A LETTER THE NEW YORK TIMES SUPPRESSED
Thomas, Norman
A Letter The New York Times Suppressed By NORMAN THOMAS WE are governed in foreign affairs by a conspiracy of concealment and propaganda on the part of a clique of supposedly liberal radio...
...Punishment of particular criminals will help only to the degree that it is obviously just...
...A Letter The New York Times Suppressed By NORMAN THOMAS WE are governed in foreign affairs by a conspiracy of concealment and propaganda on the part of a clique of supposedly liberal radio commentators and editors more or less in alliance with the State Department...
...We who differ can only very occasionally be heard over the radio or even get a letter of considerable length in a leading newspaper...
...Asia waits for a demonstration that we do not intend to perpetuate white imperialism after having defeated Japanese imperialism...
...Senators of very different political beliefs have told me that a large part of their correspondence merely echoes the outpourings of a Winchell or some less popular commentator...
...He has put all lovers of peace peculiarly in his debt by his constructive six-point program in his article, "Atomic Bomb Responsibilities," in your issue of Sept...
...He is therefore entitled to more respect than the strident rationalizer of vengeance and hate when he discusses with moderation his fear that Gen...
...Baldwin's article in detail, and admitting that there may be value in some of his suggestions and criticisms—for example, of MacArthur's neglect of the Navy—I want to state certain general principles concerning the treatment of a defeated enemy on which I suspect that our Supreme Commander is wisely acting...
...3 Nations even more truly than individuals cannot ? be taught true repentance or high morality by the superior force of a master...
...It is the rival imperialisms of the present victors which already threaten future peace...
...Another possibility might be that the Japanese could help to organize Asia against the continuance of white imperialism...
...MacArthur—the man who has accomplished the remarkable feat of the peaceful occupation of Japan in a spirit of justice and tolerance except when he has been forced to appease his American arm-chair critics...
...TO some degree I can corroborate that statement from my own experience...
...5 Our best chance of teaching penitence to the Japa...
...We shall miss our opportunity if we neglect Mr...
...Certainly great harshness to a disarmed people won't do it...
...4 The new international morality upon which peace ? depends can only be taught by example...
...Without examining Mr...
...To illustrate this point I am presenting to readers of The Progressive a rather important letter for which the New York Times has no room, although it comments on articles by one of the best of its writers...
...But the State Department which had no decent plans for Europe or Asia and no plans at all for Korea has gone along with the critics of Gen...
...Baldwin's six-point program, or if we fall into the old error, so dear to the Anglo-Saxon, of clothing our own imperialism in the robes of a Messiah anxious to do good to "lesser breeds without the law...
...There is not much that a conqueror can do after this sort of surrender either to encourage or discourage "the myth of an unbeaten army...
...Hanson W. Baldwin...
...It would be hard to name a worse crime in this cruel war than that seeond bomb over Nagasaki...
...The worst of it is that supporters of common sense and decency can barely get a hearing on the radio or in the press...
...The most they can learn from defeat is prudence for the future, and surely that lesson has been sufficiently taught...
...ness" in the Peace of Versailles...
...MacArthur's policy may permit our foe "to retain war traditions...
...2 Japan surrendered with great armies as yet un...
...beaten because of her threatened destruction by the overwhelming might arrayed against her, especially in the field of mechanized warfare...
...The British Labor Government has thus far missed an enormous opportunity to symbolize the coming of the new day, at little price to British interests, by its failure to return Hong Kong to Chinese political rule...
...nese for their collective sins would be to practice it in relation to our own guilt for the use of two atomic bombs without even warning or demonstration of their power...
...An obviously vindictive peace would make this more likely...
...In no foreseeable time can either Germany or Japan directly undertake a new war of aggression unless the present victors fall out and one of the two colossi who now dominate the world, the United States and Russia, permits or encourages aggression...
...Here is the letter which was refused space in the Times: To the Editor of the New York Times: No military analyst has rendered such competent and thoughtful public service as Mr...
...1 Germany's second war was not due" to any "soft...
...it was due to disunity among the victors, lack of constructive policy fit for peace, and positive encouragement by powerful forces in both Britain and France to the rise of Nazism...
...Fortunately the State Department or President Truman has a little more humanity or common sense than the mis-called liberals or else our boys would still be fighting a desperate war of extermination in Japan...
Vol. 9 • October 1945 • No. 40
