The Charlotte News
Thursday, July 6, 1950
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that General MacArthur's headquarters informed that three North Korean divisions had continued to move southward toward Osan and Pyongtaek, 35 and 46 miles, respectively, below Seoul, and that reorganization of the South Korean forces was underway. F-80 jet planes had destroyed eight enemy tanks south of Suwon. Field Dispatches, however, placed the vanguard 60 miles below the captured South Korean capital and stated further that American troops had been forced back eight to ten miles. These dispatches also said that 20-25 tanks and 19-25 Yak planes had been destroyed by American forces, albeit during an unstated period. The Communist forces were said to have a total of 160 to 170 heavy tanks in South Korea, which might be running low on fuel. American losses were said to be nominal to "heavy", without any numbers being stated by field headquarters. General MacArthur's headquarters stated that the situation of American troops was not considered serious. It also acknowledged loss of Inchon.
Tom Lambert of the Associated Press reports from the front that Pyongtaek and Songhwan, 36 and 41 miles, respectively, below Seoul, had been captured by the North Koreans and that the column had moved into Chonan, 14 miles further down the road. During the previous week, he said, the North Korean forces had advanced about 50 miles, overrunning several American positions in the process. A master sergeant from Mt. Airy, N.C., who had fought in World War II, said that the Koreans had at least eight tanks and 800 to 1,000 infantrymen, who marched, according to a corporal in his outfit, "like rats", while smoking cigarettes. The Americans had urged a tank crew fleeing a burning tank to surrender but the North Koreans refused, fled and rejoined other units. A senior officer said that he had been a little contemptuous of the North Koreans but was not anymore after seeing how tenaciously they fought. One officer said that he believed American casualties had been "heavy" in at least two units.
The Pentagon reported guarded optimism as American and British air power was beginning to make itself felt, causing North Korean planes to be virtually out of action.
Authoritative sources in Japan said that American Naval forces would be called upon increasingly to cut North Korean seaborne supply lines.
The Air Force announced that it was sending to the Far Eastern theater an undisclosed number of F-51 fighters, able to operate at slower speeds than the jets. The U.S. had contracted with seven private airlines to carry men and supplies to the Far East.
The President said at a news conference that there were no plans at present to call up reserves or the National Guard. He said also that he had no plans to seek additional military funding. He said that he was glad that the Joint Chiefs and Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson had decided not to make speeches during July, had instead elected to work, and added that he, also, had no speeches scheduled. He indicated, in response to a question, that he had no knowledge of a report which had claimed that the U.S. was exerting pressure on Egypt to join the coalition forces of the U.N.
The President threatened to intervene to end the rail strike of switchmen unless they ended the strike voluntarily against five major railroads. He did not say what steps he would take.
In Monica, Ill., ten passengers were crushed to death and 50 to 75 injured in a freak collision of two Santa Fe Railway streamliners, both running eastbound beside one another. A mail coach of one train, running from Los Angeles to Chicago, had derailed, setting in motion a chain derailment, causing the train to swerve into the path of the Kansas City Chief, running from Kansas City to Chicago in the same direction.
A crime expert of the Chicago Crime Commission told the Kefauver Senate committee investigating crime that the old Al Capone crime syndicate was still flourishing with underworld links, particularly with the Frank Costello gang in New York, extending to many parts of the country.
In Syracuse, N.Y., police were searching for a robber who had demanded the money of a woman as she walked home, whereupon she told him that she only had three one-dollar bills, of which he took two and departed.
On the editorial page, "The Globe and Olive Branch" tells of discussion ongoing regarding whether to add the flag of the U.N. to those of the nations participating in the joint action to stop the Northern Communist aggression in Korea. It finds it desirable to show that the U.N. was in favor of stopping the North Koreans and to demonstrate to free nations around the globe the resoluteness with which the U.N. nations, save Russia, its satellites, Yugoslavia and Egypt, were withstanding such aggression.
Many Communists in Asia were probably not convinced that the U.S. was acting as part of a broader U.N. police organization, believed that it was an "imperialist" operation, as claimed by Communist propaganda. As much of the fighting would be done by Asiatics, columnist Max Lerner had said the previous week that the fight was for the "hearts and minds" of the millions of people of Asia, as the fight could not be won without them.
Since it was necessary to impress upon skeptical Asians that the action was undertaken by the U.N. and not just by the U.S., having the U.N. insignia present would aid in this process. And the U.S. needed to demonstrate its willingness to fight under the aegis of the U.N., adding to the prestige and authority of the organization.
The U.N. Security Council was expected to meet during the week to form a "War Council" to control military and economic operations during the war. General MacArthur was likely to be named the overall supreme commander. The Western effort would then become a U.N. effort.
"Chinese Reds Next?" does not doubt the piece by Stanley Rich appearing in the previous day's edition, neither on the front page nor the editorial page, in which it was predicted that the Chinese Communists would eventually come to the aid of the North Koreans. Such was predictable as a result of the U.S. entry to the war. Whether Russia would lend troops to the action remained a question mark. But, it posits, it would use mercenary troops wherever it could find them to fight a war it badly wanted to win, that failure to use the Chinese Communists, therefore, would amount to "dangerous negligence".
The questions would then arise whether the U.N. would authorize action against the Chinese mainland. If so, would Russia be able to stand by idly as America achieved success? It wonders also what the effect would be on the satellite nations, concluding that the pattern of events which might eventuate from the crisis was becoming clearer as the conflict continued.
"Ethics and Dollars" finds that the below piece by Don Shoemaker had set forth accurately that "Unto These Hills", the new outdoor drama at Cherokee, N.C., by Kermit Hunter, had been a long delayed acknowledgment of the brutal mistreatment of the North American Indian.
It praises the project and hopes that it would be successful economically, as had been "The Lost Colony" at Manteo, as ten Western counties in the 1950 census had shown only slightly more than three percent growth in population since 1940, while the state generally had a 13 percent increase. They needed, it concludes, the economic shot in the arm from the drama, and it would shamelessly so state even if Mr. Shoemaker was chary about suggesting such commercialization.
As indicated, the piece by Don Shoemaker, editor of the Asheville Citizen, titled "Requital at Cherokee", tells of "Unto These Hills", the outdoor drama in Cherokee, not taken from the standard text on the "Trail of Tears". Author Kermit Hunter had told of brutal treatment of Indians, an ancient wrong, however, which had been partially righted by wise governmental policies of recent years.
The play was enacted in a beautiful setting, in one of the nicest theaters in the land, on the Qualla Reservation.
"The Lost Colony" by Paul Green was in its tenth year of presentation—actually, since 1937—in Manteo, and it had led to active tourist trade on once depressed Roanoke Island, having seen construction of 500 hotel rooms during the year. Such, he predicts, would happen at Cherokee as well and would benefit the Reservation.
He concludes that such was not meant to impute any crass commercialism to either venture but to provide praise to those who had created both projects.
Bill Sharpe, in his "Turpentine Drippings", excerpts from newspapers around the state, provides a piece from the Sanford Herald, reporting that a man whose wife had inquired of neighbors whether he was spending the night at any of their houses, having found subsequently the neighbors to have been overly generous, as after the husband finally had arrived home late, his wife received three telegrams assuring that he was spending the night with each of the senders.
The Waynesville Pioneer imparts of two Cherokee Indians, one of whom, George Owl, had several college degrees, was a college professor and veteran of both world wars, having recently visited Spartanburg, South Carolina, wearing their full Indian regalia, prompting the secretary of the Chamber of Commerce to approach them and state, "How, pale face Chiefums," to which Mr. Owl, while affecting an English accent, replied: "Say, old chappy, your English sounds a bit off-key. Trust you're feeling hale and hearty." The embarrassed secretary extended his hand and informed that lunch was ready.
The Watauga Democrat tells of a scrawny, little man, wearing false shoulder pads to make himself appear bigger, having ventured an opinion on the feminine wardrobe, paying special attention to falsies, saying that he believed they were "misleading and deceiving". The piece finds him an unsuitable member of the species to make such an observation.
The Fuquay Independent informs of a man who had escaped town on Saturday, June 24, the day of the runoff primary for the Democratic Senate nomination, driving a car which had attached a banner saying: "I don't care who goes to Washington—I'm going fishing."
Well, that's a hell of an attitude. You might wind up having to obtain a license from Moscow and show proof of party membership before being allowed to go fishing next time.
And so
Drew Pearson finds that though General MacArthur had once been touted as a rival GOP candidate to the President in 1948, the two men had coordinated exceptionally well on the Korean crisis, better in fact than some of General MacArthur's subordinate generals in the Pentagon, for whom he often showed disdain. The General had communicated with the President via long distance the night before the announcement of U.S. intervention, and again four days later when the General conveyed his approval for use of ground troops, as the situation was growing worse by the day despite American air and sea support. He had not disparaged the South Korean troops but said that they needed help to resist the Communists. General MacArthur had told the President in the first conversation that he could "guarantee" success whether Russia intervened or not, but had in the interim become pessimistic, after having viewed, first-hand, the situation at the front, by the time of his second conversation.
The General had authorized bombing in the North prior to authorization from Washington, causing some embarrassment when the North Koreans claimed that their air base had been bombed and Government sources, unaware of the facts, had denied it. The State Department was chagrined, as it wanted to operate in close coordination with the U.N. But after the second conversation, the President authorized bombing of the North and use of ground troops.
He notes that General MacArthur had also asked for more ground troops to be dispatched to Japan, along with heavy equipment.
As Pentagon officials waited for news from the Korean front, an office girl raced into the corridor, shouting, "Rosen just hit a homer with the bases full!" in reference to the Cleveland Indians defeating the Washington Senators.
Although Senator Frank Graham had eschewed any investigation of the anti-Communist, racist propaganda which had proliferated against him in the election campaign just lost to Willis Smith, the Post Office Department had launched such an investigation to determine the source of the literature emanating from outside North Carolina. He did not even want an investigation by the Gillette committee to determine the source of the million dollars poured into the campaign by Northern Republicans and Dixiecrats. That which hurt him was that the textile workers and and poor people, whom he had always championed, had turned against him in the runoff primary, apparently listening to the most virulently racist literature which had been circulated out of the Alabama Ku Klux Klan, mailed under the franking privilege of Congressman Ralph Gwinn of New York, a friend of General Eisenhower, as well as lending ear to the America-First rhetoric of The Road Ahead by John T. Flynn, portions of which were inserted in the Congressional Record by Senator Owen Brewster of Maine.
He concludes that some 63,000 voters who had voted for Senator Graham in the first primary either stayed home or voted for Mr. Smith in the runoff, to supply the latter with his 20,000-vote margin of victory after he had lost to Senator Graham by 52,000 votes in the initial primary.
The President, concerned about panic-buying and hoarding and the effects of those practices on the economy, had instructed the National Security Resources Board to develop a contingency plan in case the Korean situation turned into a world war.
In light of Korea, the British Foreign Office was expected to abandon its previous efforts to urge seating of the Chinese Communists in the U.N. Security Council, a move which had been hopeful of bringing the Russians back to the organization.
Some of the country's top diplomats believed that the real Russian motive behind the attack on South Korea was to bring pressure on the U.S. to engage in a military campaign against the Chinese Communists, as they believed that such a war would last generations and weaken the U.S. to the point where it could not resist Russian advances in other areas of the world, the reason that the U.S. had promptly declined Chiang Kai-Shek's offer to send 30,000 troops in aid of South Korea.
The location of new factories in the country would be henceforth determined only after clearance by the Federal Government, to avoid the over-concentration of industries in such cities as Detroit and Pittsburgh, to enable diffusion so as not to be subject to ready destruction by an atom bomb.
Understand? Not a "global conspiracy" of the "new world order" or even Skull & Bones, or even F.E.M.A.
Newsflash from 1950.
Marquis Childs finds that the moral of South Korea was two-fold: that there was a lack of capable American personnel readily available to move in when American military occupation ended a year earlier; and, second, that basic American expectations of Asian peoples emerging from colonial feudalism into democracy, were unreasonable in assuming that they could achieve independence and self-government essentially overnight, within a year or two out of the chaos and confusion of the war, when it took the West 150 years to evolve to its status in 1950.
The President, in his announcement the preceding week providing military support against the invasion, had included stepped-up military aid to Indo-China as part of a new and complete policy opposed to Communist aggression in Asia. Indo-China, with the French backing the weak regime of Emperor Bao Dai, was in even worse condition than South Korea in terms of its preparedness to endure Communist insurgency. The French had withheld many of the symbols of power from Bao Dai, who, personally, was said to be competent. Despite having 150,000 troops, the French had been having great trouble with the guerrilla forces operating under Ho Chi Minh.
Scandal-ridden operations in Indo-China had been highlighted in the French press, one in Saigon being reputed as the center of black market operations in gold, with its head reported as paying to Ho Chi Minh a large daily bribe to keep the place from being sabotaged.
Mr. Childs asks, presciently
The American military mission to be established in Indo-China, at the direction of the President, had to have authority to bring about essential changes in the regime to be effective. He points out that an American military mission with several hundred men, most of whom were officers, had existed since the end of occupation in South Korea, but that, nevertheless, it had proved of little effect in the final analysis in preventing the present crisis.
Robert C. Ruark finds it unsurprising that the American people appeared to be largely blasé in reaction to the new war in Korea, that anything more could hardly be expected of a population which had been through two world wars, the latter of which had just ended less than five years earlier. He had taken out his old sailor's suit from his three-year stint in the Navy during the war and found that it still fit, an experience which he finds not to be right, as there ought be at least twenty years between wars such that one would outgrow the uniform before being asked to don it again.
He tells of war being mostly boredom
and regimentation rather than excitement, standing in lines and
moving from one strange place to another, with "a little
loneliness and a little fear and some physical deprivation, with
dollops of pain and occasional death to spice it up." The
people would not be expected to react to a new war so soon until the
unreality
Framed Edition
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