The Viet Minh's Resistance Committee of the Saigon-Cholon Region was set up and issued an order calling for non-collaboration with the French. It was effectively a call to arms.
The Egyptian government demanded that British forces withdraw from the Sudan, prior to its incorporation with Egypt.
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In what would prove to be a last straw for Gen. Eisenhower, Gen. Patton expressed skepticism over denazification, comparing the Nazis to Republicans and Democrats.
Patton was growing increasingly frustrated now that peace had arrived. If Eisenhower could have read the comments in his journal, he would have been relieved by this time.
The Huaiyin–Huai'an Campaign ended in communist victory in China.
Former French pows went on a rampage in Saigon and killed members of the Viet Minh and innocent civilians, including children. French civilians joined in.
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Proclamation, September 5, 1925Purpose: To commemorate the cross erected and dedicated at Fort Niagara by Father Millett on Good Friday, 1688Date: September 5, 1925WHEREAS, by section 2 of an Act of Congress approved June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225), the President was authorized “in his discretion, to declare by public proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States to be national monuments, and may reserve as a part thereof parcels of land, the limits of which in all cases shall be confined to the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the objects to be protected”;AND WHEREAS, Father Millett, a French Jesuit Priest, who came to Canada – then known as New France – in 1667, and who served about fifteen years as a missionary among the Onondaga and Oneida Indians within what is now the State of New York, and subsequently became a chaplain in the French Colonial Forces, first at Fort Frontenac and later at Fort Niagara, did, on Good Friday, 1688, erect and dedicate a cross on what is now the Fort Niagara Military Reservation; and the Knights of Columbus of the Sixth New York District have requested that a suitable site be set apart thereon for the erection of another cross commemorative of the cross erected and blessed by Father Millett;NOW THEREFORE, I, Calvin Coolidge, President of the United States of America, under authority of the said Act of Congress do hereby reserve as a site for the said monument, the following described parcel of land situated within the limits of the military reservation of Fort Niagara, New York, and do hereby declare and proclaim the same to be a national monument to commemorate the cross erected and dedicated at Fort Niagara by Father Millett on Good Friday, 1688, viz:Beginning at an iron pipe on the northerly line of old stone block house (building No. 33) produced, and seventy-four (74) feet westerly from the northwest corner of said block house, running thence eighteen (18) feet westerly along said northerly line produced to an iron pipe; thence northerly at right angles to above line eighteen (18) feet to an iron pipe; thence easterly on a line parallel to the north line of block house produced and eighteen (18) feet distant northerly therefrom, eighteen (18) feet to another iron pipe; thence southerly at right angles to said northerly line of block house eighteen feet to the point of beginning; containing 0.0074 acres more or less.IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.Done at the City of Washington this 5th day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and twenty-five and the Independence of the United States the one hundred and fiftieth.
Centerville, Arkansas hit a still standing record of 112F.
The New Yorker celebrated tennis.
And Colliers discussed Picnic etiquette.
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On Monday, September 3, 1945, people woke up to a new world, whether they realized it or not.
The prior day Japan, the last Axis hold out, surrendered.
May people had the day off, as it was Labor Day.
With this entry, we end our daily tracking of events 80 days in the past. When we started tracking events 80 years ago, it was because we were coming up on the 80th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Events of the 1940s otherwise are not really the focus of this blog, and 80 years is an odd period to look back to retrospectively, although no odder, I suppose, than 125 years, 115, and 120 years, which this blog otherwise does, although in the context of this blog's focus, that actually is less odd. The tacking of those other dates fills in gaps left in the focus of this blog when we started posting on the Punitive Expedition from a 100 year focus. Just as here we failed to fill in the dates from 1939 to 1941, which were very much part of the Second World War story, we failed to fill in the dates from 1900 to 1916, which were very much part of the overall story of the event we were focusing on.
We still occasionally post events 100 years past, and 50 years past, although not all that frequently. And we will likely catch some 80 years past when they are very significant. Should this author make to 2030, chances are good that we'll start again with the events of the Korean War, or perhaps just three years from now with the Berlin Blockade.
For now, we're finished with the 80 years retrospectives.
We would note that things were still going on in the Second World War on this date. The war in the Pacific sputtered to a conclusion and in a manner distinctively different from the war in Europe. In Europe, as we have seen, there were some German formations that fought on after the German surrender, but usually because they feared being taken captive by Communist forces. Japanese forces however were often still quite well organized in the field and had not, in many locations, been defeated. Their surrenders were bizarrely formally orchestrated, usually featuring meetings and formal surrender instruments. Of course, Japan had not been occupied at the time of Japan's surrender, which was not true of Germany.
Indeed, on this day, General Tomoyuki Yamashita formally surrendered the remaining Japanese troops in the Philippines to General Jonathan M. Wainwright. Things like this would go on for days.
Also going on for days would be the British reoccupation of its lost colonial domain in the East. Other nations, notably the French and the Dutch, would try the same, but they'd have to fight their way back in, and ultimately, they lost the fight.
All that is part of the story of the post war world. Colonialism was done for. The British would have the wisdom soon to see that, whereas the French resisted it.
Also part of the post war world would be the rise of Communism.
Communism had been part of the global story going back into the late 19th Century, but the Second World War boosted its fortunes, in part because it aligned itself with anti colonial movements.
The struggle between Communism and Democracy, even imperfect democracy, had already begun before the end of the war. In some places the struggle between Communist and Anticommunist forces was long established. The Chinese Civil War had commenced before World War Two, and it had recommenced before the Japanese surrender. In other places, however, the end of the war brought out movements that had not been significant before. In Vietnam, for example, the Viet Minh has declared independence prior to the Japanese surrender and were moving towards contesting the French for control of the country, something that would be interrupted by the British at first, using surrendered Japanese troops. That a Cold War was on wasn't widely recognized to be occurring as of yet, but that it was is clear in retrospect.
The rise of the United States as a global power, something that many Americans had not wanted to occur before World War Two, had been completed by the Second World War's end. Economically, the United States was effectively the last man standing. 1945 would usher in a post war economic world such as had not existed in modern times. The US became the globally dominant economic power because its factories had not been destroyed, and would enjoy that status well into the 1970s. At the same time, the US became a major military power for the first time in its history, a status which it retains.
The period from 1945 to, roughly 1973/1991, would be sort of an American golden era, albeit one with many significant problems. The legacy of that period haunts the United States today. From 1945 until the early 1970s nobody could contest the US economically and that meant, at home, there were always decent jobs for Americans, no matter how well educated they were, or were not. A college education guaranteed a white collar occupation. That began to come apart in the 1970s and by the late 1980s that was no longer true, although Americans have never accepted the change.
Indeed, that's a major problem today. The US is controlled by those who came of age in this era, and many elderly voters cannot look back past it. When people pine for a return of a prior era, that's the era they hope to restore. But it was never destined to be permanent. World War Two was so massive it destroyed the global economy, but the economy would inevitably recover, and the Cold War against the Soviet Union could never have been won by the USSR. The economy that had come into place in the 1990s was a more natural one, and interestingly restored the global economy to the state of globalization that it had obtained prior to the First World War.
The social changes brought about by the war were likewise massive, and that's been forgotten.
Ironically, one of the most cited social claims about the war is incorrect, that being that it brought women into the workplace. It didn't. That had been going on for a long time, but as often noted here, it was domestic machinery that caused that change. Having said that, the immediate post war economic boom caused a massive introduction of that machinery into homes. People who had never owned a washing machine, for example, now suddenly did. And with the washer and dryer coming in, trips to the laundromat, or hours spent at home working on laundry, both being "women's work", went out. They now had time to go to work. . . or school.
This, as many of the trends we noted, was something that was already occurring. The war accelerated it. Even before World War Two more women graduated from high school than men. College education remained predominantly male, but even at that the number of female college students grew from 9,100 (21% of the total) in 1870 to 481,000 (44% of the total) by 1930, with female university attendance receiving a big boost during the 1920s. The war, however, boosted this. Already by the 1920s the reduction in female labor needs at home had meant that a sizable number of well off and middle class young women could attend college. The Great Depression dampened that, but the end of the Second World War dramatically altered the situation after 1945.
Young men also began to crowd college campuses like never before.
Prior to the Second World War a small minority of men attended, let alone completed, college. In 1940 5.5% of American men had completed a bachelor's degree or higher, which was a higher percentage than women at 3.8%. Moreover, with certain distinct exceptions, American men who attended college were part of a WASP upper class. Indeed, the extent to which Ivy League schools were protestant institutions has been largely forgotten. Princeton, for instance ended its Sunday chapel requirement for upperclassmen in 1935, for sophomores in 1960, and for freshmen in 1964. Harvard, we should not, ended its chapel requirement in 1886 and Yale in 1926, but the point is that most of those who attended private universities were of a WASP heritage. This was less true, of course, of state universities, which often had a agricultural, teaching or mining focus.
World War Two, however, changed all of this through the GI Bill, with newly discharged men heading to university. Included in student body were Catholics, a sizable American minority, who had largely not attended university before.
The implications of this were enormous. Women leaving homes to live on their own before marriage had really started in an appreciable degree the 1920s, although it occurred and was possible before that. My mother's mother, had a university degree prior to that time. Large numbers of young men doing so was really new, with perhaps the only real analogy being the camps of young itinerant workers in the Great Depression.
Of course, the Great Depression had practically acclimated young men to living away from home while young, and then the Second World War certainly acclimated large numbers of them. The new environment was large numbers of young men and young women living away from home, and from very varied backgrounds. Co-ed students from prior to the Second World War would have found a much narrower demographic than they did after the war.
This at least arguably accelerated the blending of distinct cultures within the overall American culture, although that's always been a feature of the United States. Having said that, the "melting pot" of American culture melted more slowly prior to World War Two. With the war having a levelling effect on ethnic differences, they shifted notably.
Prior to World War Two, and for some time thereafter, Catholics, Jews, Blacks and Hispanics were really "others". It's certainly the case that distinctions and prejudice remains today, but the Second World War started the process of addressing them. Catholics fairly rapidly moved from a disdained religious minority, albeit a large minority, to part of the general American religious background, that process complete with the election of John F. Kennedy. At the same time, however, the uniqueness and identify of many of these groups, which had heretofore been quite strong, began to dissipate.
Sudden success and sudden cultural change often has within them the seeds of their own decay and downfall. This seems to have been much the case with the second half of the Twentieth Century as "the American Century". Americans came to very rapidly believe that their postwar economic good fortune was due to some native genius, rather than the good luck of having been outside the range of Axis aircraft. Rapid cultural changes that saw young Americans step right out of high school and into good paying jobs, or off to college for even better paying jobs, all while being outside of their parents homes, began to seem like a decree of nature. Liberalization of culture yielded to libertinism of culture and an attack on traditional value. Everything seemed headed, in the end, in one direction.
It didn't.
The destroyed nations rebuilt, and at the same time, under American influence, democracy spread. This was a huge global success, but it also meant that the US inevitably came to a point at which it could not dominate the world's economies. Advances in technology an globalization ultimately wiped out he heavy labor segment of the American economy while at at the same time the same developments that freed up women from domestic labor enslaved them to the office place. The post war arrogance that bloomed in the late 60s ultimately badly damaged the existential nature of the family in ways that are still being sorted out.
The post war world started to come to an end in 1991 with the fall of the USSR. But like a lot of things, it took and is taking a long time to play out. We're likely in its final closing pages now, as the Boomer generation makes a desperate effort to restore a lost world, but only selectively. Very few really want to return to the point before these developments commenced. The ultimate question remains however if World War Two, which the country had no choice but to fight, resulted in such existential damage to the country, and the world, that much of what came before the war was not only better than what came after it, but that whether the damage of the war was so severe that it cannot be recovered.
On this day, in addition to what has already been noted, British Marines landed at Pennang. Hirohito opened the 88th Imperial Diet.
The Red Army opened Officer's Clubs.
While we won't catalog events hence force on a day to day basis, we will look in more depth at the changes World War Two brought about, for good, and ill.
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Emperor Hirohito accepted the terms of the Potsdam Declaration and recorded a radio message to the Japanese people saying that the war should end and that they must "bear the unbearable." Truman announced the Japanese surrender the same day.
Hirohito's full recorded, and then broadcast, speech stated:
To our good and loyal subjects.
After pondering deeply the general trends of the world and the actual conditions obtaining to our empire today, we have decided to effect a settlement of the present situation by resorting to an extraordinary measure.
We have ordered our government to communicate to the governments of the United States, Great Britain, China, and the Soviet Union that our empire accepts the provisions of their Joint Declaration.
To strive for the common prosperity and happiness of all nations as well as the security and well-being of our subjects is the solemn obligation which has been handed down by our imperial ancestors, and which we lay close to heart. Indeed, we declared war on America and Britain out of our sincere desire to ensure Japan’s self-preservation and the stabilization of East Asia, it being far from our thought either to infringe upon the sovereignty of other nations or to embark upon territorial aggrandizement.
But now the war has lasted for nearly four years. Despite the best that has been done by everyone—the gallant fighting of the military and naval forces, the diligence and assiduity of our servants of the state, and the devoted service of our 100 million people—the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan’s advantage, while the general trends of the world have all turned against her interest.
Moreover, the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the power of which to damage is indeed incalculable, taking the toll of many innocent lives.
Should we continue to fight, it would not only result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but also it would lead to the total extinction of human civilization. Such being the case, how are we to save the millions of our subjects or to atone ourselves before the hallowed spirits of our imperial ancestors? This is the reason why we have ordered the acceptance of the provisions of the Joint Declaration of the Powers.
We cannot but express the deepest sense of regret to our allied nations of East Asia, who have consistently co-operated with the empire towards the emancipation of East Asia. The thought of those officers and men as well as others who have fallen in the fields of battle, those who died at their posts of duty, or those who met with untimely death and all their bereaved families, pains our heart day and night.
The welfare of the wounded and the war sufferers, and of those who have lost their homes and livelihood, are the objects of our profound solicitude. The hardships and sufferings to which our nation is to be subjected hereafter will certainly be great. We are keenly aware of the inmost feelings of all you, our subjects.
However, it is according to the dictate of time and fate that we have resolved to pave the way for a grand peace for all the generations to come by enduring the unendurable and suffering what is insufferable.
Having been able to safeguard and maintain the structure of the imperial state, we are always with you, our good and loyal subjects, relying upon your sincerity and integrity. Beware most strictly of any outbursts of emotion which may engender needless complications, or any fraternal contention and strife which may create confusion, lead you astray, and cause you to lose the confidence of the world.
Let the entire nation continue as one family from generation to generation, ever firm in its faith of the imperishableness of its divine land, and mindful of its heavy responsibilities, and the long road before it.
Unite your total strength to be devoted to the construction for the future. Cultivate the ways of rectitude; foster nobility of spirit; and work with resolution so that you may enhance the innate glory of the imperial state and keep pace with the progress of the world.
Bearing it would prove to be nowhere as difficult as predicted for anyone, particularly Japanese women, and in general the Japanese middle and lower class. Frankly, everyone's life in Japan would improve immeasurably. So much so, but for some wackadoodles, Japan has never looked back.
The recording had to be smuggled out of the Tokyo Imperial Palace out of fear of a military coup taking place
The attempted coup did in fact take place, as Japanese officers attempted to steal the recording and prevent the surrender. The attempt failed, and at 19:00 Truman announced the Japanese surrender. Coup leader Major Kenji Hatanaka commited suicide after its failure..
As odd as it may seem, there were still air raids conducted until the surrender was broadcast. The last raid was on Akita (秋田空襲), which was the last raid of the war, which was a nighttime raid that occurred more or less at the same time as the attempted coup.
Huge crowds gathered all over the US to celebrate the end of the war.
The famous Times Square photograph of a sailor kissing a woman, which is protected by copyright, as American copyright provisions are absurdly long, was taken.
The Soviets continued their advance on South Sakhalin and some of the Kurils, and advanced deep into Manchuria.
Gen. MacArthur was delegated to take the Japanese surrender. A cessation of hostilities is ordered by both sides.
The War Production Board lifted restrictions on the productions of automobiles.
The Viet Minh launched an uprising against the French in Vietnam.
Steve Martin was born.
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Riffians launched an offensive against Fes.
Ralph Samuelson became the first person to perform a ski jump on water.
Antonio Genna of the Genna crime family became the third member of the Genna brothers to be shot to death in less than two months in the ongoing war with Capone's North Side Gang.
Pioneering photographer Clarence Hudson White of the Photo-Secession movement died. He photographed dreamy female portraits, including nudes which debatably crossed into pornography, emphasizing, perhaps, an ongoing and developing problem in the age of film.
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Abd el-Krim of the Riffians attacked French forces in Morocco renewing the Riffian War.
Newfoundland granted women the right to vote. It was not yet part of Canada.
Ford Air Transport Service, the first dedicated cargo airline, began operations with a Stout 2-AT Pullman airplane transporting 1,000 pounds of freight from Detroit to Chicago.
The Larry Semon-directed version of the film The Wizard of Oz was released. Semon himself starred as the Scarecrow, Dorothy Dwan as Dorothy, and comedian Oliver Hardy as the Tin Man.
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British and French troops landed on Tanna to end the attempted succession from the Anglo-French Condominium of the island in the New Hebrides.
President Nixon and Soviet General Secretary Brezhnev signed a ten year economic agreement in Moscow, and then flew on to Simferopal in Crimea for a trip to Brezhnev's beach home at Oreanada.
Mikhail Baryshnikov, Soviet ballet start, defected in Toronto.
Mexican Murualist Xavier Guerrero died at age 77.
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French forces number 14,000 men attacked the Moroccan stronghold of Mouha ou Hammou Zayani at Khenifra, Morocco.
The Third French Republic and the Nguyễn dynasty of Vietnam executed the Treaty of Saigon. The treaty granted economic and territorial concessions to France. France waived a previous war indemnity award from Vietnam in the treaty from 1862 and promised military protection against China. Vietnam was reduced to a French protectorate.
France already occupied three provinces south and east of the Mekong and had since 1867. They became the French colony of Cochinchina. The Red River, Hanoi, Haiphong and Qui Nhơn were opened to international trade. France recognized "the sovereignty of the king of Annam and his complete independence from any foreign power" (la souveraineté du roi d'Annam et son entière independence vis-à-vis de toute puissance étrangère). France understood this to mean independence from Chinese influence, although neither Vietnam nor China understood the terms in that fashion.
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The Krasnoye Selo-Ropsha Offensive ended, the objective of aiding in the lifting of the Siege of Leningrad having been obtained.
Franklin Roosevelt gave his State of the Union Address for 1944. The speech was wide-ranging, but is remembered for his call for a "Second Bill of Rights", which were:
To the Congress:
This Nation in the past two years has become an active partner in the world's greatest war against human slavery.
We have joined with like-minded people in order to defend ourselves in a world that has been gravely threatened with gangster rule.
But I do not think that any of us Americans can be content with mere survival. Sacrifices that we and our allies are making impose upon us all a sacred obligation to see to it that out of this war we and our children will gain something better than mere survival.
We are united in determination that this war shall not be followed by another interim which leads to new disaster- that we shall not repeat the tragic errors of ostrich isolationism—that we shall not repeat the excesses of the wild twenties when this Nation went for a joy ride on a roller coaster which ended in a tragic crash.
When Mr. Hull went to Moscow in October, and when I went to Cairo and Teheran in November, we knew that we were in agreement with our allies in our common determination to fight and win this war. But there were many vital questions concerning the future peace, and they were discussed in an atmosphere of complete candor and harmony.
In the last war such discussions, such meetings, did not even begin until the shooting had stopped and the delegates began to assemble at the peace table. There had been no previous opportunities for man-to-man discussions which lead to meetings of minds. The result was a peace which was not a peace. That was a mistake which we are not repeating in this war.
And right here I want to address a word or two to some suspicious souls who are fearful that Mr. Hull or I have made "commitments" for the future which might pledge this Nation to secret treaties, or to enacting the role of Santa Claus.
To such suspicious souls—using a polite terminology—I wish to say that Mr. Churchill, and Marshal Stalin, and Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek are all thoroughly conversant with the provisions of our Constitution. And so is Mr. Hull. And so am I.
Of course we made some commitments. We most certainly committed ourselves to very large and very specific military plans which require the use of all Allied forces to bring about the defeat of our enemies at the earliest possible time.
But there were no secret treaties or political or financial commitments.
The one supreme objective for the future, which we discussed for each Nation individually, and for all the United Nations, can be summed up in one word: Security.
And that means not only physical security which provides safety from attacks by aggressors. It means also economic security, social security, moral security—in a family of Nations.
In the plain down-to-earth talks that I had with the Generalissimo and Marshal Stalin and Prime Minister Churchill, it was abundantly clear that they are all most deeply interested in the resumption of peaceful progress by their own peoples—progress toward a better life. All our allies want freedom to develop their lands and resources, to build up industry, to increase education and individual opportunity, and to raise standards of living.
All our allies have learned by bitter experience that real development will not be possible if they are to be diverted from their purpose by repeated wars—or even threats of war.
China and Russia are truly united with Britain and America in recognition of this essential fact:
The best interests of each Nation, large and small, demand that all freedom-loving Nations shall join together in a just and durable system of peace. In the present world situation, evidenced by the actions of Germany, Italy, and Japan, unquestioned military control over disturbers of the peace is as necessary among Nations as it is among citizens in a community. And an equally basic essential to peace is a decent standard of living for all individual men and women and children in all Nations. Freedom from fear is eternally linked with freedom from want.
There are people who burrow through our Nation like unseeing moles, and attempt to spread the suspicion that if other Nations are encouraged to raise their standards of living, our own American standard of living must of necessity be depressed.
The fact is the very contrary. It has been shown time and again that if the standard of living of any country goes up, so does its purchasing power- and that such a rise encourages a better standard of living in neighboring countries with whom it trades. That is just plain common sense—and it is the kind of plain common sense that provided the basis for our discussions at Moscow, Cairo, and Teheran.
Returning from my journeyings, I must confess to a sense of "let-down" when I found many evidences of faulty perspective here in Washington. The faulty perspective consists in overemphasizing lesser problems and thereby underemphasizing the first and greatest problem.
The overwhelming majority of our people have met the demands of this war with magnificent courage and understanding. They have accepted inconveniences; they have accepted hardships; they have accepted tragic sacrifices. And they are ready and eager to make whatever further contributions are needed to win the war as quickly as possible- if only they are given the chance to know what is required of them.
However, while the majority goes on about its great work without complaint, a noisy minority maintains an uproar of demands for special favors for special groups. There are pests who swarm through the lobbies of the Congress and the cocktail bars of Washington, representing these special groups as opposed to the basic interests of the Nation as a whole. They have come to look upon the war primarily as a chance to make profits for themselves at the expense of their neighbors- profits in money or in terms of political or social preferment.
Such selfish agitation can be highly dangerous in wartime. It creates confusion. It damages morale. It hampers our national effort. It muddies the waters and therefore prolongs the war.
If we analyze American history impartially, we cannot escape the fact that in our past we have not always forgotten individual and selfish and partisan interests in time of war—we have not always been united in purpose and direction. We cannot overlook the serious dissensions and the lack of unity in our war of the Revolution, in our War of 1812, or in our War Between the States, when the survival of the Union itself was at stake.
In the first World War we came closer to national unity than in any previous war. But that war lasted only a year and a half, and increasing signs of disunity began to appear during the final months of the conflict.
In this war, we have been compelled to learn how interdependent upon each other are all groups and sections of the population of America.
Increased food costs, for example, will bring new demands for wage increases from all war workers, which will in turn raise all prices of all things including those things which the farmers themselves have to buy. Increased wages or prices will each in turn produce the same results. They all have a particularly disastrous result on all fixed income groups.
And I hope you will remember that all of us in this Government represent the fixed income group just as much as we represent business owners, workers, and farmers. This group of fixed income people includes: teachers, clergy, policemen, firemen, widows and minors on fixed incomes, wives and dependents of our soldiers and sailors, and old-age pensioners. They and their families add up to one-quarter of our one hundred and thirty million people. They have few or no high pressure representatives at the Capitol. In a period of gross inflation they would be the worst sufferers.
If ever there was a time to subordinate individual or group selfishness to the national good, that time is now. Disunity at home—bickerings, self-seeking partisanship, stoppages of work, inflation, business as usual, politics as usual, luxury as usual these are the influences which can undermine the morale of the brave men ready to die at the front for us here.
Those who are doing most of the complaining are not deliberately striving to sabotage the national war effort. They are laboring under the delusion that the time is past when we must make prodigious sacrifices- that the war is already won and we can begin to slacken off. But the dangerous folly of that point of view can be measured by the distance that separates our troops from their ultimate objectives in Berlin and Tokyo—and by the sum of all the perils that lie along the way.
Overconfidence and complacency are among our deadliest enemies. Last spring—after notable victories at Stalingrad and in Tunisia and against the U-boats on the high seas—overconfidence became so pronounced that war production fell off. In two months, June and July, 1943, more than a thousand airplanes that could have been made and should have been made were not made. Those who failed to make them were not on strike. They were merely saying, "The war's in the bag- so let's relax."
That attitude on the part of anyone—Government or management or labor—can lengthen this war. It can kill American boys.
Let us remember the lessons of 1918. In the summer of that year the tide turned in favor of the allies. But this Government did not relax. In fact, our national effort was stepped up. In August, 1918, the draft age limits were broadened from 21-31 to 18-45. The President called for "force to the utmost," and his call was heeded. And in November, only three months later, Germany surrendered.
That is the way to fight and win a war—all out—and not with half-an-eye on the battlefronts abroad and the other eye-and-a-half on personal, selfish, or political interests here at home.
Therefore, in order to concentrate all our energies and resources on winning the war, and to maintain a fair and stable economy at home, I recommend that the Congress adopt:
(1) A realistic tax law—which will tax all unreasonable profits, both individual and corporate, and reduce the ultimate cost of the war to our sons and daughters. The tax bill now under consideration by the Congress does not begin to meet this test.
(2) A continuation of the law for the renegotiation of war contracts—which will prevent exorbitant profits and assure fair prices to the Government. For two long years I have pleaded with the Congress to take undue profits out of war.
(3) A cost of food law—which will enable the Government (a) to place a reasonable floor under the prices the farmer may expect for his production; and (b) to place a ceiling on the prices a consumer will have to pay for the food he buys. This should apply to necessities only; and will require public funds to carry out. It will cost in appropriations about one percent of the present annual cost of the war.
(4) Early reenactment of. the stabilization statute of October, 1942. This expires June 30, 1944, and if it is not extended well in advance, the country might just as well expect price chaos by summer.
(5) A national service law- which, for the duration of the war, will prevent strikes, and, with certain appropriate exceptions, will make available for war production or for any other essential services every able-bodied adult in this Nation.
These five measures together form a just and equitable whole. I would not recommend a national service law unless the other laws were passed to keep down the cost of living, to share equitably the burdens of taxation, to hold the stabilization line, and to prevent undue profits.
The Federal Government already has the basic power to draft capital and property of all kinds for war purposes on a basis of just compensation.
As you know, I have for three years hesitated to recommend a national service act. Today, however, I am convinced of its necessity. Although I believe that we and our allies can win the war without such a measure, I am certain that nothing less than total mobilization of all our resources of manpower and capital will guarantee an earlier victory, and reduce the toll of suffering and sorrow and blood.
I have received a joint recommendation for this law from the heads of the War Department, the Navy Department, and the Maritime Commission. These are the men who bear responsibility for the procurement of the necessary arms and equipment, and for the successful prosecution of the war in the field. They say:
"When the very life of the Nation is in peril the responsibility for service is common to all men and women. In such a time there can be no discrimination between the men and women who are assigned by the Government to its defense at the battlefront and the men and women assigned to producing the vital materials essential to successful military operations. A prompt enactment of a National Service Law would be merely an expression of the universality of this responsibility."
I believe the country will agree that those statements are the solemn truth.
National service is the most democratic way to wage a war. Like selective service for the armed forces, it rests on the obligation of each citizen to serve his Nation to his utmost where he is best qualified.
It does not mean reduction in wages. It does not mean loss of retirement and seniority rights and benefits. It does not mean that any substantial numbers of war workers will be disturbed in their present jobs. Let these facts be wholly clear.
Experience in other democratic Nations at war—Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand- has shown that the very existence of national service makes unnecessary the widespread use of compulsory power. National service has proven to be a unifying moral force based on an equal and comprehensive legal obligation of all people in a Nation at war.
There are millions of American men and women who are not in this war at all. It is not because they do not want to be in it. But they want to know where they can best do their share. National service provides that direction. It will be a means by which every man and woman can find that inner satisfaction which comes from making the fullest possible contribution to victory.
I know that all civilian war workers will be glad to be able to say many years hence to their grandchildren: "Yes, I, too, was in service in the great war. I was on duty in an airplane factory, and I helped make hundreds of fighting planes. The Government told me that in doing that I was performing my most useful work in the service of my country."
It is argued that we have passed the stage in the war where national service is necessary. But our soldiers and sailors know that this is not true. We are going forward on a long, rough road- and, in all journeys, the last miles are the hardest. And it is for that final effort—for the total defeat of our enemies-that we must mobilize our total resources. The national war program calls for the employment of more people in 1944 than in 1943.
It is my conviction that the American people will welcome this win-the-war measure which is based on the eternally just principle of "fair for one, fair for all."
It will give our people at home the assurance that they are standing four-square behind our soldiers and sailors. And it will give our enemies demoralizing assurance that we mean business -that we, 130,000,000 Americans, are on the march to Rome, Berlin, and Tokyo.
I hope that the Congress will recognize that, although this is a political year, national service is an issue which transcends politics. Great power must be used for great purposes.
As to the machinery for this measure, the Congress itself should determine its nature—but it should be wholly nonpartisan in its make-up.
Our armed forces are valiantly fulfilling their responsibilities to our country and our people. Now the Congress faces the responsibility for taking those measures which are essential to national security in this the most decisive phase of the Nation's greatest war.
Several alleged reasons have prevented the enactment of legislation which would preserve for our soldiers and sailors and marines the fundamental prerogative of citizenship—the right to vote. No amount of legalistic argument can becloud this issue in the eyes of these ten million American citizens. Surely the signers of the Constitution did not intend a document which, even in wartime, would be construed to take away the franchise of any of those who are fighting to preserve the Constitution itself.
Our soldiers and sailors and marines know that the overwhelming majority of them will be deprived of the opportunity to vote, if the voting machinery is left exclusively to the States under existing State laws—and that there is no likelihood of these laws being changed in time to enable them to vote at the next election. The Army and Navy have reported that it will be impossible effectively to administer forty-eight different soldier voting laws. It is the duty of the Congress to remove this unjustifiable discrimination against the men and women in our armed forces- and to do it as quickly as possible.
It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people—whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth- is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill housed, and insecure.
This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights—among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty.
As our Nation has grown in size and stature, however—as our industrial economy expanded—these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.
We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. "Necessitous men are not free men." People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.
In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all regardless of station, race, or creed.
Among these are:
The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the Nation;
The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
The right of every family to a decent home;
The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
The right to a good education.
All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.
America's own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens. For unless there is security here at home there cannot be lasting peace in the world.
One of the great American industrialists of our day—a man who has rendered yeoman service to his country in this crisis-recently emphasized the grave dangers of "rightist reaction" in this Nation. All clear-thinking businessmen share his concern. Indeed, if such reaction should develop—if history were to repeat itself and we were to return to the so-called "normalcy" of the 1920's—then it is certain that even though we shall have conquered our enemies on the battlefields abroad, we shall have yielded to the spirit of Fascism here at home.
I ask the Congress to explore the means for implementing this economic bill of rights- for it is definitely the responsibility of the Congress so to do. Many of these problems are already before committees of the Congress in the form of proposed legislation. I shall from time to time communicate with the Congress with respect to these and further proposals. In the event that no adequate program of progress is evolved, I am certain that the Nation will be conscious of the fact.
Our fighting men abroad- and their families at home- expect such a program and have the right to insist upon it. It is to their demands that this Government should pay heed rather than to the whining demands of selfish pressure groups who seek to feather their nests while young Americans are dying.
The foreign policy that we have been following—the policy that guided us at Moscow, Cairo, and Teheran—is based on the common sense principle which was best expressed by Benjamin Franklin on July 4, 1776: "We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately."
I have often said that there are no two fronts for America in this war. There is only one front. There is one line of unity which extends from the hearts of the people at home to the men of our attacking forces in our farthest outposts. When we speak of our total effort, we speak of the factory and the field, and the mine as well as of the battleground -- we speak of the soldier and the civilian, the citizen and his Government.
Each and every one of us has a solemn obligation under God to serve this Nation in its most critical hour—to keep this Nation great -- to make this Nation greater in a better world.
TBFs from the USS Block Island (CVE-21) made the first aircraft rocket attack on a German (Type VIIC) U-boat, U-758.
The Japanese cruiser Kuma was sunk by the British submarine Tall7-Ho off of Penang, Malaya.
The Soviet government issued a statement through TASS disputing Polish territorial claims and insisting that the Soviet-Polish border had been determined through a democratic 1939 plebiscite. It also declared that the Polish Government in Exile was "incapable of establishing friendly relations with the USSR, and has also shown itself incapable of organizing active resistance against German invaders inside Poland. Moreover, by its erroneous policy it has often played into the hands of German invaders."
So, quite clearly, a war that had been started as an attempt to protect Polish integrity didn't look likely to end that way.
P-51s started escorting US bombing missions over Germany, joining P-47s and P-38s which already had that role.
From Sarah Sundin's Blog:
Today in World War II History—January 11, 1944: In a US Eighth Air Force raid on Brunswick, the 94th Bomb Group makes a rare second run on the target and receives the Distinguished Unit Citation.
The Moroccan Nationalist Movement issued its Proclamation of Independence demanding a united Morocco independent of France and Spain.
The Hitchcock movie Lifeboat was released.
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The members of the Fascist Grand Council sentenced to death by the rump Italian puppet Italian Social Republic were executed. They included Mussolini's son-in-law, Galeazzo Ciano.
