The Charlotte News

Tuesday, December 3, 1940

THREE EDITORIALS

This May Eventually Aid British Land Attack

According to a report from Bucharest, Adolf Hitler has been in secret conference with Cincar-Markovic, the Yugoslavian Premier, and Yugoslavia will shortly join the Axis. That was to be expected in view of the increasing difficulties of Italy in Albania. With Yugoslavia in the Axis the Italian forces would be able to attack Greece on a much wider front and attempt to relieve the pressure in Albania. Moreover, Hitler would be able to get aid to Italy much more easily and effectively.

Yet it is far from certain that Rome is happy about the development, for Mussolini well knows that what Adolf Hitler takes he never relinquishes. And he had staked out Yugoslavia as his own private preserve.

For Britain the move may eventually have definite advantages. Indications now are that London is planning to turn the Greek war into a major land offensive, if possible. And with Yugoslavia in the Hitler alliance, it will not be necessary to wait until Hitler takes the offense. Naturally, Yugoslavia cannot expect to retain her status as a neutral under the new circumstances, but may count on being treated as simply a part of Germany when and if it suits the British purpose. The British, that is, will stand squarely up against the enemy territory, at the Greek border.

However, the carrying out of this scheme of land attack against Germany through Yugoslavia largely depends upon the British power to knock Italy out of the war soon. To undertake it without absolute command of the Mediterranean would be very dangerous.

Mr. Nitti Is Protected By Apathy of Unions

Maybe Mr. Frank (The Enforcer) Nitti can be got as his former boss, Al Capone, was got--for income tax irregularities. Men of Mr. Nitti's sort are usually open to attack on that score, as Seymour Weiss and others of the Louisiana gang have lately found out.

But if Mr. Nitti isn't to be had by that means, it seems unlikely that he will be cut down to his size. Mr. Nitti took over the Capone rackets in Chicago after Al retired to Alcatraz. And he appeared in court the other day to answer charges of conspiracy to seize control of the Chicago Bartenders' Union. But then, the State's star witness, George McLane, business agent of the union, refused to testify on the ground that he might incriminate himself. So Mr. Nitti walked out of the court a free man.

Maybe, even probably, Mr. McLane had pressing cause in consideration of his personal safety for acting as he did.

Nevertheless, the case does serve to emphasize again the failure of the labor unions, particularly those of the AFL group, to go energetically about taking racketeers and crooks out of their ranks.

McLane's excuse for keeping silent almost amounts to a tacit admission that he has been playing ball with Nitti. But if the unions really wanted to get rid of its crooks, he would be given the choice of speaking up or losing his job. And with the union solidly behind the case, McLane could speak up in safety and Nitti can be salted away where he belongs.

Bayonet Turns Out Not To Be Obsolete, After All

The Italian complaint that the Greeks' use of the bayonet is a "barbarous form of fighting which shows that the nation which uses it is not civilized," is quaint, coming from a nation which first practiced the wholesale slaughter of innocents from the air.

But it also serves to remind that before the war "military experts" were saying that the bayonet was obsolete.

The notion that it was obsolete was based on the tactics of the last war, of course. The same belief that those tactics were basic and unchangeable for modern times also made the "experts" say that cavalry was about obsolete, too. But this war has knocked the notions of the last one into oblivion. Hitler's great success in Poland, Holland, Belgium, and France was essentially a cavalry success--motorized cavalry.

And for fighting in mountain regions the bayonet turns out again to be as effective as it always has been. There is nothing more dismaying than the spectacle of a man coming at you with cold steel.

There are really no outmoded methods of war. There are only methods which fit or do not fit into a particular set of circumstances.