Wednesday, May 27, 1942. Dorie Miller receives the Navy Cross. Reinhard Heydrich attacked.

Dores "Dorie" Miller became the first African American to receive the Navy Cross, which he received for manning 

For distinguished devotion to duty, extraordinary courage and disregard for his own personal safety during the attack on the Fleet in Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii, by Japanese forces on December 7, 1941. While at the side of his Captain on the bridge, Miller, despite enemy strafing and bombing and in the face of a serious fire, assisted in moving his Captain, who had been mortally wounded, to a place of greater safety, and later manned and operated a machine gun directed at enemy Japanese attacking aircraft until ordered to leave the bridge.

Miller grew up on his parent's farm in Texas and had joined the Navy at age 20 in 1939. He would not survive the war, being killed when a ship he was later assigned to was hit by a torpedo in 1943, setting off the ship's munition's stores.

His curious legal name was the result of a midwife being convinced he'd be born a girl, although even at that the family decision to stick with the name is odd.  It didn't fit him at all, as Miller grew to be a giant of a man.  His nickname is a matter of dispute, and may not have actually come about at all until press reports misstated his name, although there are other explanations for the name.

Reinhard Heydrich, one of the architects of the "Final Solution", was badly wounded in an assassination exercise by Czech operatives in an SOE planned operation.  He'd die on June 4.  Heydrich was drenched in evil, but the assassination did not in any way stop the Holocaust, and it resulted in massive German reprisals.

Heydrich vehicle following the attack.

Jews in Belgium were ordered to wear the yellow Star of David.

As with almost any day in this period, the Battle of the Atlantic raged, with submarines taking their toll.

Thursday, February 23, 1922. Booze sniffing hounds, Naval San Diego, Communist Theft, Japanese Suffrage.

Dog trained to sniff alcohol, February 23, 1922.

Lenin issued a decree authorizing confiscation of valuables from the Russian Orthodox Church as a relief measure for the famine caused by his failed economic policies.

The degree to which Communism was and is criminal can hardly be exaggerated.  The moronic economic policies forced upon Russia depressed its economy for decades, with it taking decades for certain sectors of it to return to pre Communist output, particularly agriculture.  It also resulted in massive famine. Theft from the Church was not going to relieve that, and more than anything else expressed the degree to which the criminal enterprise could now freely act against it.

The Church appealed the decision, but unsuccessfully.

The U.S. Navy established San Diego as a U.S. Destroyer Base, San Diego, forever altering the character of the city.

Worth noting, if San Diego had been fully retained as the headquarters for the Pacific Fleet between the wars, the attack at Pearl Harbor would have really had much less impact than it did, assuming that it would have occured at all.

The Japanese parliament rejected universal suffrage, which resulted in a riot that evening.

Saturday, February 21, 1942 Bernard Julius Otto Kuehn convicted.

Another interesting installment of Sarah Sundin's blog starts with this item:

February 21, 1942: House of Representatives begins hearings about removal of Japanese-Americans from the West Coast.

I was completely unaware that hearings had occurred.

Interestingly enough, a spy in Hawaii who was detected and convicted for his efforts, was convicted on this day, which she also reports.  The spy, in the pay of the Japanese, wasn't a Japanese American or immigrant, but rather Dr. Bernard Julius Otto Kuehn, a physician, whose entire family was in the pay of Imperial Japan.

The arrangements had actually been made by the German Abwehr through Goebbels, who had used Kuehn's 17-year-old daughter as a paramour.  Indeed, her role as his mistress may have played a part in the selection of her father and mother, and ultimately her and her 11-year-old brother, for this task, as at the point they were chosen, he may have tired of her and this provided a convenient way to send her packing.  Her father, a veteran of the German Navy during World War One, had become a post-war physician whose practice failed, leading him to become an ardent and somewhat influential Nazi.

They set up a system of sending coded messages by flashlight from their attic, something that wasn't detected until the Pearl Harbor attack.  Various adult members of the family were then arrested, tried and convicted.  Kuehn was sentenced to death, but he cooperated with American intelligence at that point and provided valuable information to the US on spy networks in the country.  His sentence was commuted to 50 years, but following the war he was deported to Germany.  His detained and convicted family joined him there.

On the same day, U-boats were very active in the Caribbean, sinking several ships.  The German Navy also sent the Scheer and Prinz Eugen from Germany to Bergen Navy. The RAF is unable to interdict them.

The Saturday news magazines were out, it being that day. The Saturday Evening Post went to press with a color photograph of an anti-aircraft gun crewman sighting through the gun's sight.  Liberty featured a woman looking through a Valentine style heart, in what must have been its belated Valentine's Day issue.  It featured an article on Lourdes.  Colliers featured a cartoon of a woman in the Army (or maybe the Marines) and a Sailor, sitting on something, back to back, with a heart behind them, in their Valentine's Day issue, apparently.  The sailor is oversize and athletic, and the female soldier/marine, extraordinarily buxom with her slip very much showing.  This demonstrates a real trend that was going on in society at the time that we recently discussed, and probably ought to a bit more when we have the chance.

Friday, February 20, 1942. Action in the Pacific

Sarah Sundin's daily blog on the Second World War has an entire series of really interesting items in it for this day. Well worth reviewing,  which you can do here:

February 20, 1942: First US Eighth Air Force officers arrive in England. Japanese land on Portuguese East Timor and Dutch West Timor in the East Indies.

Among those items is Navy pilot Edward O'Hare being credited with shooting down five Japanese aircraft within six minutes on this day in 1942, a feat which secured him the Congressional Medial of Honor. 

The aircraft that O'Hare struck were Japanese Betty bombers headed towards the USS Lexington which was off of Bougainville.  In reality, O'Hare shot down only three aircraft, rather than the six he thought he had, or the five he was credited with,although he so disrupted their attack that he prevented it from being a success.  One of the stricken Japanese bombers did attempt to fly into the Lexington, so four were in fact lost during the raid.

The heroic O'Hare was killed in combat in November, 1943.

Sundin also reports that the first advance party of the U.S. 8th Air Force arrived in the United Kingdom.

The 8th, of course, would go on to figure enormously in the US strategic bombing campaign over Germany.

Sundin also notes that the vast majority of Norwegian teachers, on this day, refused an order to become fascists, leading to some of them enduing up in concentration camps.

The Battle of Badung Strait ended in a Japanese victory, with the Japanese navy driving off a much larger combined Allied task force.   

The Japanese landed forces on Portuguese Timor and took the airfield.  Portugal wasn't in the war and was now enduring its second Timorese occupation, as the British and Australians had occupied it first to prevent it from being attacked by the Japanese.  The Portuguese protested the occupation without success.

Portuguese Timor was in the midst of an interesting transition at the time.  The Portuguese government had just turned education over to the Catholic Church, and as a result, the educational fortunes of the population were improving.  During the Japanese occupation of Timor the distinction between Portuguese and Dutch Timor were ignored, fairly obviously, but the Portuguese reasserted their possession in 1945 and would maintain it until 1975.  The region was then invaded, following the political turmoil in Portugal of that period, by Indonesia, but in 2002 it gained independence.  It's own independence movement can trace its origin to the improved educational lot of the population that started in 1941.

The Japanese also attacked Koepang in Dutch Timor on the same day, logically enough as it was all one island. The action was unusual in that it featured Japanese paratroopers who landed to take an airfield, but who were successfully repulsed by Australian troops.  Japan did have paratroopers but they received little use during the war, and were in fact mostly only used in the early stages of the war in the Pacific.

German U-boats started raiding ships off of the Lesser Antilles.  The Italian submarine Torelli participated with them.

The Hakim of Bahrain, Hamad ibn Isa Al Khalifa, died on this day in 1942.  Under his administration, which commenced in 1932, oil exploration in the country commenced.  Bahrain was a British protectorate at the time, something that had come about as the ruling family needed outside support due to their unstable position in the country.

Wednesday, February 4, 1942. Men of miscalculation.

In North Africa, an odd event known as the Abdeen Palace Incident occurred, as was reported by Sarah Sundin in her blog:

February 4, 1942: In North Africa, British retreat ends at Gazala, Libya. Japanese take Ambon, Netherlands East Indies, from a small Australian garrison. British troops surround Egyptian palace in Cairo to force King Farouk to abdicate.

I'd note, FWIW, that I disagree with that date for the Japanese taking Ambon, I think it was February 3.  But the date for the British coup in regard to King Farouk is quite correct, although he did not abdicate.  Rather, he was forced to accede to a new government.  He remained the king for another decade.

King Farouk in 1946.  He as a member of the Turco-Circassian elite in the country, which owned 3/4s of the land at the time.

Farouk was, suffice it to say, an interesting figure who was the king over an interesting country.  He was of Circassian, Turkish, French, Albanian and Greek descent, meaning he lacked Arab or Egyptian genetic heritage.  His bodyguards were Albanians, the only people he trusted in that role.  His actual heritage was more Circassian than anything else, due to the presence of various Circassian slave girls in his heritage.  He became king at age 16 and never got along with the country's British representative, Miles Lampson.  He strongly favored Italians over the British.

Egypt had technically been an Ottoman possession until World War One, and after that was technically independent but was in fact a quasi British satellite with various treaty obligations to the British.  It was not a declared combatant in the war, but treaty rights in which the British had the right to station troops there to defend it meant that it was in fact a combat theater.  Beset by a complicated domestic travails, including the lack of a male heir, he lived a lavish lifestyle which, early in the war, caused him to lose favor with the Egyptian people who were aware that the British royals were sacrificing during the war.  His palace did not adhere to blackout provisions in Cairo.

The British exerted heavy pressure over who would hold office in the Egyptian government and Farouk generally yielded to them, but on this day their displeasure over the makeup of the government boiled over.  Farouk asked his military leaders how long they could hold out against the British if they refused British demands, and were informed that they could only do so for two hours.  On this night, the British presented Farouk with an ultimatum and troops surrounded his place.  Ultimately, they stormed it.  Farouk capitulated and a new Egyptian government was formed.  The British representative, unbeknownst to him, was lucky to leave with his life, as Farouk's body guards were hidden in the room, ready to open fire if he was touched.

Ironically, the event caused the Egyptian people to rally behind Farouk, who resented the obvious British termination of their chosen government in favor of one that would do the British bidding. Farouk did not rise to the occasion, however, and the event marked part of his slide into increased gross personal excess in every imaginable fashion.  It also marked a turning point in Egyptian politics as Egyptian military leaders became opponents of ongoing British presence, something that would ultimately lead them to depose Farouk and take over the country, with their rule effectively continuing on to the present day.

Farouk's popularity with Egyptians did not last, and he was deposed in 1952 as noted, spending the rest of his life in Italy.  The entire matter ultimately proved to be a British disaster.

As an aside, his sister, Princess Fawzia Faud, would be Queen of Iran in an arranged political marriage with the Shah of Iran from 1941 to 1948. The marriage brought Iran added status, not Egypt, as the latter was the more important state. That marriage ended in divorce.  She remarried an Egyptian army officer/diplomat and lived the rest of her life in Egypt, dying in 2013.

Also on this Wednesday, February 4, 1942, Hermann Goering met with Benito Mussolini regarding the invasion of Malta.  Mussolini wasn't impressed.

Suffice it to say, the day for German invasions had really passed.  The Germans had essentially concluded that it was incapable of invading Great Britain and had turned its eyes East, oddly partially, at least, for that reasons.  That of course brought about the invasion of the Soviet Union, which was not going well.  

The Germans and Italians were not going to invade Malta.

In North Africa, however, the Germans and Italians were doing fairly well, which perhaps gave rise to the delusion that they'd be in the position for a Maltese offensive.  On this day they took Dema, Libya.  British lines, however, were forming.

Lord Beaverbrook was appointed head of the Ministry of War Production, which had been created on this day.  He resigned after occupying the office for two weeks.  The Ontario native clashed with another figure in the administration and determined to depart the agency.

Saturday January 10, 1942. Joe Louis joins the Army. Mickey Rooney gets married. . . for the first time. Ford starts building Jeeps.

 Boxer Joe Louis, who regained his heavyweight title the day prior, joined the U.S. Army.

Joe Louis sewing on Sergeant First Class stripes.

Louis was initially assigned to the cavalry, which came about due to a love of horsemanship.

As a slight aside, this really shows wartime conditions in that the recruiting station was open on a Saturday.

Mickey Rooney, age 21, married Ava Gardner, age 19.  It was the first of eight marriages for Rooney, three for Gardner, and would last only a year, mostly broken up due to Rooney's behavior, which included womanizing.  It's interesting, I suppose, in the context of Rooney, at that time, having a very youthful and childlike appearance, and having played rather innocent roles.  Gardner, at that time, was practically unknown.

Rooney, FWIW, would not enter the service until 1944.

Even while things were getting increasingly desperate in the Philippines, the Japanese presented their first surrender demand to the forces at Bataan on this day, the first US troop convoy departed Halifax, Nova Scotia, for Londonderry, Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland would be a major staging area and training area for US forces in the British Isles early in the American participation in the war.

German forces in the Soviet Union began to suffer general reversals in the face of the Soviet Winter Offensive and the weather.

The Ford Motor Company received a contract to manufacture Jeeps.

The history of Ford Jeeps is slightly complicated.  Willys had secured the contract to make 1/4 ton trucks for the services but production needs were obviously going to exceed what Willys Overland could produce.  Accordingly, a contract to produce the standardized Willlys pattern of Jeep issued to Ford. Ford would build 300,000 Jeeps during the war, whereas Willys made 363,000.

Willys, Ford and Bantam had all competed for the contract for the 1/4 ton truck prior to the war, with Ford having introduced a very light vehicle, just as Bantam had.

Ford "Pygmy" competition vehicle for the 1/4 ton truck.

Pre-production numbers were actually produced in some volume, although almost all of them were supplied to the British and the Soviets via lend lease.  Production of  the standardized Jeep has started the prior summer, but the vehicle was still brand new and no examples of it were overseas in spite of it being shown in movies in that role quite frequently.

Wednesday December 31, 1941. The conclusion of a disasterous year.

It was New Year's Eve, a traditional day of celebration in the Western World, and those using the Christian calendar in general, which at this time was the whole world, save for church calendars using the "old calendar".  Often a day of revelry, this one no doubt was in spite of the war, but the war would have weirdly warped it in at least some fashion.

It's also one of resolutions, then and now.

Making any?

As earlier noted in our Today In Wyoming's History: December 31 entry:

1941   Big Piney, Pinedale, Nowood, and Star Valley became the first Wyoming Conservation Districts when their Certifications of Organization were signed by Wyoming's Secretary of State Lester Hunt.

At least when it falls on a weekday, as it did in 1941, it's also a work day, although not all private employers observe that in the same fashion.

The Japanese were working, with ongoing advances throughout the Pacific and Far East. And they were back in action in the Hawaiian islands, where  Japanese submarines shelled Kauai and Maui.

Allied leaders agreed to a Germany First policy in the war and form a combined US/UK Chiefs of Staff organization.

While looking back it was obvious that the war had turned, for those living in the time, facing constant Japanese expansion by the day, the decision to take on Germany first must have been daunting indeed.  This is how the map of Europe then looked:

This was, moreover, even worse than this might at first suggest.  Spain was still solidly aligned with Germany at the time, and had given airfield rights to German maritime patrols and port rights to German submarines, although secretly.  Sweden was in fact a neutral, but its raw materials were going to Germany.

And then there was the Japanese offensive all over the Pacific and Southeast Asia.

In Manila, residents were destroying alcohol in fear that Japanese troops would engage in a drunken rampage, news of what had occurred in Hong Kong having reached them.

Venezuela broke off diplomatic relations with Germany, Italy and Japan.

Things must have looked awful.  And indeed they were.

But the seeds of victory were already there, even though revelers this evening would have had real reason to doubt it.  Germany had not defeated the Soviet Union, which was fighting back now that winter had arrived.  The British were advancing in North Africa, which constituted a real second front even if the USSR would never admit that.  The British were also conducting raids along the Atlantic coast pretty much whatever they wanted to, demonstrating that even though the Germans commissioned a new U-boat nearly every day, they still weren't able to drive the British from the sea or even really dominate the surface of the Atlantic.  

The Japanese, for their part, were on the march, but the case still remained that they were not into a decade long war with China which they had not defeated.  No matter how much the Japanese advanced, that remained a daunting fact.  Until they could actually take China out of the war, China would consume the bulk of its ground forces and men committed anywhere else took away from that.  They were advancing, but only because their navy had never been committed against China.  It was proving highly effective against the U.S. Navy, the Royal Navy, and the Dutch Navy, but even there, it had not struck a decisive blow against any of them.

Closer to home

My family has never been big on New Year's Eve, which makes me guess that my parents families weren't either.  For Catholics, January 1 is the Catholic Holy Day of Obligation, the Solemnity of Mary, and December 31 has always had a Mass of Anticipation.  Without knowing, my guess is that this would have been the day my parents' families would have chosen to go to Mass, but I could well be wrong.  I'd definitely be wrong if my then 12-year-old father had to serve a January 1 Mass.

My parents would have still been enjoying a holiday break from school, and probably dreading the return to school the following week.

Tuesday, December 30, 1941. A day of Axis setbacks.

 

The British offensive, Operation Crusader, drew to a successful conclusion on this day in 1941.  It had commenced on November 18.  It had driven the Axis forces in North Africa back from Tobruk and a substantial distance in retreat in Libya.

Winston Churchill, having recently addressed Congress, now addressed the Canadian Parliament in a speech famously recalled as the "Chicken Speech".  In it, he stated:

It is with feelings of pride and encouragement that I find myself here in the House of Commons of Canada, invited to address the Parliament of the senior Dominion of the Crown. I am very glad to see again my old friend Mr. Mackenzie King, for fifteen years out of twenty your Prime Minister, and I thank him for the too complimentary terms in which he has referred to myself. I bring you the assurance of good will and affection from every one in the Motherland. We are most grateful for all you have done in the common cause, and we know that you are resolved to do whatever more is possible as the need arises and as opportunity serves. Canada occupies a unique position in the British Empire because of its unbreakable ties with Britain and its ever-growing friendship and intimate association with the United States. Canada is a potent magnet, drawing together those in the new world and in the old whose fortunes are now united in a deadly struggle for life and honour against the common foe. The contribution of Canada to the Imperial war effort in troops, in ships, in aircraft, in food, and in finance has been magnificent. 

The Canadian Army now stationed in England has chafed not to find itself in contact with the enemy. But I am here to tell you that it has stood and still stands in the key position to strike at the invader should he land upon our shores. In a few months, when the invasion season returns, the Canadian Army may be engaged in one of the most frightful battles the world has ever seen, but on the other hand their presence may help to deter the enemy from attempting to fight such a battle on British soil. Although the long routine of training and preparation is undoubtedly trying to men who left prosperous farms and businesses, or other responsible civil work, inspired by an eager and ardent desire to fight the enemy, although this is trying to high-mettled temperaments, the value of the service rendered is unquestionable, and I am sure that the peculiar kind of self-sacrifice involved will be cheerfully or at least patiently endured. 

The Canadian Government have imposed no limitation on the use of the Canadian Army, whether on the Continent of Europe or elsewhere, and I think it is extremely unlikely that this war will end without the Canadian Army coming to close quarters with the Germans, as their fathers did at Ypres, on the Somme, or on the Vimy Ridge. Already at Hong Kong, that beautiful colony which the industry and mercantile enterprise of Britain has raised from a desert isle and made the greatest port of shipping in the whole world — Hong Kong, that Colony wrested from us for a time until we reach the peace table, by the overwhelming power of the Home Forces of Japan, to which it lay in proximity — at Hong Kong Canadian soldiers of the Royal Rifles of Canada and the Winnipeg Grenadiers, under a brave officer whose loss we mourn, have played a valuable part in gaining precious days, and have crowned with military honour the reputation of their native land. 

Another major contribution made by Canada to the Imperial war effort is the wonderful and gigantic Empire training scheme for pilots for the Royal and Imperial Air Forces. This has now been as you know well in full career for nearly two years in conditions free from all interference by the enemy. The daring youth of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, with many thousands from the homeland, are perfecting their training under the best conditions, and we are being assisted on a large scale by the United States, many of whose training facilities have been placed at our disposal. This scheme will provide us in 1942 and 1943 with the highest class of trained pilots, observers, and air gunners in the numbers necessary to man the enormous flow of aircraft which the factories of Britain, of the Empire and of the United States are and will be producing. 

I could also speak on the naval production of corvettes and above all of merchant ships which is proceeding on a scale almost equal to the building of the United Kingdom, all of which Canada has set on foot. I could speak of many other activities, of tanks, of the special forms of modern high-velocity cannon and of the great supplies of raw materials and many other elements essential to our war effort on which your labours are ceaselessly and tirelessly engaged. But I must not let my address to you become a catalogue, so I turn to less technical fields of thought. 

We did not make this war, we did not seek it. We did all we could to avoid it. We did too much to avoid it. We went so far at times in trying to avoid it as to be almost destroyed by it when it broke upon us. But that dangerous corner has been turned, and with every month and every year that passes we shall confront the evil-doers with weapons as plentiful, as sharp, and as destructive as those with which they have sought to establish their hateful domination. 

I should like to point out to you that we have not at any time asked for any mitigation in the fury or malice of the enemy. The peoples of the British Empire may love peace. They do not seek the lands or wealth of any country, but they are a tough and hardy lot. We have not journeyed all this way across the centuries, across the oceans, across the mountains, across the prairies, because we are made of sugar candy. 

Look at the Londoners, the Cockneys; look at what they have stood up to. Grim and gay with their cry "We can take it," and their war-time mood of "What is good enough for anybody is good enough for us." We have not asked that the rules of the game should be modified. We shall never descend to the German and Japanese level, but if anybody likes to play rough we can play rough too. Hitler and his Nazi gang have sown the wind; let them reap the whirlwind. Neither the length of the struggle nor any form of severity which it may assume shall make us weary or shall make us quit.

I have been all this week with the President of the United States, that great man whom destiny has marked for this climax of human fortune. We have been concerting the united pacts and resolves of more than thirty States and nations to fight on in unity together and in fidelity one to another, without any thought except the total and final extirpation of the Hitler tyranny, the Japanese frenzy, and the Mussolini flop.

There shall be no halting, or half measures, there shall be no compromise, or parley. These gangs of bandits have sought to darken the light of the world; have sought to stand between the common people of all the lands and their march forward into their inheritance. They shall themselves be cast into the pit of death and shame, and only when the earth has been cleansed and purged of their crimes and their villainy shall we turn from the task which they have forced upon us, a task which we were reluctant to undertake, but which we shall now most faithfully and punctiliously discharge. According to my sense of proportion, this is no time to speak of the hopes of the future, or the broader world which lies beyond our struggles and our victory. We have to win that world for our children. We have to win it by our sacrifices. We have not won it yet. The crisis is upon us. The power of the enemy is immense. If we were in any way to underrate the strength, the resources or the ruthless savagery of that enemy, we should jeopardize, not only our lives, for they will be offered freely, but the cause of human freedom and progress to which we have vowed ourselves and all we have. We cannot for a moment afford to relax. On the contrary we must drive ourselves forward with unrelenting zeal. In this strange, terrible world war there is a place for everyone, man and woman, old and young, hale and halt; service in a thousand forms is open. There is no room now for the dilettante, the weakling, for the shirker, or the sluggard. The mine, the factory, the dockyard, the salt sea waves, the fields to till, the home, the hospital, the chair of the scientist, the pulpit of the preacher — from the highest to the humblest tasks, all are of equal honour; all have their part to play. The enemies ranged against us, coalesced and combined against us, have asked for total war. Let us make sure they get it.

That grand old minstrel, Harry Lauder — Sir Harry Lauder, I should say, and no honour was better deserved — had a song in the last War which began, "If we all look back on the history of the past, we can just tell where we are." Let us then look back. We plunged into this war all unprepared because we had pledged our word to stand by the side of Poland, which Hitler had feloniously invaded, and in spite of a gallant resistance had soon struck down. There followed those astonishing seven months which were called on this side of the Atlantic the "phoney" war. Suddenly the explosion of pent-up German strength and preparation burst upon Norway, Denmark, Holland, and Belgium. All these absolutely blameless neutrals, to most of whom Germany up to the last moment was giving every kind of guarantee and assurance, were overrun and trampled down. The hideous massacre of Rotterdam, where 30,000 people perished, showed the ferocious barbarism in which the German Air Force revels when, as in Warsaw and later Belgrade, it is able to bomb practically undefended cities.

On top of all this came the great French catastrophe. The French Army collapsed, and the French nation was dashed into utter and, as it has so far proved, irretrievable confusion. The French Government had at their own suggestion solemnly bound themselves with us not to make a separate peace. It was their duty and it was also their interest to go to North Africa, where they would have been at the head of the French Empire. In Africa, with our aid, they would have had overwhelming sea power. They would have had the recognition of the United States, and the use of all the gold they had lodged beyond the seas. If they had done this Italy might have been driven out of the war before the end of 1940, and France would have held her place as a nation in the counsels of the Allies and at the conference table of the victors. But their generals misled them. When I warned them that Britain would fight on alone whatever they did, their generals told their Prime Minister and his divided Cabinet, "In three weeks England will have her neck wrung like a chicken." Some chicken; some neck.

What a contrast has been the behaviour of the valiant, stout-hearted Dutch, who still stand forth as a strong living partner in the struggle! Their venerated Queen and their Government are in England, their Princess and her children have found asylum and protection here in your midst. But the Dutch nation are defending their Empire with dogged courage and tenacity by land and sea and in the air. Their submarines are inflicting a heavy daily toll upon the Japanese robbers who have come across the seas to steal the wealth of the East Indies, and to ravage and exploit its fertility and its civilization. The British Empire and the United States are going to the aid of the Dutch. We are going to fight out this new war against Japan together. We have suffered together and we shall conquer together.

But the men of Bordeaux, the men of Vichy, they would do nothing like this. They lay prostrate at the foot of the conqueror. They fawned upon him. What have they got out of it? The fragment of France which was left to them is just as powerless, just as hungry as, and even more miserable, because more divided, than the occupied regions themselves. Hitler plays from day to day a cat-and-mouse game with these tormented men. One day he will charge them a little less for holding their countrymen down.

Another day he will let out a few thousand broken prisoners of war from the one-and-a-half or one-and-three-quarter millions he has collected. Or again he will shoot a hundred French hostages to give them a taste of the lash. On these blows and favours the Vichy Government have been content to live from day to day. But even this will not go on indefinitely. At any moment it may suit Hitler's plans to brush them away. Their only guarantee is Hitler's good faith, which, as everyone knows, biteth like the adder and stingeth like the asp.

But some Frenchmen there were who would not bow their knees and who under General de Gaulle have continued the fight on the side of the Allies. They have been condemned to death by the men of Vichy, but their names will be held and are being held in increasing respect by nine Frenchmen out of every ten throughout the once happy, smiling land of France. But now strong forces are at hand. The tide has turned against the Hun. Britain, which the men of Bordeaux thought and then hoped would soon be finished, Britain with her Empire around her carried the weight of the war alone for a whole long year through the darkest part of the valley. She is growing stronger every day. You can see it here in Canada. Anyone who has the slightest knowledge of our affairs is aware that very soon we shall be superior in every form of equipment to those who have taken us at the disadvantage of being but half armed.

The Russian armies, under their warrior leader, Josef Stalin, are waging furious war with increasing success along the thousand-mile front of their invaded country. General Auchinleck, at the head of a British, South African, New Zealand and Indian army, is striking down and mopping up the German and Italian forces which had attempted the invasion of Egypt. Not only are they being mopped up in the desert, but great numbers of them have been drowned on the way there by British submarines and the R.A.F. in which Australian squadrons played their part.

As I speak this afternoon an important battle is being fought around Jedabia. We must not attempt to prophesy its result, but I have good confidence. All this fighting in Libya proves that when our men have equal weapons in their hands and proper support from the air they are more than a match for the Nazi hordes. In Libya, as in Russia, events of great importance and of most hopeful import have taken place. But greatest of all, the mighty Republic of the United States has entered the conflict, and entered it in a manner which shows that for her there can be no withdrawal except by death or victory. 

Et partout dans la France occupée et inoccupée (car leur sort est égal), ces honnêtes gens, ce grand peuple, la nation française, se redresse. L'espoir se rallume dans les coeurs d'une race guerrière, même désarmée, berceau de la liberté révolutionnaire et terrible aux vainqueurs esclaves. Et partout, on voit le point du jour, et la lumière grandit, rougeâtre, mais claire. Nous ne perdrons jamais la confiance que la France jouera le rôle des hommes libres et qu'elle reprendra par des voies dures sa place dans la grande compagnie des nations libératrices et victorieuses. Ici, au Canada, où la langue française est honorée et parlée, nous nous tenons prêts et armés pour aider et pour saluer cette résurrection nationale. 

Now that the whole of the North American continent is becoming one gigantic arsenal, and armed camp; now that the immense reserve power of Russia is gradually becoming apparent; now that long-suffering, unconquerable China sees help approaching; now that the outraged and subjugated nations can see daylight ahead, it is permissible to take a broad forward view of the war.

We may observe three main periods or phases of the struggle that lies before us. First there is the period of consolidation, of combination, and of final preparation. In this period, which will certainly be marked by much heavy fighting, we shall still be gathering our strength, resisting the assaults of the enemy, and acquiring the necessary overwhelming air superiority and shipping tonnage to give our armies the power to traverse, in whatever numbers may be necessary, the seas and oceans which, except in the case of Russia, separate us from our foes. It is only when the vast shipbuilding programme on which the United States has already made so much progress, and which you are powerfully aiding, comes into full flood, that we shall be able to bring the whole force of our manhood and of our modern scientific equipment to bear upon the enemy. How long this period will take depends upon the vehemence of the effort put into production in all our war industries and shipyards.

The second phase which will then open may be called the phase of liberation. During this phase we must look to the recovery of the territories which have been lost or which may yet be lost, and also we must look to the revolt of the conquered peoples from the moment that the rescuing and liberating armies and air forces appear in strength within their bounds. For this purpose it is imperative that no nation or region overrun, that no Government or State which has been conquered, should relax its moral and physical efforts and preparation for the day of deliverance. The invaders, be they German or Japanese, must everywhere be regarded as infected persons to be shunned and isolated as far as possible. Where active resistance is impossible, passive resistance must be maintained. The invaders and tyrants must be made to feel that their fleeting triumphs will have a terrible reckoning, and that they are hunted men and that their cause is doomed. Particular punishment will be reserved for the quislings and traitors who make themselves the tools of the enemy. They will be handed over to the judgment of their fellow-countrymen.

There is a third phase which must also be contemplated, namely, the assault upon the citadels and the home-lands of the guilty Powers both in Europe and in Asia. Thus I endeavour in a few words to cast some forward light upon the dark, inscrutable mysteries of the future. But in thus forecasting the course along which we should seek to advance, we must never forget that the power of the enemy and the action of the enemy may at every stage affect our fortunes. Moreover, you will notice that I have not attempted to assign any time-limits to the various phases. These time-limits depend upon our exertions, upon our achievements, and on the hazardous and uncertain course of the war.

Nevertheless I feel it is right at this moment to make it clear that, while an ever-increasing bombing offensive against Germany will remain one of the principal methods by which we hope to bring the war to an end, it is by no means the only method which our growing strength now enables us to take into account. Evidently the most strenuous exertions must be made by all. As to the form which those exertions take, that is for each partner in the grand alliance to judge for himself in consultation with others and in harmony with the general scheme. Let us then address ourselves to our task, not in any way underrating its tremendous difficulties and perils, but in good heart and sober confidence, resolved that, whatever the cost, whatever the suffering, we shall stand by one another, true and faithful comrades, and do our duty, God helping us, to the end.

That part of the speech, set out above in French, was delivered in French.

The Red Army made amphibious landings in eastern Crimea.

The Soviets were demonstrating operational capabilities that the Germans lacked, which was creating real problems for the Wehrmacht.  Amphibious operations were one such capability.

The Battle of Kampar commenced in Malaysia, pitting Japanese troops against British and Indian troops.

Japanese tanks in the Battle of Kampar.

The battle would be a Japanese defeat.  The British and Indian forces ultimately withdrew, but their goal had been to slow the Japanese advance, which they did.

Manuel Quezon was inaugurated to his second term of President of the Philippines.  On that occasion, Gen. MacArthur delivered this address:

Never before in all history has there been a more solemn and significant inauguration. An act, symbolical of democratic processes, is placed against the background of a sudden, merciless war. 

The thunder of death and destruction, dropped from the skies, can be heard in the distance. Our ears almost catch the roar of battle as our soldiers close on the firing line. The horizon is blackened by the smoke of destructive fire. The air reverberates to the dull roar of exploding bombs, 

Such is the bed of birth of this new government, of this new nation. For four hundred years the Philippines has struggled upward toward self government. Just at the end of its tuitionary period, just on the threshold of independence, came the great hour of decision. There was no hesitation, no vacillation, no moment of doubt. The whole country followed its great leader in choosing the side of freedom against the side of slavery. We have just inaugurated him, we have just thereby confirmed his momentous decision. Hand in hand with the United States and the other free nations of the world, this basic and fundamental issue will be fought through to victory. Come what may ultimate triumph will be its reward. 

Through this its gasping agony of travail, through what Winston Churchill calls “blood and sweat and tears,” from the grim shadow of the Valley of Death, Oh Merciful God, preserve this noble race. 

Never before in all history has there been a more solemn and significant inauguration. An act, symbolical of democratic processes, is placed against the background of a sudden, merciless war. 

The thunder of death and destruction, dropped from the skies, can be heard in the distance. Our ears almost catch the roar of battle as our soldiers close on the firing line. The horizon is blackened by the smoke of destructive fire. The air reverberates to the dull roar of exploding bombs. 

Such is the bed of birth of this new government, of this new nation. For four hundred years the Philippines has struggled upward toward self government. Just at the end of its tuitionary period, just on the threshold of independence, came the great hour of decision. There was no hesitation, no vacillation, no moment of doubt. The whole country followed its great leader in choosing the side of freedom against the side of slavery. We have just inaugurated him, we have just thereby confirmed his momentous decision. Hand in hand with the United States and the other free nations of the world, this basic and fundamental issue will be fought through to victory. Come what may ultimate triumph will be its reward. 

Through this its gasping agony of travail, through what Winston Churchill calls “blood and sweat and tears,” from the grim shadow of the Valley of Death, Oh Merciful God, preserve this noble race.

Ernest King assumed command of the US fleet.

Monday, December 29, 1941. The growing restrictions on Japanese Americans and a Japanese American Tragedy.

As we earlier noted in Today In Wyoming's History: December 29: .

1941  All German, Italian and Japanese aliens in California, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington and are ordered to surrender contraband. (WWII List).

"Contraband", in this context, was defined to include short-wave radios, cameras, binoculars, and weapons, or in other words items that the authorities  feared could be used for espionage, or defend a person engaged in espionage.

The US and Canada were moving rapidly towards internment of their ethnic Japanese residents who lived on the coast.

1941  Sunge Yoshimoto, age nineteen, killed in the Lincoln-Star Coal Company tipple south of Kemmerer.  He was a Japanese American war worker.

He lived in the household of his father, Charlie, who had been born in Japan.  Mr. Yoshimoto was widowed, but he still had six children at home in Rock Springs, ranging from 23 years old to eleven.  A daughter-in-law, Hatsuko, of his also lived in the household at the time.  Sunge had been born in Rock Springs as had all of his siblings.  His sister-in-law had been born in Idaho.

On the same day, the Japanese bombed Corregidor for the first time.

Douglas MacArthur was on the cover of the Time magazine released on this day.  An aerial gunner was on the cover of Life.

The Red Army took back Kerch in Crimea.  Elsewhere in the East the Germans were completely on the defensive.

Eddie Rickenbacker announced that the 1942 Indianapolis 500 would be canceled for the duration of the war.  He was then the President of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Pvt Moss wrote another letter home.

Saturday, December 27, 1941. Vågsøy, Norway raided by Commandos. Australia turns towards the US.

Following up on yesterdays' diversionary raid on the Lofoten islands, British and Norwegian commandos raided the Vågsøy, Norway in Operation Archery.  The raid was the first combined arms raid conducted by the British.

British commandos in action on Operation Archery.

Fish oil was the material objective, but a broader goal was to cause the Germans to shift more manpower to Norway, where they'd accordingly reduce pressure on the Eastern Front. To that extent it was a success, as the Germans in fact moved 30,000 men into the Scandinavian country due to Hitler's fear that the British were preparing to invade Norway.  Ultimately the Germans would come to station 15 Divisions in Norway, where the 300,000 men were in fact fairly useless.

Operation Anklet, the diversionary raid, ended as the Germans were reacting with aircraft which that mission now lacked.

The first SOE operatives are dropped by the British into Denmark, but as the item below details, one was killed when his parachute didn't open:

Today in World War II History—December 27, 1941

Australian Prime Minister released this statement for publication.

That reddish veil which o'er the face

Of night-hag East is drawn ...

Flames new disaster for the race?

Or can it be the dawn? 

So wrote Bernard O'Dowd. I see 1942 as a year in which we shall know the answer. I would, however, that we provide the answer. We can and we will. Therefore I see 1942 as a year of immense change in Australian life. 

The Australian government's policy has been grounded on two facts. One is that the war with Japan is not a phase of the struggle with the Axis powers, but is a new war. The second is that Australia must go on a war footing. Those two facts involve two lines of action - one in the direction of external policy as to our dealings with Britain, the United States, Russia, the Netherlands East Indies and China in the higher direction of the war in the Pacific. 

The second is the reshaping, in fact the revolutionising, of the Australian way of life until a war footing is attained quickly, efficiently and withoutquestion. ... 

Now with equal realism, we take the view that, while the determination of military policy is the Soviet's business, we should be able to look forward with reason to aid from Russia against Japan. We look for a solid and impregnable barrier of the Democracies against the three Axis Powers, and we refuse to accept the dictum that the Pacific struggle must be treated as a subordinate segment of the general conflict. By that it is not meant that any one of the other theatres of war is of less importance than the Pacific, but that Australia asks for a concerted plan evoking the greatest strength at the Democracies' disposal, determined upon hurling Japan back. The Australian Government, therefore, regards the Pacific struggle as primarily one in which the United States and Australia must have the fullest say in the direction of the democracies' fighting plan. Without any inhibitions of any kind, I make it quite clear that Australia looks to America, free of any pangs as to our traditional links or kinship with the United Kingdom. 

We know the problems that the United Kingdom faces. We know the constant threat of invasion. We know the dangers of dispersal of strength, but we know too, that Australia can go and Britain can still hold on. ...  

Summed up, Australian external policy will be shaped toward obtaining Russian aid, and working out, with the United States, as the major factor, a plan of Pacific strategy, along with British, Chinese and Dutch forces. Australian internal policy has undergone striking changes in the past few weeks. These, and those that will inevitably come before 1942 is far advanced, have been prompted by several reasons. In the first place, the Commonwealth Government found it exceedingly difficult to bring Australian people to a realisation of what, after two years of war, our position had become. Even the entry of Japan, bringing a direct threat in our own waters, was met with a subconscious view that the Americans would deal with the short-sighted, underfed and fanatical Japanese. 

The announcement that no further appeals would be made to the Australian people, and the decisions that followed, were motivated by psychological factors. They had an arresting effect. They awakened the somewhat lackadaisical Australian mind the attitude that was imperative if we were to save ourselves, to enter an all-in effort in the only possible manner.

That experiment in psychology was eminently successful, and we commence 1942 with a better realisation, by a greater number of Australians, of what the war means than in the whole preceding two years.

The decisions were prompted by other reasons, all related to the necessity of getting onto a war footing, and the results so far achieved have been most heartening, especially in respect of production and conservation of stocks. I make it clear that the experiment undertaken was never intended as one to awaken Australian patriotism or sense of duty. Those qualities have been ever-present; but the response to leadership and direction had never been requested of the people, and desirable talents and untapped resources had lain dormant. Our task for 1942 is stern ... The position Australia faces internally far exceeds in potential and sweeping dangers anything that confronted us in 1914-1918.

The year 1942 will impose supreme tests. These range from resistance to invasion to deprivation of more and more amenities ...

Australians must realise that to place the nation on a war footing every citizen must place himself, his private and business affairs, his entire mode of living, on a war footing. The civilian way of life cannot be any less rigorous, can contribute no less than that which the fighting men have to follow. I demand that Australians everywhere realise that Australia is now inside the firing lines.

Australian governmental policy will be directed strictly on those lines. We have to regard our country and its 7,000,000 people as though we were a nation and a people with the enemy hammering at our frontier. Australians must be perpetually on guard; on guard against the possibility, at any hour without warning, of raid or invasion; on guard against spending money, or doing anything that cannot be justified; on guard against hampering by disputation or idle, irresponsible chatter, the decisions of the Government taken for the welfare of all.

All Australia is the stake in this war. All Australia must stand together to hold that stake. We face a powerful, ably led and unbelievably courageous foe. We must watch the enemy accordingly. We shall watch him accordingly.

The speech acknowledged that Australia was looking to the United States for support, rather than the United Kingdom, a major shift in its traditional allegiance to its mother country.

On the same day, the Japanese bombed the open city of Manila.  On the same day, US and Filipino forces withdrew to defensive line "D", the third of five pre-war designed lines of defense.

The US, as also detailed in the link above, commenced the rationing of rubber.  You can read more about that here:

“Make It Do—Tire Rationing in World War II”).

Friday, December 26, 1941. Churchill address Congress.

Winston Churchill addressed a joint session of Congress, the first British Prime Minister to do so.  He stated:

Members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives of the United States, I feel greatly honored that you should have thus invited me to enter the United States Senate Chamber and address the representatives of both branches of Congress. The fact that my American forebears have for so many generations played their part in the life of the United States, and that here I am, an Englishman, welcomed in your midst, makes this experience one of the most moving and thrilling in my life, which is already long and has not been entirely uneventful. I wish indeed that my mother, whose memory I cherish, across the vale of years, could have been here to see. By the way, I cannot help reflecting that if my father had been American and my mother British instead of the other way around, I might have got here on my own. In that case this would not have been the first time you would have heard my voice. In that case I should not have needed any invitation. But if I had it is hardly likely that it would have been unanimous. So perhaps things are better as they are.

I may confess, however, that I do not feel quite like a fish out of water in a legislative assembly where English is spoken. I am a child of the House of Commons. I was brought up in my father's house to believe in democracy. "Trust the people." That was his message. I used to see him cheered at meetings and in the streets by crowds of workingmen way back in those aristocratic Victorian days when as Disraeli said "the world was for the few, and for the very few."

Therefore I have been in full harmony all my life with the tides which have flowed on both sides of the Atlantic against privilege and monopoly and I have steered confidently towards the Gettysburg ideal of government of the people, by the people, for the people.

I owe my advancement entirely to the House of Commons, whose servant I am. In my country as in yours public men are proud to be the servants of the State and would be ashamed to be its masters. The House of Commons, if they thought the people wanted it, could, by a simple vote, remove me from my office. But I am not worrying about it at all,

As a matter of fact I am sure they will approve very highly of my journey here, for which I obtained the King's permission, in order to meet the President of the United States and to arrange with him for all that mapping out of our military plans and for all those intimate meetings of the high officers of the armed services in both countries which are indispensable for the successful prosecution of the war.

I should like to say first of all how much I have been impressed and encouraged by the breadth of view and sense of proportion which I have found in all quarters over here to which I have had access. Anyone who did not understand the size and solidarity of the foundations of the United States, might easily have expected to find an excited, disturbed, self-cantered atmosphere, with all minds fixed upon the novel, startling, and painful episodes of sudden war as they hit America. After all, the United States have been attacked and set upon by three most powerfully armed dictator states, the greatest military power in Europe, the greatest military power in Asia-Japan, Germany and Italy have all declared and are making war upon you, and the quarrel is opened which can only end in their overthrow or yours.

But here in Washington in these memorable days I have found an Olympian fortitude which, far from being based upon complacency, is only the mask of an inflexible purpose and the proof of a sure, well-grounded confidence in the final outcome. We in Britain had the same feeling in our darkest days. We too were sure that in the end all would be well.

You do not, I am certain, underrate the severity of the ordeal to which you and we have still to be subjected. The forces ranged against us are enormous. They are bitter, they are ruthless. The wicked men and their factions, who have launched their peoples on the path of war and conquest, know that they will be called to terrible account if they cannot beat down by force of arms the peoples they have assailed. They will stop at nothing. They have a vast accumulation of war weapons of all kinds. They have highly trained and disciplined armies, navies and air services. They have plans and designs which have long been contrived and matured. They will stop at nothing that violence or treachery can suggest.

It is quite true that on our side our resources in manpower and materials are far greater than theirs. But only a portion of your resources are as yet mobilized and developed, and we both of us have much to learn in the cruel art of war. We have therefore without doubt a time of tribulation before us. In this same time, some ground will be lost which it will be hard and costly to regain. Many disappointments and unpleasant surprises await us. Many of them will afflict us before the full marshalling of our latent and total power can be accomplished.

For the best part of twenty years the youth of Britain and America have been taught that war was evil, which is true, and that it would never come again, which has been proved false. For the best part of twenty years, the youth of Germany, of Japan and Italy, have been taught that aggressive war is the noblest duty of the citizen and that it should be begun as soon as the necessary weapons and organization have been made. We have performed the duties and tasks of peace. They have plotted and planned for war. This naturally has placed us, in Britain, and now places you in the United States at a disadvantage which only time, courage and untiring exertion can correct.

We have indeed to be thankful that so much time has been granted to us. If Germany had tried to invade the British Isles after the French collapse in June, 1940, and if Japan had declared war on the British Empire and the United States at about the same date, no one can say what disasters and agonies might not have been our lot. But now, at the end of December, 1941, our transformation from easy-going peace to total war efficiency has made very great progress.

The broad flow of munitions in Great Britain has already begun. Immense strides have been made in the conversion of American industry to military purposes. And now that the United States is at war, it is possible for orders to be given every day which in a year or eighteen months hence will produce results in war power beyond anything which has been seen or foreseen in the dictator states.

Provided that every effort is made, that nothing is kept back, that the whole manpower, brain power, virility, valor and civic virtue of the English-speaking world, with all its galaxy of loyal, friendly or associated communities and states-provided that is bent unremittingly to the simple but supreme task, I think it would be reasonable to hope that the end of 1942 will see us quite definitely in a better position than we are now. And that the year 1943 will enable us to assume the initiative upon an ample scale.

Some people may be startled or momentarily depressed when, like your President, I speak of a long and a hard war. Our peoples would rather know the truth, somber though it be. And after all, when we are doing the noblest work in the world, not only defending our hearths and homes, but the cause of freedom in every land, the question of whether deliverance comes in 1942 or 1943 or 1944, falls into its proper place in the grand proportions of human history. Sure I am that this day, now, we are the masters of our fate. That the task which has been set us is not above our strength. That its pangs and toils are not beyond our endurance. As long as we have faith in our cause, and an unconquerable willpower, salvation will not be denied us. In the words of the Psalmist: "He shall not be afraid of evil tidings. His heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord."

Not all the tidings will be evil. On the contrary, mighty strokes of war have already been dealt against the enemy-the glorious defense of their native soil by the Russian armies and people; wounds have been inflicted upon the Nazi tyranny and system which have bitten deep and will fester and inflame not only in the Nazi body but in the Nazi mind. The boastful Mussolini has crumpled already. He is now but a lackey and a serf, the merest utensil of his master's will. He has inflicted great suffering and wrong upon his own industrious people. He has been stripped of all his African empire. Abyssinia has been liberated. Our Armies of the East, which were so weak and ill-equipped at the moment of French desertion, now control all the regions from Teheran to Bengazi, and from Aleppo and Cyprus to the sources of the Nile.

For many months we devoted ourselves to preparing to take the offensive in Libya. The very considerable battle which has been proceeding there the last six weeks in the desert, has been most fiercely fought on both sides. Owing to the difficulties of supply upon the desert flank, we were never able to bring numerically equal forces to bear upon the enemy. Therefore we had to rely upon superiority in the numbers and qualities of tanks and aircraft, British and American. For the first time, aided by these-for the first time we have fought the enemy with equal weapons. For the first time we have made the Hun feel the sharp edge of those tools with which he has enslaved Europe. The armed forces of the enemy in Cyrenaica amounted to about 150,000 men, of whom a third were Germans. General Auchinleck set out to destroy totally that armed force, and I have every reason to believe that his aim will be fully accomplished. I am so glad to be able to place before you, members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives, at this moment when you are entering the war, the proof that with proper weapons and proper organization, we are able to beat the life out of the savage Nazi.

What Hitlerism is suffering in Libya is only a sample and a foretaste of what we have got to give him and his accomplices wherever this war should lead us in every quarter of the Globe.

There are good tidings also from blue water. The lifeline of supplies which joins our two nations across the ocean, without which all would fail,-that lifeline is flowing steadily and freely in spite of all that the enemy can do. It is a fact that the British Empire, which many thought eighteen months ago was broken and ruined, is now incomparably stronger and is growing stronger with every month.

Lastly, if you will forgive me for saying it, to me the best tidings of all-the United States, united as never before, has drawn the sword for freedom and cast away the scabbard.

All these tremendous facts have led the subjugated peoples of Europe to lift up their heads again in hope. They have put aside forever the shameful temptation of resigning themselves to the conqueror's will. Hope has returned to the hearts of scores of millions of men and women, and with that hope there burns the flame of anger against the brutal, corrupt invader. And still more fiercely burn the fires of hatred and contempt for the filthy Quislings whom he has suborned.

In a dozen famous ancient states, now prostrate under the Nazi yoke, the masses of the people, all classes and creeds, await the hour of liberation when they too will once again be able to play their part and strike their blows like men. That hour will strike. And its solemn peal will proclaim that night is past and that the dawn has come.

The onslaught upon us, so long and so secretly planned by Japan, has presented both our countries with grievous problems for which we could not be fully prepared. If people ask me, as they have a right to ask me in England, "Why is it that you have not got an ample equipment of modern aircraft and army weapons of all kinds in Malaya and in the East Indies?"-I can only point to the victory General Auchinleck has gained in the Libyan campaign. Had we diverted and dispersed our gradually-growing resources between Libya and Malaya, we should have been found wanting in both theaters.

If the United States has been found at a disadvantage at various points in the Pacific Ocean, we know well that that is to no small extent because of the aid which you have been giving to us in munitions for the defense of the British Isles and for the Libyan campaign, and above all because of your help in the Battle of the Atlantic, upon which all depends and which has in consequence been successfully and prosperously maintained.

Of course, it would have been much better, I freely admit, if we had had enough resources of all kinds to be at full strength at all threatened points. But considering how slowly and reluctantly we brought ourselves to large-scale preparations, and how long these preparations take, we had no right to expect to be in such a fortunate position.

The choice of how to dispose of our hitherto limited resources had to be made by Britain in time of war, and by the United States in time of peace. And I believe that history will pronounce that upon the whole, and it is upon the whole that these matters must be judged, that the choice made was right. Now that we are together, now that we are linked in a righteous comrade-ship of arms, now that our two considerable nations, each in perfect unity, have joined all their life-energies in a common resolve-a new scene opens upon which a steady light will glow and brighten.

Many people have been astonished that Japan should in a single day have plunged into war against the United States and the British Empire. We all wonder why, if this dark design with its laborious and intricate preparations had been so long filling their secret minds, they did not choose our moment of weakness eighteen months ago. Viewed quite dispassionately, in spite of the losses we have suffered and the further punishment we shall have to take, it certainly appears an irrational act. It is of course only prudent to assume that they have made very careful calculations and think they see their way through. Nevertheless, there may be another explanation.

We know that for many years past the policy of Japan has been dominated by secret societies of subalterns and junior officers of the army and navy, who have enforced their will upon successive Japanese cabinets and parliaments by the assassination of any Japanese statesmen who opposed or who did not sufficiently further their aggressive policy. It may be that these societies, dazzled and dizzy with their own schemes of aggression and the prospect of early victories, have forced their country-against its better judgment-into war. They have certainly embarked upon a very considerable undertaking.

After the outrages they have committed upon us at Pearl Harbor, in the Pacific Islands, in the Philippines, in Malaya and the Dutch East Indies, they must now know that the stakes for which they have decided to play are mortal. When we look at the resources of the United States and the British Empire compared to those of Japan; when we remember those of China, which have so long valiantly withstood invasion and tyranny-and when also we observe the Russian menace which hangs over Japan-it becomes still more difficult to reconcile Japanese action with prudence or even with sanity. What kind of a people do they think we are? Is it possible that they do not realize that we shall never cease to persevere against them until they have been taught a lesson which they and the world will never forget?

Members of the Senate, and members of the House of Representatives, I will turn for one moment more from the turmoil and convulsions of the present to the broader spaces of the future. Here we are together, facing a group of mighty foes who seek our ruin. Here we are together, defending all that to free men is dear. Twice in a single generation the catastrophe of world war has fallen upon us. Twice in our lifetime has the long arm of fate reached out across the oceans to bring the United States into the forefront of the battle.

If we had kept together after the last war, if we had taken common measures for our safety, this renewal of the curse need never have fallen upon us. Do we not owe it to ourselves, to our children, to tormented mankind, to make sure that these catastrophes do not engulf us for the third time?

It has been proved that pestilences may break out in the Old World which carry their destructive ravages into the New World, from which, once they are afoot, the New World can not escape. Duty and prudence alike command first that the germ-centers of hatred and revenge should be constantly and vigilantly served and treated in good time, and that an adequate organization should be set up to make sure that the pestilence can be controlled at its earliest beginnings, before it spreads and rages throughout the entire earth.

Five or six years ago it would have been easy, without shedding a drop of blood, for the United States and Great Britain to have insisted on the fulfilment of the disarmament clauses of the treaties which Germany signed after the Great War. And that also would have been the opportunity for assuring to the Germans those materials-those raw materials-which we declared in the Atlantic Charter should not be denied to any nation, victor or vanquished. The chance has passed, it is gone. Prodigious hammer-strokes have been needed to bring us together today.

If you will allow me to use other language, I will say that he must indeed have a blind soul who cannot see that some great purpose and design is being worked out here below of which we have the honor to be the faithful servants. It is not given to us to peer into the mysteries of the future. Still, I avow my hope and faith, sure and inviolate, that in the days to come the British and American peoples will, for their own safety and for the good of all, walk together in majesty, in justice and in peace.

MacArthur declared Manila an open city.

British commandos landed in the Lofeten Islands in Operation Anklet.  The raid was successful in its own right, although it was actually a diversion for a raid to take place the following day.

A German offensive that would run into May was commenced on the Kerch Peninsula in Crimea.

Closer to home

Both of my parents would have had this as a day off from school, but for my mother's parents it would also have been the holiday of Boxing Day.