THE WAR IN REVIEW
THE WAR IN REVIEW FIGHTING their way through a bitterly cold European Winter and against a fanatically resisting foe who exacted a high price in lives for every yard gained, Allied soldiers this...
...It has been obvious to many skilled political observers, such as former Undersecretary of State Sumner Welles in this country and Britain's Laborite leader, Harold Laski, that the 'Italian situation was growing steadily more critical...
...Those who have been looking and working for an aggressive, democratic American peace policy were greatly heartened by the Stettinius announcement, although they waited hopefully for deeds of implementation...
...Democracy is no harlot to be picked up in the street by a man with a tommy gun...
...Efforts to form a new government headed by-Count Carlo Sforza, Italy's respected and famed anti-fascist, failed when Britain, without consulting either the United States or Russia, vetoed any proposal which would place Sforza in a responsible position...
...It takes all sorts to make a democracy, not only a left wing or even Communists...
...A few weeks <a|g£ Churchill was in Paris for conversations with Gen...
...I feel quite different about a swindle democracy...
...Britain, he said, does not trust Sforza, "nor would we put the slightest confidence in any government Of which he is a dominant member...
...In a gesture of supreme defiance and amid charges that he was resorting to blackmail, Churchill demanded a vote of confidence on his position...
...Displaying the same bull-dog tenacity that he showed in the dark days of the Nazi menace he argued brilliantly for his stand...
...At mid-week Ormoc was in American hands...
...Charles de Gaulle concerning France's role in the Western bloc the British have determined to build...
...Principals in the disagreement over Allied policy were Britain's determined old Tory, Prime Minister Churchill, and America's new Secretary of State Edward R. Stettinius...
...The declaration also emphasized that this policy "would apply to an even more pronounced degree with regard to governments of the United Nations in their liberated territories...
...Sforza, British spokesmen declared, had shown himself "unreliable" by violating a pledge purportedly given to Britain and the United States that he would support the Badoglio regime...
...A break between the United States and Great Britain over the policy to be followed in liberated and defeated countries, threw the international spotlight on one of the most tragic and dangerous political blunders of the war —the utter failure of the Allied nations to reach some common ground of agreement on this critical problem...
...Presumably a test for the "unconditional' surrender" formula, the terms of peace imposed on Italy have never been made known...
...Bolstering this interpretation was Stettinius' own later statement to the press that he favored a hands-off policy in Greece.,, The reaction to the break favored the American side in both the United States and British, press...
...In Washington, Lord Halifax, British Ambassador, told reporters after conferring with Stettinius that "there is substantial understanding, as always, between the two Governments...
...As for Italy, where no such problems.of security exist, he was equally defiant...
...In a declaration that was widely heralded by the liberal press, the State Department announced that it fa-voredallowing the Italians to work out their own problems of government "along democratic lines without influence from the outside...
...Some recalled our dealings with Darlan, Peyrouton, and other pro-fascists and bitterly denounced our "self-righteousness...
...There was growing speculation about whether Moscow would launch one of its mighty W'inter offensives...
...Charging that Great Britain was creating disunity, he angrily assailed the Churchill policy and suggested that the United States might use its military power "to force the British to see the light...
...Douglas MacArthur provided the most cheering military news of the week...
...We stand on the foundation of a fair and free elections based upon universal suffrage," he said...
...Fall Of Ormoc Meanwhile, Great Britain and Russia were shrewdly jockeying for influence in France...
...Many members of the House refrained from voting...
...This was taken to mean that America frowned on British interference in Greece where, this week, leftist elements were engaged in bloody civil strife with the pro-monarchist and British-sponsored regime of Premier Papandreou...
...did speak up was Louisiana's interventionist Sen...
...In the east, Russian troops were reported to be tightening the arc around the Hungarian capital of Budapest...
...The British press generally condemned the position of their leader, but spoke testily of our State Department's lack of diplomatic finesse...
...The declaration specifically disavowed "any opposition" to Sforza...
...THE WAR IN REVIEW FIGHTING their way through a bitterly cold European Winter and against a fanatically resisting foe who exacted a high price in lives for every yard gained, Allied soldiers this week watched the lands for whose liberation they fought become the storm center of the most serious political crisis of the war...
...This week de Gaulle concluded discussions with Marshal Stalin in Moscow...
...Questioned about his one-time support for Mussolini, the Prime Minister said: "In 1928 I certainly did support him in the sense of making speeches to say that it was a very good thing that Italy was not plunged into bolshevism...
...There was nothing of a decisive nature in the military developments in Europe...
...State Department's Declaration Last week, the coalition cabinet of Ivanoe Bonomi crumbled under the pressure of disagreement stemming mainly from the reluctance of left wing elements to work with royalists and former fascists...
...Allen J. Ellender, Democrat...
...Churchill, it was noted, although he plainly demonstrated in the House of Commons that he intended to yield nothing, had ordered his ace Mediterranean expert, Harold MacMillan, to the United States...
...The 3rd Army continued to make the big news in its drive into the Saar Basin against savage enemy counter-attacks...
...For the most part members of Congress assumed a wary attitude toward the new and startling developments...
...He charged that the revolutionary groups in Greece were "gangsters from the mountains" who were attempting to force communism on Greece and defiantly asserted that British troops, tanks, and guns would be continued to be used to "guarantee us the necessary security for our lines of communication...
...Involved specifically were Greece, a liberated country, and Italy, a defeated country...
...The, agreement shocked many people who look on such maneuvers as inimical to the aims of an over-all security organization...
...One of the few who...
...Here at home, Churchill was bitterly and almost universally attacked, even by those papers which have hitherto held that any questioning of his motives was irrefutable proof of "isolationism" and "obstructionism...
...It was announced that a mutual aid pact had been signed by the two countries...
...When questioned about his friendly expressions toward Spain's dictator Franco, he conveniently denied that he had ever spoken in his praise...
...Gen...
...There was good news from the Asiatic mainland too, where Chinese forces were checking the Japanese drive to cut the upper jend of the Burma Road with a series of hardhitting counterattacks...
...Pointing out that while America is bearing the "brunt of this holocaust of war," Ellender declared that the "British are pursuing a course that is diametrically opposed to the objects for which we in America are fighting/' Churchill Defends His Stand With world opinion marshalled against him as it has never been since those days when he rallied Britain for its epic stand against the Nazis, Churchill went to the House of Commons to defend his position...
...The motion carried by a vote of 279 to 30...
...In a daring strategical stroke, which sent amphibious forces around behind the enemy lines on Leyte in a surprise attack, MacArthur cleared the way for the fall of Ormoc, enemy supply port...
Vol. 8 • December 1944 • No. 51
