from current production.

Mr. Molotov had rejected three demands made by Secretary of State Marshall, that full accounting be made by the Big Four foreign ministers on withdrawal from Germany of reparations, that withdrawals stop by January 1, 1948, and that restoration be made of seized German assets. Mr. Molotov had agreed only to one additional condition, that the first charge against German exports would be for repayment of money advanced by the U.S. and Great Britain for aid to the German people. Secretary Marshall had stated that it was useless to proceed until such agreement was reached.

Jewish Agency and Haganah leaders called on the Palestine Government to evacuate all Trans-Jordan Legion troops from the country following the machinegunning by a detachment the previous day of a truck convoy near Tel Aviv, killing 14 Jews and wounding 15 others. The Legion, with British officers, was on loan to the Palestine Government as a police force. Haganah stated that failure to evacuate the forces would be viewed as provocation against Jewish defense forces. The Jewish Agency stated that 1,700 Jewish police were accompanying convoys of food to Jewish settlements but because they were in open transportation, they were exposed to massacre. The Jewish Agency's 18 armored vehicles were stored by the Government and they could not obtain use of them. The result of the violence against the convoys had produced a shortage in Jewish communities of flour, meat, vegetables, and milk, causing prices to skyrocket. Because of inadequate transportation, tons of imported goods were said to be piling up in Haifa.

The death toll in Palestine had reached 242 since the U.N. passage of partition on November 29, and 363 throughout the Middle East.

House Republicans declared that their substitute voluntary plan for control of inflation was the only thing that they would allow to pass, and that were Democrats to reject it, they would be responsible for the absence of any plan. The plan was expected to come to a vote later this date without extended debate or amendments, requiring therefore, on the streamlined procedure under House rules, a two-thirds extraordinary majority. Republicans would thus need Democratic support for passage—obviously a conniving political maneuver to enable either blame of the Democrats for failure to pass an anti-inflation plan or claim of mutual support of the plan if passed, even if this pathetic plan was known in advance to be doomed to fail.

Congressman Albert Gore of Tennessee outlined the Democrats' plan to oppose the Republican bill, as being a "smokescreen for inaction", designed to raise interest rates on Government bonds and commercial loans, and, in its exception to the anti-trust laws, to permit price-fixing by large corporations to give big business a "big stick" over the Government.

The Senate approved compromise legislation for 597 million dollars worth of emergency aid, with House approval expected later in the day, to make the bill ready for the President's signature. The bill allowed for 150 million dollars worth of supplies to begin moving as soon as it became law, with further amounts to require additional Congressional approval. There were no specific limits on how the money would be allocated among the recipient nations, France, Italy, and Austria. It was not clear whether China, as specified in the House bill, would receive any aid under the plan.

It was reported from Moscow that the ruble was being devalued by 90 percent to try to check inflation, causing goods to sell at 10 to 15 times prewar value. A report singled out wartime profiteers as a target for the devaluation. Rationing was also abolished, while price cuts of 10 to 12 percent on such items as flour, cereal, macaroni and beer were announced. The diplomatic exchange rate with the U.S. had been 12 to 20 rubles to the dollar.

The President's commission on higher education proposed Federal funding to double college enrollment in the country by 1960. It denounced minority quotas, particularly with respect to blacks and Jews, and racial segregation in schools, stressing that a shortage of doctors, teachers and other professionals was taking place, with the possibility of fostering an intellectual elite. Four Southern members of the commission dissented to the majority report, particularly with respect to the criticism by the majority of the state of segregated education in the South, that it was not equal for blacks as required by the Constitution.

Political strategists for both Governor Dewey and Senator Taft admitted that General Eisenhower appeared to be the most formidable potential dark horse candidate in the Republican race for the 1948 presidential nomination. The strategists for Governor Dewey said that he did not intend to declare formally his candidacy prior to the convention, as his policy positions were known from the 1944 campaign and his time since 1943 as Governor of New York. He would also not campaign in the primaries.

Admiral Chester Nimitz retired as chief of Naval Operations and was replaced by Admiral Louis Denfeld. Admiral Nimitz was to serve in San Francisco as special adviser to the Secretary of the Navy.

In Great Lakes, Ill., a Navy physician, Dr. John Brewster, claimed to have discovered the cure for the common cold, provided it was administered within a few hours of the onset of symptoms. The remedy was the anti-allergy medicines benadryl, phenylene or pyribenzamine, taken orally.

He also owns a bridge in Brooklyn if you're interested...

We recommend vitamins, exercise, proper intake of food and liquids, and adequate rest during the winter, while avoiding, to the extent possible, others with colds and coughs.

The trial of R. L. Fritz, former principal of the Hudson High School in Lenoir and president of the North Carolina Education Association, began this date on the charge that he misappropriated funds of the school in an effort, he said, to keep it open by paying regular teachers overtime from funds ostensibly paid to substitute teachers, who actually did not teach and refunded the payments. Mr. Fritz had been stripped of his teaching credential by the State Board of Education, a member of which stated that if he were acquitted in the criminal trial, the member would lead a drive to have the certificate reinstated.

Whether that was supposed to be a dare to the jury to acquit him or otherwise designed to color their judgment during the jury selection which began this date, we cannot say. It is too near Christmas.

Dick Young of The News reports that a meeting had been scheduled with the oil dealers by City and County officials to discuss on Tuesday the fuel oil shortage in the community, causing many families to begin to run out of heating oil until January. Mayor Baxter was in the process of contacting the President and asking for emergency aid.

The Carolina Farmer section of the newspaper tells of a farmer in Montgomery County, through soil conservation techniques, being able to raise 350 bushels of corn from ten acres, whereas it once took 30 acres of his land to achieve the same yield.

On the editorial page, "'Neat Trick' for Taft's Party" discusses Senator Taft's recent statement that a meat shortage would likely occur by May, and that the Congress thus might be forced to undertake a system of rationing with price ceilings. But since it conflicted with his other recent statement, in critical response to the President's call for limited price control and rationing, that such were totalitarian methods, inappropriate at any time, he was forced to amend his statement to say that he was definitely opposed to the concept. Thus, he was running in both directions at once.

It appeared that the Republicans, because of the omission in their newly proposed voluntary program of any condemnatory statement of the President's plan, were going to attempt to have it both ways should the voluntary plan not work. The theory was based on the notion that it would not hurt to try the voluntary program first. But it wasted precious time in implementing controls on inflation, as the voluntary plan was virtually doomed in advance to fail. By spring, the absence of controls might create such havoc as to be hard to reverse.

"To the Showdown on Germany" tells of Foreign Commissar V. M. Molotov's maneuver to end the foreign ministers conference in London having caught off guard Western diplomats, as Mr. Molotov had recently made several conciliatory gestures. Thus, apparently, the attack against British, French, and American policies was being directed from Moscow.

The notion was conveyed that Russia did not fear Western unification of Germany, leaving Russia on its own in the Eastern sector. Russia appeared to have used the conference as a means of communicating propaganda to the Germans, that the Soviets were the true champion of German restoration and that the democratic powers were interested only in exploitation. The conciliatory gestures may have been deception merely to prolong the conference for the purpose.

Russia may have become convinced that the time was ripe for a drive against European recovery, orchestrated from Eastern Germany. It also might portend further Communist demonstrations in Italy and France, as part of the new Cominform's strategy to create chaos during the winter when want and hunger would most precipitantly supply the fodder for revolt.

Most disturbing of all was the fact that the Congressional issues raised with regard to both emergency aid and the inflation control program urged by the President had served to encourage the Soviet attempts to disrupt the Marshall Plan.

"John L. Lewis in 'Isolation'" discusses the withdrawal of UMW from the AFL, as directed by John L. Lewis, effective December 13. The editor of the UMW Journal assured reporters that no deal had been made by the union for political alignment. Mr. Lewis, since his contempt citation a year earlier for not obeying the Federal Court order to end the called coal strike against the Government-operated mines at the time, upheld by the Supreme Court, had made it clear that he was in defiance of the Truman Administration for the resulting humiliation. But he also was more vocal than any other labor leader in defiance of Taft-Hartley, had refused on principle to sign the affidavit of non-Communist affiliation, and so likewise was not able to find a home in the Republican camp.

The piece finds his break with AFL to spell a problem ahead for the President, William Green, head of AFL, and Philip Murray, head of CIO.

Drew Pearson tells of the inside story of how Nagasaki came to be the second recipient of the atom bomb, on August 9, 1945, rather than Kokura, the first choice as the second target. Kokura had been saved by the fortuity of a heavy fog, a decision left to Major Charles Sweeney, commander of the second mission. Major Sweeney had circled Kokura several times, looking for an opening to drop the bomb but could find none. His gas was running low because of a problem with his fuel pump on takeoff, preventing use of a spare 800 gallons of fuel. So, he headed for Nagasaki, 100 miles to the southwest, the secondary target. He found the city also under a cloud layer but was able to locate an opening sufficient to drop the bomb, albeit one very small and in need of assistance from radar.

The plane then had to land on Okinawa for want of fuel, doing so with but two minutes of flight time left on the gauge.

He next tells of a carefully guarded money printing operation by a Boston publisher on behalf of the Bureau of Printing & Engraving of the Treasury Department. The job had strict security around it as the Government did not want the Russians to become aware that the Government was printing paper money for its occupation zones in Germany and Korea.

The Federal Housing expediter had finally given permission to the owners of Tanforan Racetrack in San Bruno, Calif., south of San Francisco, for the purpose of building new buildings, despite the fact that the owners previously had been cited for illegally using scarce building materials, on reserve for veterans housing.

There was a controversy in the Navy regarding the appointment of a new Deputy of Naval Operations, Rear Admiral John Reeves, instead of Vice-Admiral Arthur Radford, recommended by the Navy. The White House did not like Admiral Radford for his having opposed merger of the military. But GI's during the war had considered Admiral Reeves to be one of the "brassiest" of the brass hats.

Marquis Childs comments anent a previous column on November 20, in which he had reported that a member of the F.C.C. had complained of receiving unsolicited reports from the FBI regarding persons in the radio industry, tells of it having stirred controversy on Capitol Hill. Senator Homer Capehart of Indiana wanted an investigation of what he termed "sabotage" of the work of the FBI. But Clifford Durr, who made the allegation, had no such intention, was merely concerned, as many Americans, regarding abuse of civil liberties in tracking down alleged Communist influence.

Mr. Childs quotes at length from a letter written to him by J. Edgar Hoover, stating that the FBI had never sought to influence FCC decisions, but that routinely the Bureau furnished information which might be relevant to a particular agency's decisions, without determining its importance to policy. He added that the Bureau attempted to evaluate credibility of assertions without any effort to suggest how the information ought be used. Mr. Hoover believed it the responsibility of the agency in question to evaluate and determine the use of the information. Nor had the FBI initiated investigations to determine the propriety of FCC action.

Mr. Childs regards it as reasonable for the Bureau to take such a stance. And so a Congressional investigation might prove useful in the case, provided its aim was to determine all the facts. But, "Senator Capehart sounded as though he wanted merely to get another broomstick and start riding off through the night sky."

Mr. Childs, you have not seen anything yet with regard to the old Wurlitzer King's an tics.

But, as a friendly admonition, beware the Enemies List. You may wind up on it.

What is it? you ask. Wait another ten months or so and you will begin to get an idea.

Joseph Alsop, in London, considers Lieutenant General Curtis LeMay, being of importance in tracing the development of the Anglo-American relationship since the end of the war. From his headquarters in Wiesbaden, Germany, the Air Force General made frequent trips to London.

General LeMay, he asserts, was probably the greatest of the young fighting leaders to emerge in the American Air Forces during the war, having led the saturation bombing campaign of Japan during 1944-45 and commanded the 20th Air Force when the two atomic bombs were dropped to end the Pacific war. His current assignment was to command the small American air force in Germany, seemingly a minor assignment given his credentials.

The reason for that assignment, Mr. Alsop ventures, was as deterrent to Russian aggression in Germany and to enable planning of Western strategy in case something did occur. That explained his frequent trips to London.

At the end of the war, Britain had proposed an old Churchill idea of maintaining the joined Anglo-American chiefs of staff into peacetime, but the Truman Administration rejected the idea as endangering the peace. The combination was maintained for about a year because of continuing joint forces in Italy and elsewhere, but as these forces were reduced, so was pressure by Britain to end the joint command, especially for the leftist agitation at home in Britain opposed to its continuance. And, concomitantly, the Soviets had changed their focus from Britain to the U.S.

But as Britain by that point determined that they would like the joint command terminated as quickly as possible, the U.S. wanted to maintain it. As a result, the combination had continued, and had wound up very nearly as Mr. Churchill had proposed during the war. The command of General LeMay was an example of that combination. In the matter of strategy, Britain and the U.S. were collaborating closely.

To supplement the piece, topically, we add the following, from an oral history interview, conducted in May, 1978 by Sheldon Stern on behalf of the John F. Kennedy Library, of General Godfrey McHugh, Air Force aide to Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, from 1961 to 1964—the same General who received the wrong end of President Kennedy's Irish wit and wisdom in July, 1963, anent the Air Force's statement to the press regarding the purchase by the Air Force of $5,000 worth of furniture to equip a suite at the hospital at Otis Air Force Base, near Hyannis Port, Mass., to accommodate Mrs. Kennedy, then expecting their third child:
STERN: I know that [President Kennedy] had some trouble with LeMay over another military…
McHUGH: I will tell you something that will amuse you to no end about LeMay. When [President Kennedy] named LeMay the [Air Force] chief of staff [in 1961], he came to me, and the President asked me, “You like LeMay?” I said, “Sir, I’ve know him for many, many years, but you’re not the first one who has named him chief of staff.” He looked at me and said, “What do you mean?” I said, “There’s an interesting story [from spring, 1950] that is on record in the Pentagon, but nobody knows.”
When General [Hoyt] Vandenberg was chief of staff and I was with him on a trip to Germany and looking over the troops that were there, when we came back, suddenly General Vandenberg was told that General LeMay [following the death of Air Force Vice-Chief General Muir Fairchild] had been named his vice-chief, which means he’s chief the next time. General Vandenberg said, “LeMay is the head of the SAC, and that’s where he should be. He’s a very good commander, brilliant commander. I don’t want him as vice-chief or chief.” I said, “What are you going to do, General?” He said, “Get hold of the [Air Force] Secretary, Mr. [Thomas K.] Finletter. I will go and see him.”
So we walked together and we saw Mr. Finletter, and he explained to Mr. Finletter. Finletter said, “I’m the one who selected him and I thought I could do that.”
That was illegal actually because you were supposed to talk to the chief to select his vice-chief. You can impose a man on him, but you first have to talk to him. That’s the normal thing.
And [Mr. Finletter] said, “Not only that, the President, President Truman, has accepted and is delighted, and has signed the papers on it.”
“Do you mind if I can go and see President Truman?”
“No,” he said, “You go and see President Truman.”
General Vandenberg and I went to see him. I knew Truman very well, you see. I called and I said, “Mr. President, the Chief of Staff would like to see you.” I called his secretary and made an appointment. We walked in and [General Vandenberg] explained that he did not want General LeMay as his vice-chief or the next chief of staff. Truman said, “I did not know your point of view on that. It was told to me by Mr. Finletter who apparently did not know either. I withdraw my recommendation. As of now he is no longer the vice-chief of staff.”
We walked out of there. Now LeMay was furious. He was already selling his house, he was already moving his furniture, and when we came back to Fort Myer, to the house that Vandenberg had, Mrs. LeMay was measuring curtains to come in.
STERN: Isn’t that fascinating. Fascinating story.
McHUGH: It’s amazing. So then he took a man called General [Nathan F.] Twining, who was a two-star general, who was the head of the Alaskan command, made him a four-star general overnight, and named him as vice-chief of staff which Mr. Finletter signed and agreed. Truman signed and agreed, and he was a marvelous chief of staff.
A letter writer thinks that if a political party could control primary and secondary schools of a state, it could perpetuate itself in power for twenty years. He thinks the North Carolina schools were being controlled by Democratic propaganda.
He points out that in Mississippi, 77,000 votes determined the destiny of the state, of which the population was nearly 2.2 million.
North Carolina had been dominated by the Democratic Party since after the Civil War, with the exception of a four-year period in the mid-1890's, during which the Fusion Party held sway. And only half as many citizens took part in elections as in states where viable two-party systems existed.
A letter writer urges less emphasis on the material world and more on the spiritual being, resting on the "solid rock" of faith in God.

A Quote of the Day: "We are thankful to be sound of limb and alive. Our longevity we attribute to the grace of God and the fact we never go hunting on opening days." —Slidell (La.) News

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