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About Capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1919-1980 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 21, 1942)
o?'n!. R Friday, August 21, Sallm, Oregon Price Five Cents 54th Year, No. 199 ntend u mcodcI oIam matter tt Salem, Oregon Japs Report American Landing in Gilberts II n IfflL irS J II Willkie Sent To Tell Allies Of War Effort FDR Sends Former Oppo nent to Deliver Message To Stalin and Mid-East Washington, Aug. 21 U.R Wendell L. Willkie will tell to leaders ,of countries he visits during his forthcoming trip the truth about American war pro duction and correct erroneous impressions that production is not all it should be, President Roosevelt said today. Mr. Roosevelt told a press con ference that the 1940 republican presidential candidate will tra vel as a special representative of the president. Willkie an nounced yesterday he will leave within three weeks for Russia and the near east. The primary purpose of the trip, Mr. Roosevelt said, will be to tell foreign leaders the truth about the United States and its war effort. Willkie, he added, will seek to correct the impres sion that is spread over Europe and certain countries of the near east that American production is not all it should be . False Impression The preseident said many peo ple outside the United States have the false impression that American war production is be ing " seriously hampered by la '. bor and management troubles. He said he wanted Willkie. to spreadlhe, wrd- that tptafejiraj I duction delays are. only an in finitesimal percentage of the to tal. . The chief executive said Will kie will carry, messages . from him to a number of leaders, in eluding Premier Josef Stalin of the Soviet Union. ( Willkie's itinerary, he said, will include Egypt, Arabia, Pal estine, Syria, Turkey, Iraq, and Iran. Willkie will report back to the president when he returns to this country not later than Oc tober 15. Talks on Production The president hoped Willkie would impress upon the nations he visits and the leaders with- whom he confers the comparison , between the world that will re sult from the United Nations vic tory and that which would result from an axis victory. As his discussion of Willkie's trip turned into a commentary )on American production, a re porter pointed out to the presi dent that statements had been made by competent authorities such as labor leaders and some congressmen that American pro duction actually is falling off. The president said this de pended on what paper you work for, and stated his belief that iso lated strikes were so reported (Concluded on page 9, column 6) Second Front Held Possible Bern, Switzerland, Aug. 21 W) Foreign military specialists J expressed a belief today that the 'allied landing raid on Dieppe proved that a second front could be opened in France, . Essential to its success, these sources said, would be sufficient superiority in land-based planes adequate transport facilities, and a strong element of surprise. Published neutral descriptions of the recently completed Ger man system of channel fortifi cations indicated that a full- scale allied Invasion effort would cost heavily, but would have a chance of advancing to the Meuse and Rhine provided the defenders could be out weighed in men and materials, A correspondent for the so cialist newspaper La Sentinelle who recently visited some of the fortified i ction, said that Meven in the most exposed areas, kthe German defenses along the coast of France, Belgium and Holland extend barely more than fix to six kilometeri in depth. Raid Witness Drew Mid dleton (above), of the Asso ciated Press, was one of the American newsmen select ed to represent the United Statls press on the com mando raid on Dieppe. He was not permitted to land, but he saw the operations from a vessel offshore. (As sociated 'Press Photo.) Tropic Storm On Texas Coast . Port Arthur, Tex., Aug. 21 (IP) Sailboats and yachts at an chor were sunk, plate glass win dows blown in, city power dis rupted in places, and roofs damaged by gale force winds today. . . No loss of life was reported, Damage was confined principal ly to the waterfront. Residents of coastal lowlands were warned by the coast guard of dangerously high tides. In nearby Beaumont, gale winds levelled trees, blew down signs, and disrupted power sup plies in some sections of the heavily-industrialized area, but most large plants were operating normally. Efforts to check on damage and possible loss of life in beach districts of the entire heavily - populated Sabine dis trict were hampered through lack of communications. There were no reports of injury or loss of life. Joseph Newspaper Quits Joseph, Ore., Aug. 21 ) The weekly Joseph Herald suspend ed publication this week after 47 years of continuous opera tion. Jack Estles, editor, left for La Grande to take a railroad job. He said he would return after the war and resume pub lication of the paper. Dieppe Raid Clips W IngsofNaziA irforce London, Aug. 21 (IP) The clipped wings of the German air force in western Europe was rated by British observers today as the first big dividend of Dieppe. Allied mastery of the air, they asserted, is complete beyond challenge, not only over Bri tain and the channel but even deep into enemy territory it self. - These commentators, whose identity could not be disclosed, said this was proved by the ex traordinary shov of allied air power yesterday, with virtually no opposition and apparently without the loss of a single plane, over German-held soil. In broad daylight, S00 fight ers swept across the French coast where never before had more than 300 planes made such a raid at one time and a force of the United States' big four cngined flying fortresses rained explosives on -the Amiens rail way yards without even sighting a nazi fighter over the target. The smoke of battle has lifted from ruined Dieppe. The nat U.S. Bombers Smash Swarms Of Nazi Planes 1 1 Flying Fortresses Bat tle 20 to 25 Focke-Wulf 190's, Downing 6 London, Aug. 21 u. A squadron of 11 American flying fortresses smashed into a swarm of 2o to 25 nazi Focke-Wulf 190's the fighter pride of the lu'ftwaffe today, a U. S. com munique reported, and shot down or damaged half a dozen nazi planes without a single loss. The test of the American big bombers came in a 20-minute dog fight high over the North sea, the communique said. It was the fourth assignment for the U. S. bombers in as many days. One American fortress co-pi lot was killed and his pilot wounded by a nazi cannon shell, but the plane managed to make its way back to base. At Extreme Altitude It was believed the battle may have been fought at ex treme altitude, possible 20,000 feet or higher. The fortresses are famous for their high alti tude operation and the Focke Wulf fighters, the newest model in the luftwafle arsenal, are' cre dited with one of the highest operating-ceilings or any fighter Iplane..' -. . two engines of this aircraft." the communique said. "The fort ress also was hit in many other places, but no other casualties were suffered." ". More Strikes in War Plants (By the Associated Press) Government officials worked today to try to avert a strike vote by the CIO aluminum work ers of America in seven plants of the Aluminum Company of America as 300 workers in an eighth plant at Vernon, Calif., remained idle protesting what they said was a company lock out of 30 skilled workers. In Detroit a Chrysler Corpor ation spokesman, Vice President H. L. Weckler, said that 475 AFL construction workers stopped work at the Detroit tank arsen al this morning on orders of Ed Thai, secretary of the Detroit building trades council. We,ckler said Thai threatened to call off the job all AFL men unless a sub-constractor handl ing installation ' of paint booths and ovens fired CIO employes and hired 40 AFL men. Weckler described the stoppage as "sab otage against the government.' ural surge of enthusiasm over the masterful assault on the most strongly gurrded point- of nazi coast has given way to sober reasoning. But even in the cold light of fact and figure, Britons regard ed Wednesday as a day of al lied triumph from every angle as a victory on the field itself, as a help to Soviet Russia, as a step forward in the whole master plan of the United Na tions. I A communique summarizing the raid called it a "successful demonstration of coordination of all three services" land, sea and air. : -Although the official an nouncement labeled the attack merely a "reconnaissance in force," it said the raid had "vital part" in allied policy. 1 - Prisoners From Dieppe Raid Commandos guard blindfolded Germans, brought back to England as prisoners from the Dieppe area, where allied raiders struck at the German held coast. One prisoner (right) is wrapped in a blanket. This picture cabled from London to New YortfT (Associated Press Photo.) FDR Warns Axis Against Savagery Washington, Aug. 21 (IP) President Roosevelt warned enemy nations in a formal statement come for what he called their populations in axis-occupied countries. The chief executive is sued his warning after Secretary of State Hull had given him a communication from the Neth Battle Raging Llsb,'pij,.:;AugC31 .((Pi A report from Algarve province tonight said a fierce naval and air bat tle : was raging off Cape Saint Vincent, the southwest tip of Portugal. " The dispatch did not say who was fighting, and gave no par ticulars of the reported engage ment. Cape St. Vincent is famous in naval history as the scene of many encounters, notably a Brit ish victory over the Spanish February 14, 1797. It was in that battle that Lord Nelson established his fame, when as captain of one of the 15 British ships he left the line without orders and interposed his vessel to prevent the escape of the Spanish fleet of 27 men o' war. The British commander, Sir John Jervis, was named the Earl of St. Vincent as a result of the victory. Russia Warns Of 2nd Front fBy the United Press) The Russian radio told the German people today, in broadcast directed to the reich and nazi-occupied Europe, that "the second . front will come very soon, sooner than German propaganda attempts to convince you." The Moscow broadcast, in German, ridiculed nazi propa ganda attempts to picture the allied raid on Dieppe as "the failure of a second front" and pointed out that the British warned at the outset of the at tack that it was not an inva sion. Simultaneously, the Moscow radio said, Russian planes heav ily bombed Danzig, Koenigsberg and Tilsit in Prussia, starting numerous fires and explosions. The inference of the broadcast was that the Russian air attacks followed up last night by a raid on Warsaw, according to the Germans were timed to aid the Dieppe attack, "The second front will come soon very soon sooner than German propaganda attempts to convince you," said the Moscow radio, as recorded by the United Press listening post in New York. "The Germans would like to know when the second front fighting will start, but this is ex actly what they will not know. "Anyway, the second front will come sooner than expected." today of "fearful retribution" to "barbaric crimes" against civilian erlands ambassador and the Yu- goslav and, the Luxembourg min isters calling . attention to nazi slaying of hostages. Describing these as acts of des perate men, and promising tbat .thr.y would result in fearful: ret-' riDution, me president-snict me government of the United States had been receiving information of axis atrocities from numerous sources and would welcome more. When the United Nations achieve victory, he asserted, it is their purpose to make appro priate use of the amassed evi dence, The lime will come, Mr. Roo sevelt said, when the guilty per sons will have to stand up in courts of law in countries they now are oppressing and answer for their acts- Asked at his press conference whether he could commit the people of ravaged countries to acting through courts of law once "they got a chance" at their op pressors, the chief executive ad mitted probably he could not do so, but said he was expressing 9 hope that judicial processes would prevail. Mr. Roosevelt said he had heard of pleas from the oppress ed nations to give them one week at their subjugators, but that ho did not. approve. He said he thought persons of sober judgment would approve methods of judicial procedure because we do not wish to kill innocent people. FDR Signs Bill For Dependents' Pay Washington, Aug. 21 U.R President Roosevelt today sign ed legislation permitting the army and navy to begin immedi ate payments of allowances to dependents of men in the armed forces. The original law pro hibited the payments until No vember 1. The new bill does not require that payments start immediate ly. The war ' department has indicated that it may be unable to make payments before No vember 1, but the navy probably will begin payments soon. Portland Dimout Held Success Portland, Ore., Aug. 21 VP) Civilian defense officials, re viewing today the city's first dimout last night under Lieut. Gen. John L. DeWitt's rogula tions, reported that violations were few and minor. All advertising signs were dark but in the residential dis tricts the effects of the order were scarcely noticeable. President Gags Washington, Aug. 21 (IP) De claring heads of some govern ment agencies were talking loo much, President Roosevelt today directed all government admin istrators to refrain from public debate on controversial ques tions of policy and to stop criti cizing each other in such con troversies. Mr. Roosevelt said, that such airing of divergent opinions in the public '; press, were . being .seTizedytjpqn ...and' exploited by enemies ' of the United Nations. In identical letters to the heads of each department and agency, the president said: "Disagreements cither as to fact or policy should not be pub licly aired, but are to be sub mitted to me by the appropri ate heads of the conflicting agen cies. "The policy of the govern ment should be announced by me, as the responsible head thereof. Disagreements as to facts can be resolved, if neces sary, by Investigations and sur veys directed by me. "Will you please see to it that your particular department and its various bureaus and divisions comply with these instructions, "Where honest differences of opinion exist, no one would pro pose to suppress them," the president wrote. "Nor would anyone attempt to interfere with the free use by every public of ficial of the normal processes of information to the public and press. "But it is no solution to a controverted question to argue it out in public. If the agencies would refrain from resorting to public debate of this kind, they would have a good deal more time to attend to their business, and the nation would have a good deal more assurance that that business was being done right." Vichy Excited Over Attack Upon Dieppe Vichy, Aug. 21 (VP) Fcrnnnd Do Brinon, Vichy representative in Paris, told a French cabinet meeting today that the allies lost 3,500 men killed and 1,800 captured at Dieppe Wednesday. The majority were Canadians, with a few De Gaulle French De Brinon said. He came here to give the German report on the coastal raid. The German high command gave no figures on Silled cas ualties but said 2,005 prisoners were taken. Thero was no con firmation from any allied source of either claim. German dispatches - insisted the allied landing failed from the beginning and that German troops never had to enter into action because of the defense put up by German coastal guards alone. Other sources, however, in dicated that important destruc tions of coastal defenses were carried out, that the Germans suffered severe losses, and that Russians Hurl Germans Back Across the Don Defenders of Stalingrad Crush Nazi Drive Sky Troops Slain in Caucasus (Br the Associated Press) Bayonet - charging Russian troops were reported today to have slaughtered all but a few Germans who stormed across the Don river before Stalingrad for the second time in 12 hours, and soviet dispatches declared the invaders had suffered an other setback in bloody fighting south of the great Volga steel city. In the western Caucasus, sov iet dispatches said hundreds of nazi parachute troops descended on the steppes at the approaches to Novorossisk, Black sea naval base, only to be cut down by Kuban cossacks. Warships of the soviet Black sea fleet left Novorossisk base more than ; week ago. Sky Troops Slaughtered Dispatches said several hun dred sky troops were annihil ated in a two-hour battle west of Krasnador. German tanks and large infantry forces also were reported attempting to break through the northwest Caucasus foothills to the Black sea coast. A bulletin from the red army headquarters said Russian in fantrymen and tank crews, bat tling to . hold the- bend of the Don as a final barrier before Stalingrad, "almost completely annihilated an enemy group which crossed the river." "More than 500 Germans were killed," it said. The fighting centered in the Kletskaya - Kalach region, 50 miles west of Stalingrad.' Other nazi forces which crossed the river yesterday' were said to have boon wiped out. In Other Areas In the Kotclnikovski sector, 95 miles below Stalingrad, the Russians reported they had driv en back German tanks and mo torized infantry in a fight for a railway town after the invad ers had driven a wedge into soviet defenses. "The Hitlerites abandoned on the field hundreds of killed," the soviet command said. "More than 20 German tanks were de stroyed." Dispatches to the Russian gov ernment newspaper Izvestia said a great area was set aflame when nazi tanks hit a soviet minefield. Five German col umns of tanks and infantry wore reported moving behind aerial and artillery bombardment in a thrust from Kotclnikovski along the rail line to Stalingrad. In Caucasus In Ihe Caucasus, the Russians conceded new reverses as hard fighting soviet troops executed a further retreat south of Kras ' (Concluded on page 0, column 8) the raid demonstrated a bridge head could be established with a single division and held fur at least nine hours. De Brinon told French newspapermen the allies had "three or four di visions" aboard ships in addi tion to the one which landed. On the second day after the raid, Vichy still was pouring out accounts ad explanations and holding press conferences on the subject, which continued to occupy the main place In all French newspapers. The conferences were to sup port the official position, taken since yesterday ifternoon, that the landing really was an effort to i start a second front which failed after "ten months of care ful preparation." Makin Island Said Scene of Marines' Raid British Radio Reports Flying Fortresses At tacking Jap Warships (By the Assoclftted Press) The Japanese enemy reported today a landing attack by Unit ed States forces on Makin island in the Gilberts, 2,400 miles from Hawaii, and the wording of the communique aroused specula tion that the action had been a task force raid in strength. Imperial Japanese headquart ers said the landing was made by about 200 troops four days ago and that they were "com pletely repelled" by the Japan ese garrison. This, however, was the usual Japanese formula for beating the opponent to an nouncement of a Japanese re verse. Warships Attacked Meanwhile a British radio re port said American flying for tresses had made a large scale attack on Japanese warships off the Solomon islands. However, this report had received no elab oration after several hours and it appeared likely it was mere ly a restatement of General Mac- Arthur's communique of Thurs day, announcing such an attack on enemy naval units off Faisi, at the northern tip of -the Solo mons. Seized by the Japanese at the outset of the war, the former British-owned Gilbert islands lie on he equator, just below pow erful enemy bases in the Mar shall islands and 1,100 miles northeast of the Solomon is lands. Seeking Jap Fleet Such a raid presumably would be little more than a commando thrust to test out the enemy's defenses. In the 18-day-old battle of the Solomons, Gen. Douglas MacAr thur's air scouts searched the vast island-dotted south seas in quest of Japanese naval activ ity amid reports that the enemy was massing new strength for a counter-blow against U. S. ma rines in the Tulagi area. A navy communique announc ed last night that the marines now were engaged in mopping up remnants of Japanese garri son troops on islands "recently captured" at the eastern end of the 900-milc-long archipelago. (Concluded on pane 0, column 1) Nazi Troops Sent To Africa Ankara, Turkey, Aug. 21 (U.R) Balkan reports said today that an estimated 50,000 German troops have been moved by sea and air transport from Greece to the North African front and the island of Crete. The reports, which indicated that the Germans were organ izing for a resumption of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel's axis drive in the Egyptian desert, were brought hero by travelers and were corroborated to some extent by intelligence reports. Largo forces of German troops, both infantry and mechanized and totaling two or three divi sions, were said to be moving into Greece from Germany over the Belgradc-Nish railroad as well as through Rumania and Bulgaria to replace troops shift ed to North Africa and Crete. The reinforcement of the axis forces on Crete, an important axis air base, might mean that the Germans arc preparing to use large parachute forces ag ainst the British in North Af rica. British Town Bombed Folkestone, England, Aug. 21 (P) Two German planes bomb ed and machine-gunned the streets of a small southeast coast town at noon today, hitting a theatre and some other build ings. A number of casualties resulted. I
