THE WASHINGTON PARADE
Hanighen, Frank C.
The Washington Parade By FRANK C HANIGHEN Washington, D. C. THE PRESS CONFERENCE of three Senators (Brewster, Russell, and Mead) on their return from their round-the-world tour of war fronts...
...Millions of pounds of concrete were defectively mixed of substandard material...
...The British express considerable worry about this new German line of development...
...What else are the arguments about the mythical Atlantic wall, about the allegedly, insoluble problem of tonnage, about the risk of invasion...
...Some Senators, notably Murray, Clark, and Langer, protested against these provisions as reducing the incentive to "inform" and limiting chances to "inform...
...Despite efforts by Senators Langer, Murray, Clark, and Revercomb to send the bill back to committee and to liberalize its provisions by amendment, the bill was passed—without a record vote...
...Rocket bombs are guided to targets by radio...
...The push behind the lobbyist comes from the large fire-insurance companies which hope to pave the way for a general hiking of their rates...
...Their attitude of pained surprise that the British Empire is imperialist may provoke smiles from the sophisticated...
...They won't even allow our commercial planes now to use the bases we have built across Africa...
...He asserted that the British "are not enthusiastic about making China strong...
...The first Administration answer to the Senators' complaint about Britain hoarding oil in the Middle East ran as follows: Not all oil in the Middle East is owned by British companies...
...Standard of California owns oil rights in Saudi, Arabia, and on Bahrein Island, in the Persian Gulf...
...Not only have our enemies effectively bombed our planes in the air with the rocket bomb, but in the Salerno operation they hit and damaged a warship from the distance of 10 miles...
...He cited one case in which responsible citizens in Kansas charged that a contractor bought one million lead pencils at nine cents apiece—pencils that cost two for five cents, retail...
...The following day Sen...
...Without doubt there are some public circles who are not at all interested in a rapid termination of the war...
...Structural steel was omitted from buildings where the most ordinary good building practice demanded its incorporation...
...Langer's report alleges that political interests protect the companies involved...
...Twenty tons of steel cut and shaped for the roof of the reservoir were buried by a bulldozer, etc., etc...
...8 Sen...
...Politics And Graft While the four Senators mentioned above were journeying back to give the people the first real uncen-sored news about the war, their colleagues who stayed at home performed something less than a service to the country by passing a bill to limit private suits for penalties and damages arising out of frauds against the United States...
...The bill's defenders say it will prevent "racketeering" in these suits...
...It must not be forgotten that the brilliant successes of our Allies in the Mediterranean became possible primarily thanks to the two years' heroic struggle of the Red Army against the main forces of the common enemy...
...The person who answered ought to know...
...The Times, it is common knowledge in journalistic quarters, killed a long story by one of their ace reporters on this Lodge speech in which the reporter naturally led off with the main point...
...Lease goods, tear off the American labels, substitute British trademarks, and send the goods to Turkey...
...The Anti-trust Division of the Department of Justice views with alarm a bill, pending in Congress, which provides for exemption of fire insurance companies from provisions of the anti-trust statutes...
...The action of American troops is either ignored or subordinated to British actions— much to the indignation of the American soldiers...
...2 In the Near East, the British take our Lend...
...Instead, the Times ran, on its 11th page, an AP dispatch about the proceedings which led with a minor point that commanders wanted a unified command—and made no mention of the Siberian bases complaint...
...For the Senators at this conference (and another of the party, Sen...
...The "informers" received 50 per cent of the damages collected by the government...
...The present Senate action (based on a House bill already passed), among other provisions, limits informers' reward to 10 per cent, and provides that the informers suits cannot be based on evidence gathered by the government, but only by "original" evidence gathered by themselves, and then only after the government has a chance to file the suit first...
...But the average American, drenched with propaganda, will receive a wholesome shock, after reading their feports...
...3 Everywhere the Senators found American soldiers ? complaining of the news distribution, which lies completely in the hands of the British semi-official Reuter's agency...
...The New York Times completely ignored not only the oil story but the whole press conference, on which news-famished Capitol Hill reporters feasted heartily...
...Chandler said about our position in the ? Pacific that "as a general proposition, we should fortify our islands or give them up, and support MacArthur or give them up...
...Our scientists are working on an antidote...
...The contract, performed under a cost-plus-fixed fee basis, called for an original expenditure of $56 millions, but finally involved $129 million...
...Perhaps, the Pulitzer outfit should award a booby prize...
...The newspapers frequently complain that they can't print such news because of government censorship...
...Lodge talked on the floor of the chamber...
...6 British officials in the Orient told the American ? Senators that Britain did not want a strong China after the war, nor a weak Japan...
...5 The Senators expressed horror at the signs of ? starvation among the Indian people...
...The Washington Parade By FRANK C HANIGHEN Washington, D. C. THE PRESS CONFERENCE of three Senators (Brewster, Russell, and Mead) on their return from their round-the-world tour of war fronts should interest, the committee which confers the Pulitzer Prize for journalism...
...One of the biggest nuggets produced by the Senators was the revelation that the British have been "hoarding" oil in the ground in Iran, the while straining our reserves...
...This bill amends an old statute dating from 1863 which provided the basis for "informers suits"—legal action taken by citizens who sue for collection of damages for fraud committed against the government...
...Brewster said, that "if we had another war in 10 years, we would have to go out with a tin dipper and ask somebody to give us some petroleum...
...While the Senators may have failed, due to their time schedule, to explore thoroughly all the charges they made, time and history will doubtless show that, in the mass, their impressions have a considerable substance of truth...
...It is obvious they haven't done a great deal to strengthen China...
...Langer in his eloquent speech on the subject lifted the curtain on the charges of graft in government contracts—charges which could be exposed and prosecuted by informers' suits...
...He is Ralph K. Davies, petroleum administrator under Ickes, and an official of the Standard Oil Company of California...
...But from the handling of the Senators' utterances by certain papers, one can only conclude that these papers exert a little censorship of their own...
...Among the things the Senators said, we should note the following: 1 Stressing the lack of real American diplomatic ? representation in North Africa, the Senators said they found the office of Robert Murphy of the State Department behind a door labeled, "Office of British Resident Minister...
...He referred to a suit pending for graft in connection with the notorious Hague machine in New Jersey that has not been settled since its inception in 1935...
...In one city, they were informed, several hundreds die of starvation every day...
...4 The rich oil reserves in Abadan, Iran, owned by ? the British Anglo-Iranian Company, are being exploited at only 60 per cent of capacity, while our reserves are being depleted at such a rate, Sen...
...Langer quite properly pointed out that the Attorney General's office today cannot possibly cover all such cases before time has outlawed them, and that the Department of Justice should not be solely trusted with the power to file such suits, on their own evidence...
...Langer quoted from the report he had received on this case, as follows: "Carloads of new and used lumber have been burned daily while farmers are unable to get what they need to build chicken houses and outbuildings...
...The British fear that the Germans may eventually shell London with rocket bombs directed from Channel ports...
...The British have two envoys of Cabinet rank in this area...
...7 Brewster said the United States had invested ? "hundreds of millions of dollars in air bases in Britain, Africa, India, Australia and the Pacific islands, yet there is not a spot outside the Western Hemisphere where our planes can land after the war...
...If China is strong after the war, the British may not go back to Hong Kong...
...Mention of the rocket gun and bomb by Churchill in his last speech was not merely one of the Premier's characteristic pieces of colorful journalism...
...He made his main point—all reporters present agreed—when he relayed the concern of Allied commanders in the Pacific at the continuing refusal of Russia to let them use Siberian bases in the war against Japan...
...Lodge, in his Senate speech of the following day) provided the American public with more real news than all the agencies, war correspondents, OWI, and government propaganda channels have offered us in the past year...
...A prominent lobbyist, supplied with at least a half million dollars, has arrived in Washington to push this bill...
...However, the nine months are nearing their end and the second front in Europe still does not exist . . , We know that there exist many excuses to justify the postponement and protraction of the opening of a second front in Europe...
...Jottings and Joltings From the Information Bulletin, Embassy of the USSR: "At the meeting at Casablanca it was decided that during the first nine months of the current year our British and American Allies would put into effect an exhaustive plan of operations which naturally included the opening of the second front...
Vol. 7 • October 1943 • No. 42
