Sunday, August 18, 1940

WILLKIE ACCEPTS THE G.O.P. NOMINATION. I haven’t seen a transcription yet. But as heard on the Mutual network yesterday afternoon, Wendell Willkie’s formal acceptance of the Republican nomination was a pip. He spoke eloquently for individual liberty and rightly scored the Roosevelt Administration’s secrecy and inefficiency, the stagnation of the New Deal, and a preparedness program that badly lags behind the Rooseveltian rhetoric.

But more importantly, he demonstrated that he would not oppose the Democrats merely for the sake of opposing them, and said a number of things which must be terribly grieving to isolationist Republicans -- "Peace is not something that a nation can achieve by itself." He endorsed conscription, in bold, plain language. He rejected the arch-neutrality of some in his party, condemned Hitler’s "barbarous and worse then medieval persecution of the Jews," and made it clear that the survival of Britain was essential to American liberty -- "The loss of the British fleet would greatly weaken our defense....If the British fleet were lost or captured, the Atlantic might be dominated by Germany....This would be a calamity for us." He also heartily endorsed the President’s pledge to aid other countries resisting Axis aggression.

What’s more, Mr. Willkie argued convincingly that he, more than President Roosevelt, is interested in a genuine coalition government to see us through the current emergency. He prominently identified himself not as a Republican, but as a "liberal Democrat who changed his party affiliation because he found democracy in the Republican Party and not in the New Deal Party." The crowd of 250,000 gathered in Elwood, Indiana for the acceptance ceremony enthusiastically cheered almost every remark, though doubtless a good number of them probably differed with their nominee’s anti-isolationist opinions. But Mr. Willkie seems above all to have the leadership ability to bring isolationists and inteventionists together.

GERMANS BOMB LONDON SUBURBS. Just one day after the Germans launched a 1,000-plane air raid that hit within eight miles of London, the Nazis sent another 1,000 to 1,500 air raiders to blast five of London’s southwestern suburbs bordering both sides of the Thames River. Sigrid Schultz’s account in the Chicago Tribune prominently describes the docks, storehouses, and industrial plants of the East End as sustaining terrific damage. James B. Reston’s New York Times story emphasizes the rush-hour timing of the raid -- "Hundreds of thousands of people were crowding out of their offices and factories to go home. Trains, subways, buses and streets were absolutely jammed." Despite the pounding, Mr. Reston writes that civilian morale "remains excellent" and adds, "If on the coast they are getting a little tired of the constant raids, certainly there are few complaints and in London optimism seems to increase as the air war develops."

Miss Schultz quotes a German source as saying rather ominously that "the German air force will prove that no power in the world can prevent it from dropping its bombs wherever it wants over England, and even if it should be necessary, over the city of London." But she adds that "authorized sources said...the city of London would be spared." For how much longer, one wonders?

THE HUMAN COST OF THE BOMBING. Frank R. Kelley’s account of the raid in the New York Herald Tribune pauses from the facts and figures of the air battles to describe what happened to a few ordinary people and places near London --

"One bomb burst close to a garage in which three persons were killed. Another victim was a man in his twenties. Girls in a factory were near where another bomb fell, and when they rushed out of the building machine-gun bullets spattered among them. Another missile blew out the windows of a saloon and wrecked a telephone booth. Shop windows were smashed. In some streets hardly a pane of glass was left in houses. Many were demolished, while others were made uninhabitable."

The New York Times account mentions a war reserve policemen who discovered the body of his thirteen-year-old son while cleaning up debris in an alley near his home. Drew Middleton of the Associated Press says the first sight he saw when entering the bombed area was "two dead air raid wardens, lying on the ground in their tin hats and blue overalls."

SPAIN, GREECE JOINING THE WAR? In the Chicago Tribune's Saturday editions, Larry Rue passes along unconfirmed reports of large Spanish troop movements in North Africa, which are seen as "a prelude to Gen. Francisco Franco’s entry into the war, depending on Italian successes in Somaliland." And as far as the battle in British Somaliland goes, Mr. Rue says that the small British force there is facing two Italian divisions, and that Britain’s meager forces will likely have to withdraw to the capital of Berbera. Friday’s New York Times says the British are in an "extremely grave position" in Somaliland, and "may have to adopt the advice given in a recent editorial in the Daily Telegraph to withdraw...altogether." (But Joseph M. Levy reports in Saturday’s Times that the Italians are still more than thirty miles from Berbera, and one of the Fascist columns has been slowed by an R.A.F. bombing and machine-gunning attack.)

Meanwhile, Greece has partially mobilized her forces after a squadron of Italian bombing and fighting planes attacked two Greek destroyers in the Aegean Sea on Friday. According to the Associated Press, Italy’s naval attache in Athens has apologized for the attack, explaining the destroyers were mistakenly identified as British. The incident doesn’t say much for Italian military prowess -- the A.P. reports seventeen bombs were lobbed at the ships, and not one hit its target. No damage was done.

HITLER’S IN A HURRY. Major George Fielding Eliot writes in Saturday’s New York Herald Tribune that an invasion is probably coming, and soon --

"Judging solely from the evidence now available, accepting the British figures as to proportionate losses of planes engaged, bearing in mind that air power alone has never yet been decisive but had always proved the more formidable in combination with surface forces, it seems probable that an attempt at invasion will be forthcoming before very long, perhaps within a comparatively short time, for under present circumstances, and in face of the ominous signs (ominous to the Germans, of course) of growing Anglo-American co-operation, German leaders can hardly dare to resort to the long drawn-out and very uncertain process of blockade with such means as they have at their disposal for it. If they actually attempt invasion, it will be a cast on which Hitler will for the first time set all his fortunes. There will be no minimum and maximum objective about such an enterprise. If it wins, he wins everything; if he loses, it will assuredly mark the definite declining of his star toward the dark horizon."

That’s the most persuasive argument I’ve heard yet. But can the British claims be trusted? C.B.S.’s Edward Murrow implies they can -- he observed the bombing of Portland’s naval base last week, and saw first-hand that the Admiralty’s reports were true that the most of the Nazis’ bombs had missed their targets. (Meanwhile, the Chicago Tribune’s "air war box score" in Saturday’s editions shows the disparity between German and British claims is as great as ever -- the Nazis say they’ve shot down 599 British warplanes while losing only 142 of their own, while the British claim to have destroyed 536 German planes and lost only 127 R.A.F. planes.)

AN UNSIGHTLY GERMAN INFLUENCE. From the New Republic’s Bandwagon section, quoted from the New York Daily News -- "Michael Dorfman, president of the Hay Fever Sufferers Society of America, started a campaign yesterday to stop well meaning people from saying ‘gesundheit’ when anyone sneezes. Instead, he insists, everyone ought to say, ‘God Bless America.’"