Chapter 8
“AIM OF PRESIDENT IS WAR”
August–November 1941
A s the crisis in Russia and in the Atlantic deepened, the chances of keeping the United States out of the conflict seemed slim. American public opinion on the issue, however, remained divided. When a survey of all the nation’s newspaper publishers and editors was conducted to find out their views on immediate war, the 871 replies were two to one against U.S. entry.
Roosevelt edged closer to belligerency when on August 9, at Placentia Bay in Newfoundland, aboard the American cruiser Augusta, he met Churchill face-to-face to discuss the future of the war. The press were held at bay until the public announcement on August 14 of a communiqué from the historic meeting, which has been known ever since as the Atlantic Charter. The two leaders pledged their countries to reestablish democracy and national self-determination throughout the war zones. No formal military commitment was made by the United States, but it was plain for all the world to see that Roosevelt had thrown his political and moral weight behind the efforts of the Allied powers. Hitler reacted angrily to the announcement and assumed that American intervention was only a matter of time. The Japanese poured scorn on a statement that challenged their right to an Asian empire. Churchill was glad they had forged the joint agreement but he doubted whether it would mean immediate American entry into the war.
On the other side of the world, the vast contest in the Soviet Union, along a front of a thousand miles, grew fiercer as the Red Army battled to keep the enemy away from the Russian heartland. By September, Leningrad was surrounded, but not captured. A siege began that was to see the death of up to a million people over the following two years. The war news from both sides presented as rosy a picture as possible, but there was no disguising the slow Soviet retreat. On September 19 Kiev surrendered to the Germans and Soviet forces suffered 527,000 casualties. On September 30 Hitler launched Operation Typhoon, aimed at capturing Moscow, the Soviet capital. The Soviet government left the city to go to Kuibyshev, farther east, to safety. Hitler flew to Berlin where he boasted before an ecstatic crowd that the Soviet dragon was slain and would never rise again.
The Nazi regime was already planning to ship German Jews to the East, where, unbeknownst to most people in the West, hundreds of thousands of Soviet Jewish men, women and children had already been killed by SS murder squads. The German high command thought there were few Soviet reserves left and expected Stalin to sue for peace, as the French had done in 1940, so that the harsh racial empire could be built. But the winter was approaching and time, as Hanson Baldwin wrote in The Times, was a key factor in war.
For the United States the greater crisis remained in the Pacific. The Times reported on September 21 that negotiations between the Americans and the Japanese were at “a virtual standstill.” The British continued to express confidence in their major base at Singapore as a barrier to sudden Japanese expansion, but the news from Asia had a new edge of menace to it. The isolationists remained committed to American neutrality and continued to condemn Roosevelt’s foreign policy, though with Japan there was little hope of rational compromise.
In late September Senator Gerald Nye announced at a dinner of the Steuben Society, a group of American citizens of German heritage, that the “aim of the President is war.” Outside, protesters gathered bearing placards that read, “Der Fuehrer thanks you for your many services!” The news of German success continued to pour in from the Russian steppes to the gray seas of the Atlantic. The Times’s tone was unmistakable: “U-Boats Roam Sea with a New Fury”; “Germans Smash On.” But the crisis was to come not from Europe but thousands of miles away in the central Pacific.
AUGUST 1, 1941
NEWSPAPERS OPPOSE OUR ENTRY INTO WAR
2 to 1 Against It, A Survey by Editor and Publisher Shows
The daily newspapers of the country in a proportion of more than two to one oppose immediate participation by the United States in the war, it was announced yesterday by Editor and Publisher as a result of a survey made by the magazine that will be published in its issue tomorrow.
A questionnaire was sent to the 1,878 dailies listed in the magazine’s international year book, and 871 replies were received. Of these, 615 opposed active military and naval participation, 250 favored such action and the rest failed to reply. The magazine commented that the survey demonstrated that “the majority of editors are opposed to United States participation in a European war, now or in the future, assuming the continuance of the present situation of the United States in relation to the warring nations.”
“However, there is no doubt but that this opinion would change overnight following an overt act on the part of any of the Axis powers,” it continued.
A majority of editors also held, the survey showed, that the United States, in its own strategic interests, should seize bases owned by foreign powers. Majorities also favored Federal laws regulating commodity prices and compelling arbitration in labor disputes. 
AUGUST 7, 1941
NAZIS DEPICT HAVOC
Claim 895,000 Prisoners and Vast Materiel in ‘Destructive’ Feats
By C. BROOKS PETERS
By Telephone to The New York Times.
BERLIN, Aug. 6 —After weeks of almost absolute silence on the course of the invasion of Russia, the Supreme Command of the German armed forces released at noon today a series of special communiqués, partly recapitulating the results of the operations on the Eastern Front from the break through the Stalin Line announced on July 12 up to the present.
Aside from reporting on the total losses in men and equipment suffered by the Soviet since the invasion began on June 22, however, today’s series of announcements added little to the information previously revealed about the present positions of the opposing armies. Moreover, they neither asserted, as did the special announcement released on July 2, that another “decision of world political import” had been forced, nor implied that the definite defeat of the Russian Army was imminent.
Russian prisoners in one of the first German concentration camps in Soviet territory, July 1941.
The German Claims and Russian Counter-Claims: In a series of special communiques yesterday the Nazi High Command reported in the progress of its drives for Leningrad, Moscow and Kiev. Arrows indicate the extent of the advances credited to the German spearheads; numbered squares show where the Russians claim to be fighting. In their drives for Leningrad (1) the Nazis say they have pierced the Stalin Line, captured Pskov, Porkhov and Kholm and pushed north up both sides of Lake Peipus; the Russians report they are standing firm in Northern Estonia (5), counter-attacking near Porkhov (6) and beating off Nazi assaults around Kholm (7). The Germans say the battle of Smolensk (2) has been victoriously concluded; the Russians assert they still hold Smolensk and are counter-attacking from Orsha to Dorogobuzh (8). On the Kiev front (3), according to the Nazis, they are successfully continuing a battle of encirclement; Moscow, however, says Nazi spearheads at Korosten and Byelaya Tserkov (9) have been smashed. In the far south (4), Berlin declares, German and Rumanian troops have reconquered all Bessarabia and pushed northeast across the central Dniester to join the forces from the north.
Since June 22, the Germans declared, the Russians have suffered the following losses in man power and materiel captured or destroyed: 895,000 prisoners, 13,145 tanks, 10,388 pieces of artillery and 9,082 planes. The number of Soviet killed or wounded is officially said to be “many times” the number captured, but authoritative military quarters refused to explain whether that meant more than twice the number captured.
Informed German quarters, however, estimated that between 2,500,000 and 3,00,000 Russians have been killed or wounded. Thus the total loss in effectives is estimated here to be between 3,500,000 and 4,000,000.
The Russian census figure of 1939 gives the total population of the U.S.S.R.—without the annexed Finnish, Baltic and southeastern territories—at around 170,000,000. Allowing three divisions for each million of the population, the Russians may have some 510 divisions. If each division totals 25,000 men, the total Soviet force would be 12,750,000. Other neutral sources have estimated the Russian military potential at 17,500,000 men.
Therefore, if the Red Army losses are already between 3,500,000 and 4,000,000, this would be between one-fifth and one-third of the total strength in manpower. Conservative informed German quarters, however, declare merely that most of the Russian forces that had been deployed at the outbreak of hostilities have been defeated. Step by step, they add, the Russians are approaching destruction.
SILENT ON GERMAN LOSSES
The Germans did not make a single reference to their own losses on the Eastern Front. In recapitulating the double battle of Bialystok and Minsk they asserted that their losses were “happily small.” Informed quarters declared that, “relative to enemy casualties, Reich losses were small.”
The last of today’s series of announcements asserted that several factors had made it possible that the “tremendously armed Soviet forces could be beaten.” This is interpreted to refer to the forces already defeated and not to the entire Russian armed forces. The Supreme Command declared that a new phase of the operations had begun.
Particularly interesting is the statement that it has been possible for the Germans to restore rail connections in the territory occupied. They declare the rail system is functioning to its full extent almost as far as the fighting zones.
The five communiqués were read in unbroken succession over a national hook-up. The introduction admitted that the German population had misinterpreted the long silence of the Supreme Command. But, it added, this had been necessary because the Russians’ communications did not give them an accurate picture of the fighting front. Now, however, the “just” wish of the German people to be informed daily of the newest developments could be fulfilled.
AUGUST 14, 1941
NEW ‘DUNKERQUE’ IS SEEN AT ODESSA
ALL FRONTS UNDER STTACK
By C. BROOKS PETERS
By Telephone to The New York Times.
BERLIN, Aug. 13 —According to official German reports, the German armed forces are successfully attacking on all fronts in the Russian theatre of war, including the sector east of Kiev, and are making particularly rapid headway in the Southern Ukraine.
There German and allied motorized units and infantry divisions are said to be still pursuing Soviet forces that are retreating southward. The Russians are being pushed into their Black Sea ports, the Germans declare, and thus may be trapped with that body of water at their backs and no possibility of escape eastward across the Dnieper River.
According to German reports, it begins to appear probable that sizable Soviet forces may face a new Dunkerque between Odessa and Ochakov—that is, be barred from all save sea lines of escape. To what extent the Russian Black Sea Fleet and air force will be able to evacuate troops from harbors in the Southern Ukraine may be seen within the next few days, it is remarked here.
TOLL ON SHIPPING CLAIMED
In fact, informed Berlin quarters declare the pressure on the Russians in this sector already is so great that the Soviet command is trying to evacuate forces trapped in Odessa and ship them to the Crimea. According to these quarters, the German Air Force has taken measures to hinder this evacuation and has sunk 22,100 tons of transport shipping and two destroyers in this region, in addition to damaging a vessel of 4,000 tons.
The Russians, it is said, have begun to use lighters to evacuate their forces. This, informed quarters add, suggests another Dunkerque, but they express doubt that the Russians are able to effect as successful a retreat as the British did across the English Channel last year.
The retreat southward in the Ukraine appears to be general, according to German reports. The only engagements mentioned are with rear-guard units that are trying to slow down the German pursuit sufficiently to enable the Soviet units to retire in order. In these encounters, the Germans officially declare, the Russians are suffering heavy losses in men and equipment.
Today, according to the official news agency D.N.B., the attacks of the German air arm were directed chiefly and with particular intensity against “crossings” over the southern reaches of the Dnieper. These “crossings” are said to be jammed because of the size of the forces trying to escape.
GERMAN BOMBERS ACTIVE
In the southern sector German bombers are credited with having destroyed yesterday 240 motor vehicles, eight tanks, two armored trains and stretches of railway. Along the entire front the Germans claim to have destroyed 184 planes, 121 in dogfights and sixty-three on the ground, with the loss of only three of their own planes.
In the center of the Eastern Front the Germans report that encircled Soviet units frantically attempted yesterday to escape from the pocket in which they are held. No indication is given of the present geographical stand in this sector, but the Germans declare the Russians suffered heavy losses there yesterday.
In the north, the Germans assert, bombs from their planes destroyed various stretches of the Leningrad-Moscow railway. In the same sector attacks are said to have been repulsed with the loss of eighteen Russian tanks. Counter-attacks by the Germans are reported to have been successful and ten additional tanks and thirty-two pieces of artillery are said to have been destroyed.
South of Lake Ilmen the 103d Russian Infantry Regiment is said to have been encircled and, except for a few prisoners, annihilated.
AUGUST 15, 1941
The Official Statement
By The United Press.
WASHINGTON, Aug. 14 —The text of the official statement on the Roosevelt-Churchill meeting follows:
The President of the United States and the Prime Minister, Mr. Churchill, representing His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom, have met at sea.
They have been accompanied by officials of their two governments, including high-ranking officers of their military, naval and air services.
The whole problem of the supply of munitions of war, as provided by the Lease-Lend Act, for the armed forces of the United States and for those countries actively engaged in resisting aggression has been further examined.
Lord Beaverbrook, the Minister of Supply of the British Government, has joined in these conferences. He is going to proceed to Washington to discuss further details with appropriate officials of the United States Government. These conferences will also cover the supply problems of the Soviet Union.
The President and the Prime Minister have had several conferences. They have considered the dangers to world civilization arising from the policies of military domination by conquest upon which the Hitlerite government of Germany and other governments associated therewith have embarked, and have made clear the steps which their countries are respectively taking for their safety in the face of these dangers.
They have agreed upon the following joint declaration:
The President of the United States of America and the Prime Minister, Mr. Churchill, representing His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom, being met together, deem it right to make known certain common principles in the national policies of their respective countries on which they base their hopes for a better future for the world.
President Roosevelt, left, with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill aboard the HMS Prince of Wales, during their Atlantic Meeting in August 1941.
FIRST, their countries seek no aggrandizement, territorial or other;
SECOND, they desire to see no territorial changes that do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the peoples concerned;
THIRD, they respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live; and they wish to see sovereign rights and self-government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of them;
FOURTH, they will endeavor, with due respect for their existing obligations, to further the enjoyment by all States, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity;
FIFTH, they desire to bring about the fullest collaboration between all nations in the economic field with the object of securing, for all, improved labor standards, economic adjustment and social security;
SIXTH, after the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny, they hope to see established a peace which will afford to all nations the means of dwelling in safety within their own boundaries, and which will afford assurance that all the men in all the lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want;
SEVENTH, such a peace should enable all men to traverse the high seas and oceans without hindrance;
EIGHTH, they believe that all of the nations of the world, for realistic as well as spiritual reasons, must come to the abandonment of the use of force. Since no future peace can be maintained if land, sea or air armaments continue to be employed by nations which threaten, or may threaten, aggression outside of their frontiers, they believe, pending the establishment of a wider and permanent system of general security, that the disarmament of such nations is essential. They will likewise aid and encourage all other practicable measures which will lighten for peace-loving peoples the crushing burden of armaments.
Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Winston S. Churchill.
AUGUST 15, 1941
JAPANESE SCORN THE EIGHT POINTS
Roosevelt-Churchill Plan Is ‘Nothing New’ And Besides It Is ‘Too Late,’ They Hold
TOKYO, Aug. 15 (UP) —The joint declaration yesterday by President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill “contains nothing new,” and even if their eight points for a new world order could be enforced they are “now too late,” authorized quarters said today.
Tokyo was most interested in the fourth point of the “Anglo-American bloc”—the one concerning trade and equality of access to world supplies of raw materials—but its language was denounced as “vague” and “noncommittal.” In this point, it was said, lies the “whole cause of the present world struggle.”
Japan, it was added, has reason to know that London and Washington never have been able to envisage economic equality on the part of any “have-not nation,” and Japan will be unwilling to believe that President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill intend, or will be able in the future, to give this country “an equal chance in world markets.”
REVERSAL IS SEEN
It is strange, an informed source said, to hear two nations that for years jealously have guarded the bulk of the world’s wealth both in raw materials and consuming markets now talking of a new era of economic equality.
Newspapers considered the Roosevelt-Churchill declaration of less importance than German reports of victories on the Ukraine front in the war against Russia. The Russo-German conflict remains the key to the international situation, Nichi Nichi said, and Japan must not “relax her watchfulness for a single moment.”
The small ultra-Nationalist newspaper Kokumin, commenting on the Roosevelt-Churchill declaration, asserted that Britain was in her last struggle to preserve the status quo in the Far East, but would fail because of Japan’s “immutable determination to establish a new order in East Asia regardless of British-American plots and manoeuvres.” A reckless attitude on the part of London and Washington, this newspaper said, will “only push the Far Eastern situation into a more dangerous stage.”
“Americans should realize their laughable folly in playing into British hands,” it added.
If the Roosevelt-Churchill declaration serves any purpose at all, Kokumin declared, it will be to “mark a turning point for an intensified Axis offensive.”
AUGUST 15, 1941
WIDE ACCLAIM HERE FOR ‘EIGHT POINTS’
Hailed as the ‘Mein Kampf’ of Democracy and Blueprint for a New Order
The Roosevelt-Churchill declaration was generally hailed by organizations and individuals here yesterday as a blueprint for a democratic “new order,” as a “victory code” and as “the ‘Mein Kampf’ of democracy.”
A dissenting opinion was expressed, however, by John T. Flynn, chairman of the New York Chapter of the America First Committee. He characterized the declaration as “a lot of words—a cover-up statement.”
Clark M. Eichelberger, acting chairman of the Committee to Defend America, said the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of Great Britain “have raised the curtain of the future and have given the world the general principles of the world order which a democratic victory will make possible.”
Speaking for Fight for Freedom, Inc., the Right Rev. Henry W. Hobson, Protestant Episcopal Bishop of the Southern Ohio Diocese and national chairman of the organization, said the eight points of the joint declaration were “our victory code,” but that it could be put into effect only “after we start shooting at the enemy of all mankind.”
FLYNN VOICES SKEPTICISM
Mr. Flynn, in a statement issued from the offices of the America First Committee here, asserted that President Roosevelt and Mr. Churchill “didn’t meet to draw up a statement such as they issued.”
“They should be frank and tell the American people why they did meet and what they actually decided to do,” he said. “What the American people would like to know is what Churchill demanded and what Roosevelt promised.
“All of their words about all the peoples in the world naming their own kind of government is meaningless unless it applies to such countries as India, Indo-China, the Dutch Indies, British Malaya, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland.”
Speaking as an individual, Bishop William T. Manning said the declaration “cements the fellowship between our country and other English-speaking nations,” and that it “unites us irrevocably with them for the overthrow of tyranny and aggression and for the maintenance of justice and human liberty.”
ANTI-NAZI LEADERS’ VIEWS
James H. Sheldon, chairman of the board of directors of the Anti-Nazi League, who called the declaration the ‘Mein Kampf’ of democracy, said it would go down in history as “a 1941 Declaration of Independence, written on behalf of the oppressed peoples of the world.” He said the eight points comprised “a strategy of democracy against the Nazi strategy of terror.”
The Rev. A. J. Muste, secretary of the Fellowship of Reconciliation, said the declaration was not reassuring to those who “recall how completely the Idealistic Wilson–Lloyd George statements of the last war failed to justify the hopes which they aroused.” Asserting that the declaration would lead to “another Versailles,” he said that “World War III will spring as surely out of World War II as it did out of World War I.”
NAZIS IN KEY CITIES
RUSSIANS GIVE UP GOMEL
By C. BROOKS PETERS
By Telephone to The New York Times.
BERLIN, Aug. 21 —Considerable gains in all sectors of the Russian front are claimed by the German High Command today.
In the Southern Ukraine, Kherson, Dnieper River port southeast of Nikolaev, was captured by Elite Guard troops, according to the communiqué.
In the Gomel sector, about midway between Smolensk and Kiev, the advance continues beyond the city, probably southward along the Dnieper in a drive to flank Kiev, the capital of the Ukraine.
On the northern wing Novgorod, Kingisepp and Narwa have been taken, and therewith the drive to cut the vital Leningrad-Moscow railroad has been brought within forty miles of its goal, it is asserted.
TWO-MONTH GAINS TALLIED
Units of the German Air Force rained bombs on Odessa and Ochakov, from which Black Sea ports Russian soldiers are being evacuated on ships. One transport of 6,000 tons is reported to have been sunk in this “super-Dunkerque.” Three other large vessels, one of which was a 15,000-ton passenger ship, were damaged, according to the official news agency D.N.B.
German troops are ferried across the Dnieper River after having set fire to Mogilev, Belarus, July 1941.
Two months ago tomorrow, on June 22, the Germans began their invasion of Russia. In this period, authoritative military quarters here report, about 5,000,000 Russians have been killed, wounded or captured. The number of prisoners is said to total more than 1,200,000, so that, according to German casualty estimates, the Soviet has lost nearly 3,800,000 dead and wounded.
[A Russian communiqué this morning admitted the abandonment of Gomel, and an earlier Soviet statement told of a “direct threat” to Leningrad. A Soviet spokesman said, however, that in the eight weeks of the conflict the Germans had lost nearly 2,000,000 men in dead and wounded, and that the Russians would win eventually whether the war lasted for “months or years.”]
In addition, 14,000 pieces of artillery of all calibers, 14,000 tanks and more than 11,000 planes are said to have been captured or destroyed.
SPRING FIGHTING WEIGHED
The Germans definitely have the upper hand in the fighting, informed quarters assert, although it cannot yet be said that a decision in the war has been reached. The Soviet officers’ corps has suffered heavily, these circles add, which increases the Russians’ problem for future resistance.
Since the single important strategic consideration of the present stage of the invasion is to cripple the Russians’ powers of resistance so badly that they cannot revive it by next Spring, the capturing of cities is a minor consideration, informed circles say.
Moscow, for example, probably will “remain in the rear of our troops for some time,” they declare. Leningrad, moreover, is a fortress, they add, and may not be stormed, but merely surrounded.
To Marshal Klementy Voroshiloff’s appeal to the residents of Leningrad to arm and prepare to resist the threat to their city, the Germans reply that should they attack the city and the Russians employ the franc tireur method, they should recall Warsaw and compare the latter city with unscathed Paris and Brussels.
AUGUST 28, 1941
NEW IRAN REGIME ENDS RESISTANCE
British and Russian Forces Continue Advance—Offers by Teheran Awaited
By JAMES MacDONALD
Special Cable to The New York Times.
LONDON, Aug. 28 —An announcement that the new Iranian Government, formed yesterday, had issued orders to its forces to “cease fire” was received simultaneously in London and other European capitals today via the Teheran radio, and was regarded here as most welcome.
At the same time it was emphasized in London circles that British and Russian troops would continue to advance through the country. Officials of both countries are waiting to see what offers will be made by the new Iranian Government, headed by Ali Furanghi, with regard to various aspects of the general situation, including expulsion of Nazis still in Iran and safeguards against any creeping back into the country. Although the expulsion of Nazi technicians and others from Iran was one avowed cause of the Russo-British entry into the country, one of the underlying aims of both invaders was to establish direct land communication with each other, as well as to keep the rich oil fields from falling into German hands.
EXPECT FORCES TO MEET
In welcoming the Iranian order to “cease fire,” some persons in London pointed out that further opposition on the part of the Iranian forces in the large and mountainous country would not only have caused serious bloodshed but would have been useless from a practical point of view.
The British and the Russian forces will now be enabled to extend their control of communication lines speedily toward vital objectives via the trans-Iranian railroad and the Teheran-Tabriz road. It is assumed in unofficial quarters that the British and the Russian forces will continue to advance until they have met and thereby solidified communication lines and established protection for the oil lines.
Before the Teheran radio’s announcement, news reached London that there had been an order for general mobilization. This made it appear that ultimate Anglo-Russian occupation would not be readily accepted. In the light of later developments, this order was interpreted merely as meaning that Iranian men of military age were to be brought under control at a moment of crisis.
As an example of the futility of Iranian resistance it was pointed out that in less than twenty-four hours British forces had taken control of the world’s largest oil refinery plant at Abadan, had captured the entire Iranian Navy, had seized the strategic wireless station at Muhammereh and had trapped several Axis merchant ships in the harbor at Bandar Shahpur. Moreover, a column of troops had advanced from Khaniqin, Iraq, to Shahabad, Iran—a distance of about 100 miles—in less than three days.
STATEMENT BY PREMIER
The Teheran radio’s announcement, as picked up in London, quoted the new Premier as saying that the government would do its utmost to maintain good relations with foreign powers, “and especially our neighbors,” and continue to have peace with the rest of the world.
“In order that these intentions should be made clear to the world at large,” the Premier said, “we declare at this moment, when the governments of Soviet Russia and Britain have ordered certain actions to be taken, that the Government of Iran, in pursuance of the peace-loving policy of His Majesty, is issuing orders to all armed forces of the country to refrain from any resistance so that the causes for bloodshed and disturbance of security shall be removed and public peace and security assured.”
AUGUST 31, 1941
BOOM IN STRAW SHOES
Nazi Industry Is Unable to Fill Orders for Footwear
By Telephone to The New York Times.
BERLIN, Aug. 30 —Shoes of straw, last year a novelty for children, are now being demanded in such quantities that the new “industry” is unable to fill all orders.
Made of a very close weave of straw, the shoes are said to be waterproof. They are lined with cloth and thin leather and their arches are braced with light metal spans. They last about a year but must be resoled every four to six weeks. A pair costs 16.50 marks.
Experiments for the manufacture of shoes from the bark of trees are also being made, but thus far have met with little success. The sale of leather shoes to the public was drastically limited at the beginning of this Summer.
TOKYO STILL FIRM
Japanese Are Insisting on Special Status in the Far East
By FRANK L. KLUCKHORN
Special to The New York Times.
HYDE PARK, N.Y., Sept. 20 —Negotiations with Japan looking toward a settlement of Japanese-American relations have reached a virtual standstill, although they are being kept open in the hope of effecting an eventual settlement, it was reported on good authority today.
Japan’s insistence upon terms that would give the Japanese considerable control in China and the unwillingness of Secretary of State Cordell Hull to depart from his insistence that Japan should have no special status in East Asia are understood to have caused negotiations to bog down for the moment at least.
Meanwhile, more than half of the United States Navy is forced to remain in the Pacific at a time when it is operating against German and Italian submarine, surface and air raiders in the Atlantic. It is feared the reverses suffered by Russia in the Ukraine and around Leningrad will encourage Japan and increase the difficulties in the way of a settlement of the Far Eastern situation.
According to reliable diplomatic sources, Secretary Hull’s insistence that Japan drop her plans to obtain a privileged status in China, and his refusal to talk detailed terms until the Japanese altered their present attitude, led to the decision of Prince Fumimaro Konoye, Japanese Premier, to attempt to negotiate directly with President Roosevelt.
The President, however, has consulted constantly with the Secretary of State on the matter and, according to the information available, neither this government nor the Japanese has to this point softened its position. The President told reporters yesterday that he was in constant touch with Mr. Hull even when he was at Hyde Park.
Mr. Roosevelt has not made public any reply to the letter received from Prince Konoye, and in his press conference yesterday hinted strongly that there had been no recent developments regarding Japan. The Japanese Embassy in Washington revealed last week, however, that one of its staff was on the way from Tokyo to the United States by way of Peru because Japanese ships do not now travel to American ports. It was thought likely that he was bringing new instructions from his government.
Prince Fumimaro Konoye of Japan. Rebuffed by Secretary of State Cordell Hull, he sought direct contact with President Roosevelt.
At the moment, however, American trade with Japan is virtually at a standstill and American embargoes on shipments to Japan have increased sharply the economic pressure under which the Japanese are laboring.
THREAT IN PACIFIC IS FEARED
Should the German Army continue to be victorious against the Soviet armies, and Tokyo come to believe a Nazi victory over the Russians is inevitable, it is widely feared that Japan will tighten her Axis bonds and move north or south, thus threatening the United States with simultaneous naval struggles in the Atlantic and Pacific.
There is every reason to believe that President Roosevelt is still giving considerable personal attention to this two-ocean threat, which may become more acute at any moment. No doubt exists, however, that this government was encouraged to believe that the recent Japanese governmental shake-up, with the Emperor taking personal control of a large part of the military establishment, was forced by economic pressure on the part of this country. But the best information available here is that a solution of difficulties is unlikely unless Japan softens her attitude.
While no specific proposed terms for a settlement have been made public, it is reported that Japan seeks to maintain control of the Chinese treaty ports and the four Northern Provinces of China and to maintain “token” military garrisons in some other parts of China. In exchange, it is reported, Japan is willing to withdraw from French Indo-China and give up any idea of southward conquest. Although these terms may not be exactly correct, in a general way, diplomatic sources believe, they give a reliable idea of the Japanese position.
Equally reliable sources report this government is unwilling to come to terms with Japan at the expense of China, but will go so far as to give Japan economic aid and restore trade to a normal basis if Japan is prepared to eschew conquest by force.
SEPTEMBER 21, 1941
AIM OF PRESIDENT IS WAR, NYE SAYS
Urges ‘All Loyal Americans’ to Oppose Foreign Policy
Senator Gerald P. Nye appealed last night to “all loyal Americans” to oppose President Roosevelt’s foreign policy program of all-out aid to nations fighting against Nazi Germany on the ground that it represented a deliberate attempt by the President and British leaders to involve this country against its will in the war.
Speaking at the annual dinner of the Steuben Society of America, held at the Hotel Biltmore, Senator Nye, a leading member of the Congressional isolationist bloc, contended that the United States was “still at peace with the world” and that national unity here was impossible of achievement as long as the President and his supporters continued to uphold their foreign policy.
One thousand members of the society attended the dinner and applauded Senator Nye’s speech. Although a heavy police guard was on duty within and outside the hotel, no disorders occurred during the evening.
“Americans, when America is at stake, will give every ounce and every measure of unity that an intelligent people can and will afford,” Senator Nye asserted. “But that unity can be invited only by frankness; that unity can never be won on the issue of hunting and building a war for America.”
“I insist that the manner in which the President has brought our country to the peril of involvement in war is not a thing inviting of ‘unity’ however great may be the desire to afford loyalty to one’s government. There is a thing to which none can shut their eyes; namely, that so long as the present situation in the world remains only what it is today, never, never, never can there be unity in America on the issue of asking ourselves into these foreign wars.”
As Senator Nye spoke in the grand ballroom to the members of the society, which is composed of Americans of German descent, the outside of the hotel was picketed by representatives of the Fight for Freedom Committee, the American Youth Congress and several other organizations in protest against the Senator’s isolationist stand.
Senator Gerald P. Nye
These pickets carried placards which read: “‘Der Fuehrer thanks you for your many services,’ Senator Nye.” The Fight for Freedom Committee and other organizations had urged Theodore Hoffman, society president, to permit a speaker expressing an opposite viewpoint to Senator Nye to be heard at the dinner “in fairness to loyal Americans of German descent.” But the request was declined.
Throughout the night a heavy detail of police was on hand at the hotel to prevent any possible disorder. Commanded by Deputy Chief Inspector John J. De Martino, the police, 175 strong, permitted the pickets to parade before the hotel, but chased away curious passersby who sought to congregate in front of the building.
Theodore H. Hoffman, president of the Steuben Society, in a message printed in the dinner program, declared that the members of his organization resented the attempt of “professional agitators, certain newspapers and certain commentators to brand the American of German ancestry as being un-American or fifth columnist.”
“Americans of Germanic extraction do not want communism, fascism, nazism or British imperialism,” he said. “They believe in only one ism and that is Americanism. The aims and principles of our society teach us to have faith in our country, faith in our form of government and faith in the principles on which our government was founded.”
SEPTEMBER 21, 1941
KIEV MOPPED UP, NAZIS ANNOUNCE
By C. BROOKS PETERS
By Telephone to The New York Times.
BERLIN, Sept. 20 —Surrender of the Kiev garrison, mopping up operations in the Ukrainian capital and progress in liquidation of 200,000 Russians trapped in the triangle between Kiev, Priluki and Kremenchug to the east were featured in today’s German Supreme Command communiqué. Desperate Russian attempts to break out of the trap were declared thwarted in every instance.
Kiev’s conquerors were said to be pushing east past Poltava, while attention shifted to the Baltic front, where two islands were reported taken in a drive to clear the sea approaches to Leningrad.
[The Associated Press transmitted a D.N.B. report that a “very heavy” air attack was carried out yesterday against Leningrad and Soviet troops encircled in the city’s defense zone.
A number of fires were started in the city and anti-aircraft positions, supply centers and barracks were hard hit, the dispatch said. The main force of the Luftwaffe’s attacks, however, was said to have been directed against Russian artillery positions and bunkers.]
AIMS HELD ACHIEVED
Tomorrow the German invasion of Russia enters its fifteenth week. In the opinion of informed Berlin quarters, the major portions of the German plan of operations in the East have already been fulfilled. The objective of the German leadership is said here to encompass explicitly the destruction of Russian resources for resistance in five ways:
By continuing to attack the Russian reservoir of men, which in former wars was regarded as inexhaustible, until all trained soldiers had been captured or killed.
By destroying or capturing as much of the Soviet’s available war materiel as possible.
By so weakening Soviet industrial potential that the Russians are no longer competent to carry on effective large-scale operations.
By destroying Russian lines of communication, particularly through the use of the German Air Force, making cooperation between the war industry and fighting units at the front difficult, when not impossible.
By Luftwaffe air raids on political centers, making it extremely difficult for the Russians effectively to administer their country, thus placing a tremendous strain upon attempts to continue a centralized direction for the war.
The concentrated attack on Kiev, it is stated, began last Wednesday. Yesterday morning the citadel with its arsenal and barracks was taken by storm. Throughout the remainder of the day one portion of the city after another was cleaned up and occupied, says today’s communiqué.
The Russians are reported to have made elaborate preparations for defending Kiev in street fighting. Civilian formations and N.K.V.D. [Soviet secret police] regiments, according to D.N.B., erected barricades, tank traps and other obstacles in the streets. All these measures, however, are said to have been rendered fruitless by the suddenness and speed of the German attack from the north and south.
DONETS DRIVE WELL STARTED
Following the successful German operations in the Kiev sector, all of the Northern Ukraine appears already lost to the Russians. In the drive on Kharkov and the Donets Basin the Nazi legions are already beyond Poltava, which they captured Thursday.
German vanguard units are thus already less than seventy-five miles from Kharkov. Therewith the threat to the entire Eastern Ukraine has become acute, it is emphasized.
Crimea is believed entirely to be cut off from land connections with the north by the Nazi thrust on Perekop. How deeply the German forces have already penetrated into this peninsula on their drive to Sevastopol is not revealed. The attack is believed to be in constant motion, however, and official information from this sector may be expected in the near future.
SEPTEMBER 24, 1941
NAZIS TO BANISH JEWS FAILING TO WEAR STAR
Prison Camp To Be Punishment Even for Children’s Laxity
BERLIN, Sept. 22 (AP) —Thirty-five provisions on the required wearing of the Star of David by Jews have been communicated to the Jewish Central Council to clear up uncertainties as to when and how the star, first required last Friday, must be displayed.
The Jews were informed it must be worn where it may be seen every moment a Jew is outside his own home. It is not sufficient to have a star affixed to a coat or topcoat. If a Jew steps into his yard in his shirtsleeves, he must have a star on his shirt.
By Nazi edict, German Jews were forced to wear the Star of David.
If a Gentile rings his doorbell, the Jew must wear the star when he opens the door. Jews who hide the star by covering it with a briefcase or shopping bag in the streets may be sent to concentration camps.
[Usually reliable sources said a sentence to a concentration camp was the standard punishment for violation of these regulations, The United Press reported. Parents and guardians were said to be liable to punishment for violations by children.]
Jews are barred from railway waiting rooms or station restaurants unless they have written permission to leave the city and have purchased tickets. Jews without written permission may not use taxicabs, hospital cars or first-aid trucks.
Two “non-Aryan” Catholic priests in Cologne are wearing Stars of David on their cassocks.
SEPTEMBER 28, 1941
RUSSIANS MAKE READY FOR WINTER CAMPAIGN
They Believe Their Chances Then Will Be Much Better Than The Germans’
By CYRUS L. SULZBERGER
Wireless to The New York Times.
WITH THE RED ARMY ON THE CENTRAL FRONT, Sept. 27 —“This is a war of blitz grinding. On a large part of the front the German troops already are digging in. What lies ahead of them is trench warfare, the mud of Russian roads and Winter.” Such is the opinion of Lieut. Gen. Vassily Sokolovsky, one of the Red Army’s ablest generals on the central sector. It is his belief that, as has already occurred along most of the length of that front where Marshal Timoshenko is operating, stabilization of the fighting lines will soon come about in both north and south.
According to General Sokolovsky, the Russian soldier will have a tremendous advantage as soon as this situation is established. The German Army will have lost its hitting power when its manoeuvrability is obviated by terrible road conditions. German morale, he believes, will be cracked with the shattering of the Blitzkrieg tradition.
WEATHER AS ALLY
How accurate these predictions will prove the next few months can demonstrate. The Nazis already are sending sheepskin-lined coats to the front, as shown by tattered garments in reconquered central trenches. The Russians, however, are confident the invaders won’t be able to face the climatic rigors for long.
Whatever should prove to be the case—and in this respect it may be recalled that difficulties of climate or terrain facing the Germans in other campaigns of this war have been habitually exaggerated—the Red Army is making ready for Winter and organizing thoroughly for a long struggle in which it is hoped Hitler’s war machine will not only be ground to a stop but entirely disintegrated.
These preparations may be divided into three categories—those of the rear, those behind the front area and those of the front itself. The first include such essential steps as opening new trade routes to Iran whence Allied matériel may arrive, the continued moving eastward of important quantities of machinery from threatened areas in order to maintain sufficient internal manufacturing power, the training of new groups of soldiers including a hundred thousand Poles encamped in the Urals region and the institution of military science courses in all high schools.
FACTORIES REORGANIZE
Factories in the rear are reorganizing production schedules—and the success of this phase already is signalized, according to General Sokolovsky, by the fact that twice as many aircraft as a month ago are now functioning with the Red Air Force in the central sector. One of the great staff problems is to keep transport routes clear to the front during the Autumnal spells of bad weather which naturally hamper both sides.
With the exception of the few highways which are paved, most of the roads can be used only with the greatest difficulties except during the short period between the evaporation of the Spring meltings and the commencement of the Autumnal rains. Even in Winter when the mud is frozen the passage is not easy because of vast drifts of snow.
This at best slows up, at worst enormously impedes, the transport of the mobile invading forces at the same time that a lesser if still difficult problem is presented to the Red Army’s supplying lines. Therefore as the cold comes up and the rains continue one can notice more and more attention devoted to maintenance of communications.
LABOR ON THE ROADS
Quoting from this correspondent’s own notebook jottings:
“After the macadam road ends squads of workers keeping up the dirt highway; men and woman peasant laborers; steamrollers; piles of earth interspersed along sides for surfacing; intermittent sentries and patrols; helmeted soldier driving a procession of tractors down the road; truck stations hidden in the trees off the road; squads of workers by the roadside in charge of armed guards; a blazed trail in the woods avoids the regular road which is a terrible soup of mud; a squad of peasants with spades working on a bad patch; soldiers laying a corduroy road over a marsh; gangs of soldiers stationed at bad places to help shove traffic across.”
In order to maintain the army during the Winter it is essential to keep up a high standard of health, which in itself necessitates ample food and warm clothing. Russians are proud of their ability to withstand cold. As General Sokolovsky says:
“Winter will create even greater difficulties for the Germans. Every Russian has his sheepskin coat. He is also used to hard weather and he has his felt boots. As the Finnish campaign showed, we can stand 50 degrees of frost. The Red Army man can remain in the open day and night when necessary, but the German will freeze. In this very part of the country we have 35 to 40 degrees of frost Centigrade—about the same as Siberia. Although the Germans are buying up skis in large numbers in Norway I doubt whether many of their soldiers know how to use them. They are no good for transporting tanks and heavy equipment. As a result there will be further stabilization of the war and gradual exhaustion,”
This Winter will scarcely be a pleasant one for either party, but the Red Command is determined to do its utmost to make it physically bearable for its soldiers. The motto is, “A Russian’s meat’s a German’s poison.”
SEPTEMBER 29, 1941
WAR GAMES OVER; BLUES NEAR GOAL
MARSHALL PRAISES MEN
New Army Fast Becoming a ‘Powerful Machine’—350,000 Troops Ready for Rest
By HANSON W. BALDWIN
Special to The New York Times.
FIELD HEADQUARTERS, Second Army, Shreveport, La., Sept. 28 —As the hot Southern sun sank in a red blaze above the Texas plains tonight, the concluding phase of the greatest manoeuvres in the country’s history ended with Shreveport almost ringed by “enemy” forces.
Tired, sweat-soaked, mud-covered and dusty after the hardest two weeks of mimic war in which any American troops have ever engaged, the 250,000 soldiers of the Second and Third Armies were moving to bivouacs all over this 30,000-square-mile manoeuvre area tonight, happy over the prospect of a fifteen-day furlough which awaits them on their return to home stations.
They were cheered, too, by the knowledge of a job well done and a pat on the back from the Army’s Chief of Staff.
MARSHALL PRAISES SPIRIT
General George C. Marshall, in a telegram addressed to “all commanders and their officers and non-commissioned officers and to the men in the ranks,” said:
“The manoeuvres just completed have been a great success on the ground, in the air and for the supply and maintenance services. The zeal and energy, the endurance and the spirit of the troops have been a model of excellence. There is much more to learn, but the mistakes of the past two weeks will be corrected, the deficiencies in material will be made good.
“The armored units and the air squadrons are now a part of the military team supported by dive bombers of the Navy and Marine Corps. The supply services have proved they know their business. The new citizen army is rapidly on its way to becoming a powerful machine with all its parts in close cooperation.
“To all of you, and especially to those older men soon to be released from active service, my thanks and those of the entire War Department for having done a grand job.”
The “cease firing” order came at 4:45 P.M. after a grueling day in the sun for the armies of both sides.
When the umpires waved their flags for the last time small units of the attacking Blue Third Army had seized Shreveport’s water works, pushed into the city’s northern suburbs and were fighting units of the defending Red Second Army at the end of the Cross Bayou Bridge in the city’s outskirts.
MAIN FORCES TWENTY MILES AWAY
The center of Shreveport was clearly within artillery range from the north, but the Blue forces to the north were described by the Red defenders as light harassing forces only; the main Blue forces were still eighteen to twenty-five miles distant, and Lieut. Gen. Ben Lear, commanding the Second Army, still had used only part of his powerful Army reserve—the First Armored Division and the Sixth Infantry Division.
Tonight General Lear particularly praised three aspects of the Second Army’s work in the manoeuvres. He put first, as the finest thing about the Louisiana exercises, “the thorough willingness of the men to do their job.” He described the functioning of his intelligence services, including his reconnaissance and security elements, as outstanding, and declared that “I got everything I asked for from the aviation.”
The “cease firing” order, although issued from Lieut. Gen. Lesley J. McNair’s director headquarters in late afternoon, did not reach all elements in the field until almost sunset. At that time armored elements of the Blue First Armored Division, supported by infantry, were battling in the thick woods along the Sabine River in East Texas with units of the Second (horsed) Cavalry Division, supported by a corps reconnaissance regiment of cavalry, a regiment of infantry and an anti-tank group.
DEADWOOD, TEXAS, BUZZES
At and around the little town of Deadwood, Texas, which has never known such excitement since the frontier days, there were gathered several regiments of the old “hell-for-leather” cavalry of tradition, their horseflesh plainly showing the grueling tests that the men have been through in the last two weeks. And near by were parked captured thirteen-ton light tanks, their steel sides splashed with mud and dust.
The two horsed cavalry divisions and the horsed cavalry brigade participating in the war games have done outstanding service. The horsed cavalry available at these manoeuvres probably outnumbered the horsed cavalry which the German Army possessed at the outbreak of war, for the German Army then mustered only one division, besides numerous regiments, although this number may have been increased since.
There has been, and still is, considerable difference of opinion as to the tactical value of horse cavalry in modern war. But in this manoeuvre, the two divisions, the First under Major Gen. Innis P. Swift and the Second under Major Gen. John Millikin, acquitted themselves with pride. They were operating in tangled terrain, extremely difficult for tanks, in fact, in places too difficult for horses.
Both divisions, in addition to the Fifty-sixth National Guard Cavalry Brigade from Texas, now commanded by a regular officer, earned commendations for their work.
WEATHER AND TERRAIN BAD
The two brigades of the Second Division—the Third, led by Brig. Gen. Terry de la M. Allen, and the Fourth, by Colonel Duncan G. Richart—were in the thick of most of the fights and traveled hundreds of miles through some of the worst weather and over some of the most difficult terrain these States can muster.
On one occasion the Second Division marched seventy miles and fought an action in a thirty-hour period; the Fourth Brigade covered forty-five miles in one day, and the night of this week’s hurricane, when a twenty-five to forty-five-mile-an-hour wind was blowing, the rain was pouring in torrents, the back woods roads were fetlock deep in mud and many motorized vehicles were bogged down, the horsed cavalry marched twenty-five to thirty miles.
The horses, thin but still strong, and the men, sun-baked, wind-burned and drawn-looking, show the results of this sort of grind, but they are proud of their record and their endurance and they are heading back to home stations in Texas and Kansas singing the old songs of the cavalry with a new lilt.
The Fourth Brigade’s songs are generally a little off the Army line, however, for the Fourth is a Negro outfit, and tonight as they marched to their bivouacs, the strains of “Flat Foot Floogi” echoed over the cactus and through the pines, supplanted often by the mournful notes of the Negro spirituals, such as “All Gods Chillun Got Shoes.”
SEPTEMBER 30, 1941
BRITISH CONFIDENT AT SINGAPORE BASE
Steady Improvement Has Made Far Eastern Bastion Even More Formidable
By F. TILLMAN DURDIN
Wireless to The New York Times.
SINGAPORE, Sept. 29 —The British now face the possibility of war in the Pacific “without anxiety,” Vice Admiral Sir Geoffrey Layton, Commander in Chief of the British fleet based on Singapore, told this correspondent today in an interview at his shore headquarters at the famous Singapore naval base.
Asked to give an indication of the increase in British strength at Singapore, Sir Geoffrey said that had Singapore been attacked a year ago the defenders would have had “definite cause for anxiety.” “Now,” he said, “we view the possibility of attack without anxiety.”
Britain, he said, “obviously does not want a war in the Pacific now,” but he declared that “if any of our territories are attacked we shall certainly fight.”
He made it clear that the British in the Far East now felt their strength sufficient successfully to resist attack from any quarter. Based on Singapore, Admiral Layton commands the British ships in the vast expanse of ocean that includes not only the Malay archipelago but also the seas from mid-Pacific westward to the Bay of Bengal.
SILENT ON INDIES DEFENSE
Asked about arrangements for mutual defense with the Netherlands Indies, Admiral Layton declined to comment saying that a statement on such a matter would have to come from the British Government. But, he asserted, “obviously an attack on any part of the Netherlands Indies would be a matter of immediate concern to us as it would jeopardize our life line to Australia.”
Air Force Marshall Conway Pullford, Major Gen. Arthur E. Percival, Air Chief Marshall Sir Robert Brooke-Popham and Vice Admiral Sir Geoffrey Layton discussing maneuvers in 1941.
He emphasized the importance of Malaysia to the United States.
“I hope Americans are coming to realize,” he said, “that if this area ever comes under Japanese control the United States will have to go to Japan to beg for the rubber, tin and oil here, which are indispensable to American defense and industry.”
Explaining how the British position is becoming stronger day by day, Admiral Layton from the window of his office surveyed the enormous expanse of the naval base, pointing out the sites where thousands of men are working on projects designed to improve the facilities and defenses of the base.
NEW BUILDING IN PROGRESS
“Over there,” he said, “we are building a new torpedo depot; there work is starting on a new dock; yonder we are constructing new facilities for the Fleer Air Arm. The base is completely ready for any use to which we might want to put it now, but we shall always be improving its facilities and protection.”
The correspondent toured the base following the interview. Two ships being repaired in the huge graving dock—one of the world’s largest—looked like midgets. One construction crew was rushing the erection of quarters for additional forces which Admiral Layton had said “keep coming in so fast we hardly know where to put them.”
Everywhere, from the sites where more anti-aircraft guns are being erected to the big kitchens in the comfortable quarters for fleet crews come ashore, were scenes of efficient and well-ordered activity. They added up to that impression of impregnable power that the base has come to signalize for Britain in the Far East.
OCTOBER 2, 1941
MOSCOW PARLEY PLEDGES HUGE AID
Talks Ended Speedily as U.S. And Britain Agree To Supply Almost All Soviet Asks
By The Associated Press.
MOSCOW, Oct. 2 —The United States and Great Britain agreed to fill virtually every Soviet need for war supplies in exchange for “large quantities” of Russian raw materials at the concluding session last night of the three-power conference.
The conference closed two days ahead of schedule after only three days of sessions—probably the shortest international council of such dimensions ever held. A communiqué issued by the British and United States delegations and one by the Russians announced its results.
For the United States and Great Britain, W. Averell Harriman and Lord Beaverbrook, heads of their delegations, promised “to place at the disposal of the Soviet Government practically every requirement for which the Soviet military and civil authorities have asked.”
In return, said the communiqué issued by Mr. Harriman and Lord Beaverbrook, “the Soviet Government has supplied Great Britain and the United States with large quantities of raw materials urgently required in those countries.”
Arrangements were said to have been made to “increase the volume of traffic in all directions.”
The Soviet communiqué stressed the “atmosphere of perfect mutual understanding, confidence and good-will,” and said that the delegates had been “inspired by the eminence of the cause of delivering other nations from the Nazi threat of enslavement.”
In a speech to the closing session Foreign Commissar Vyacheslaff M. Molotoff said that the conference had shown that “deliveries of arms and most important materials for the defense of the U.S.S.R., which were commenced previously, must and will become extensive and regular.”
Mr. Molotoff added that “these deliveries of airplanes, tanks and other armaments and equipment and raw materials will be increased and will acquire growing importance in the future.”
U.S.-BRITISH STATEMENT
Mr. Harriman and Lord Beaverbrook issued the following joint statement:
The Moscow conference of representatives of the Soviet, American and British Governments has been brought to conclusion.
Members of the conference were directed to examine the requirements from the United States and Great Britain necessary to supply the Soviet Union, fighting to defeat the Axis powers.
The conference, which assembled under the chairmanship of Vyacheslaff Molotoff, Commissar of Foreign Affairs, has been in continuous session since Monday. It examined available resources of the Soviet Government in conjunction with the productive capacity of the United States and Great Britain.
It now has been decided to place at the disposal of the Soviet Government practically every requirement for which the Soviet military and civil authorities have asked. The Soviet Government has supplied Great Britain and the United States with large quantities of raw materials urgently required in those countries.
Transportation facilities have been fully examined and plans made to increase the volume of traffic in all directions.
Mr. Stalin has authorized Mr. Harriman and Lord Beaverbrook to say he expressed his thanks to the United States and Great Britain for their bountiful supplies of raw materials, machine tools and munitions of war.
The assistance has been generous and the Soviet forces will be enabled forthwith to strengthen their relentless defense and develop vigorous attacks upon the invading armies.
Mr. Harriman and Lord Beaverbrook, speaking on behalf of the United States and Great Britain, acknowledged the ample supplies of Russian raw materials from the Soviet Government which will greatly add to the output of their own weapons of war.
Mr. Harriman and Lord Beaverbrooks emphasized the cordial spirit of the conference which made the agreement possible in record time. In particular they made it plain that M. Stalin was always ready with sympathetic cooperation and understanding. They thanked Mr. Molotoff for efficient chairmanship of the conference and all Soviet representatives for their help.
In concluding its session the conference adheres to the resolution of the three governments that after the final annihilation of Nazi tyranny a peace will be established which will enable the whole world to live in security in its own territory in conditions free from fear or need.
OCTOBER 3, 1941
NAZIS SAID TO BID FOR SOVIET PEACE
Washington Foreign Circles Hear Stalin Has Not Yet Rejected Offer by Hitler
By BERTRAM D. HULEN
Special to The New York Times.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 —Reports received in some foreign diplomatic circles from Moscow today were to the effect that Reichsfuehrer Hitler had made what was described as a liberal peace offer to Premier Stalin and that it had not yet been definitely rejected. The circles are not closely identified with any of the belligerents. Details were not available.
No such reports have been received by the United States, as far as could be ascertained. There was a disposition in this quarter to question the accuracy of the information. On the other hand, the reports were not considered beyond the realm of possibility.
HALIFAX DOES NOT SHARE VIEWS
Viscount Halifax, the British Ambas sador, just back from London, however, did not share even these qualified views. As he left the White House after a conference with President Roosevelt, he was asked about rumors that Russia might enter peace negotiations with Herr Hitler.
“I did not see anything of that at all [in England],” he replied. “Indeed, I would put it stronger. Those sorts of rumors received flat contradictions from the communiqué issued [yesterday] in Moscow by Mr. [W. Averell] Harriman and by Lord Beaverbrook and by the Russian Government. Their conference seems to have been successful.”
Nevertheless, the neutral reports received here are said to hint that Mr. Stalin impressed the Americans and British at the tripartite conference so deeply with the urgency of his position that promises to give all the aid requested were speedily forthcoming. Provided the reports have substance, diplomatic observers comment, the offset to these pledges could be the ability of Herr Hitler to make concessions to Russia in the Near East, as well as in reference to territory in European Russia.
The determining factor, it was suggested, might turn out to be the disposition to be made of the Soviet Army, rather than territory. If the reports were true, it was commented, Mr. Stalin still could be weighing one side against the other before reaching a final decision.
OCTOBER 7, 1941
U-BOATS ROAM SEA WITH A NEW FURY
Battle of Atlantic Held More Critical In Iceland Than London Had Believed
By The Associated Press.
REYKJAVIK, Iceland, Sept. 28 (Delayed) —The Battle of the Atlantic is entering a crucial period.
A great onslaught of German submarines against the North Atlantic supply line equal in scope to that of March and April is well under way, informed persons say.
Crew of an English cargo liner ship leaves it to the Germans, June 1941.
A vast amount of war material, much of it the product of American industry, is the objective of a campaign designed to cripple the British war effort.
There was some complacency in high political circles in London this Summer over the Battle of the Atlantic, but this is not reflected in the minds of British and United States naval officers or merchant captains here. They regard the situation as critical.
The actual figures of tonnage losses are secret.
STRENGTH PUT AT 600 U-BOATS
The popular estimate in London of the German U-boat strength last Spring was 600 submarines of all types operating in the Atlantic, plus a third as many Focke-Wulf Kuriers and Condors for observation and bombing.
Despite German losses of last Summer, in which an increased number of destroyers and aircraft dealt severe blows to U-boats, the German submarine strength is believed in informed quarters to remain at 600.
Considering the required rest in port for crews, periods of refit for the submarines themselves and the time spent in reaching the hunting grounds, it appears probable that always 200 German submarines are operating in the Atlantic north of the Azores, and that these are replaced by another 200 at the end of each two weeks.
Guenther Prien and other U-boat commanders who were the most accomplished and boldest of the German undersea fighters in the first months of the war are now dead or missing. However, the fall of France gave the German Navy unequaled facilities for submarine warfare, and newly trained commanders and crews have gained in audacity with each voyage.
Now submarines are again hunting in packs. They are directed to the quarry by Kurriers and Condors, which can sight the prey without being seen, then transmit the speed of the sighted convoy to U-boat commanders. The hour before dawn is still most favored by the Germans for the attack.
The announcement by Secretary Knox that the American navy would convoy lease-lend material was said to have taken some weight off the British fleet, however.
Destroyers, not in scores but in hundreds, appear to some observers to be the ultimate answer to the U-boat. Well does the British Navy remember Admiral Lord Beatty’s statement on the eve of his death: “We must have 300 destroyers.”
This island is one of the centers of the counter-offensive to the German U-boat campaign. British and American destroyers, equipped with the most modern detection devices and powerfully armed, are shepherding convoys.
The most heroic part of the story comes from the merchant sailors who emerge alive from attacks at sea. Among them it is common to meet seamen who have been torpedoed twice and even three times. Without exception they are eager to “get another ship.”
Thousands of their fellows are dead. Others are in hospital, permanently crippled. Gangrene is the deadly enemy of the man in lifeboats.
Theirs are terrible stories: of men who went insane and leaped into the sea from lifeboats; of tongues that swell for lack of water; of nights when waves break over the frail lifeboats and half of the crew bails while the other half rows; of horrible minutes when the smoke of a far-off convoy dies on the horizon; of hours in biting cold water that numbs the body and senses before it drags men to the bottom.
OCTOBER 13, 1941
GERMANS SMASH ON
One Spearhead Is Said to Be Only 90 Miles from Capital
By Telephone to The New York Times.
BERLIN, Oct. 12 —Military observers here are of the opinion that a spearhead of the German invasion forces is less than ninety miles from the gates of Moscow. The progress achieved in the last forty-eight hours, German sources said tonight, has been possible because the Red Army is able to offer only desultory opposition.
A special war bulletin announced that the German forces pressing toward Moscow had left the Vyazma and Bryansk battlefields far behind them, and the Berlin press stated flatly that Marshal Semyon Budenny’s armies defending the Donets Basin had been “completely dissolved.”
200,000 CAPTIVES CLAIMED
The German communiqué reported that 200,000 Russian soldiers had been captured thus far in the Vyazma and Bryansk battles of encirclement. It added that despite desperate Soviet resistance and continued attempts to break out, the Russians “have no prospect of escaping their fate.” The number of captives is rising steadily, the High Command said.
The communiqué also declared that a “new phase” in the operations begun on Oct. 2 had opened with the approach to Moscow, but it did not make clear just what that new phase was. It was said that from the Sea of Azov to the Valdai Hills south of Lake Ilmen, a front 750 miles long, the troops of Germany and her allies were in offensive movement eastward.
A statement in the communiqué relating to the closing of a trap on Soviet forces north of the Sea of Azov led the press to declare almost unconditionally that Soviet resistance in the south had ceased. An official military spokesman was slightly more cautious, declaring that Marshal Budenny possibly could “throw against the German forces a few quickly assembled reserve troops.”
“However,” the spokesman continued, “it must be said that a regular army, or army group, no longer exists there. With the prospect of an early loss of the Donets Basin, the Russians are robbed of the possibility of ever making good, even in part, the war materials they have lost.”
NAVAL ACTIVITY REPORTED
D.N.B., the official news agency, reported that units of the German Navy were operating in the Black Sea. A number of captured Soviet bases on the Black Sea coast have been rebuilt and, with captured Soviet merchant ships, are being used to supply German land forces, D.N.B. said.
Danger to the Soviet Capital Increases: Of the several German drives on the central front, indicated by black arrows, the most menacing ones seemed to be those stemming from the Vyazma region (1) and the Bryansk region (2). The eastward thrust above Vyazms was the one that had reached closest to the capital. Moscow acknowledged that its forces had evacuated Bryansk and Berlin said that a German column sweeping around that place had reached Kaluga (3). The solid line shows the front at the beginning of the offensive; the broken line shows delineation of the present forces as issued in Berlin.
In the Leningrad area the Red Army forces of Marshal Klementy E. Voroshiloff continued their bitter counter-attacks, according to other German dispatches, but these attacks were said to have been crushed by German fire. There are, however, no reports of further German advances in that region. An eyewitness account published in the German press gave one reason for this. The report came from an observer who made a flight over the Soviet defenses around Leningrad.
“Below us we saw nothing but one single enormous field of forts,” the observer said. “One could try for half an hour and longer and the picture remained the same: anti-tank guns, trenches, innumerable little machine-gun nests and other trenches. The land southwest of Leningrad is like this for a depth of about thirty miles.”