Wednesday, August 25, 1943. Victory on New Georgia.

The Red Army prevailed in the Migorod Direction Offensive.  On the same day, the Red Army took Zenkov and Akhtyrka, near Kharkiv.

Contrary to what I posted yesterday, some sources have today as the day Lord Mountbatten took command of the Southeast Asia theater, and the sources for today would be correct.

German "Fritz X" glide bomb, of the type most widely used and first used on this day in 1943.

Germany used glide bombs for the first time, with that deployment being made in the Bay of Biscay against Royal Navy and Royal Canadian Navy escort destroyers.  Some crewmen were killed on the HMS Bideford.

In the same bay, the Royal Navy sank the U-523.

The last Japanese resistance on New Georgia was eliminated.

The Quebec Conference having ended, President Roosevelt made an address in Ottoawa to the Canaidan parliament.

August 25, 1943

Your Excellency Mr. Prime Minister, Members of the Parliament, and all my good friends and neighbors of the Dominion of Canada:

It was exactly five years ago last Wednesday that I came to Canada to receive the high honor of a degree at Queen's University. On that occasion- one year before the invasion of Poland, three years before Pearl Harbor— I said:

"We in the Americas are no longer a far away continent, to which the eddies of controversies beyond the seas could bring no interest or no harm. Instead, we in the Americas have become a consideration to every propaganda office and to every general staff beyond the seas. The vast amount of our resources, the vigor of our commerce and the strength of our men have made us vital factors in world peace whether we choose it or not."

We did not choose this war—and that "we" includes each and every one of the United Nations.

War was violently forced upon us by criminal aggressors who measure their standards of morality by the extent of the death and the destruction that they can inflict upon their neighbors.

In this war, Canadians and Americans have fought shoulder to shoulder—as our men and our women and our children have worked together and played together in happier times of peace.

Today, in devout gratitude, we are celebrating a brilliant victory won by British and Canadian and American fighting men in Sicily.

Today, we rejoice also in another event for which we need not apologize. A year ago Japan occupied several of the Aleutian Islands on our side of the ocean, and made a great "to-do" about the invasion of the continent of North America. I regret to say that some Americans and some Canadians wished our Governments to withdraw from the Atlantic and the Mediterranean campaigns and divert all our vast supplies and strength to the removal of the Japs from a few rocky specks in the North Pacific.

Today, our wiser councils have maintained our efforts in the Atlantic area, and the Mediterranean, and the China Seas, and the Southwest Pacific with ever-growing contributions; and in the Northwest Pacific a relatively small campaign has been assisted by the Japs themselves in the elimination of that last Jap from Attu and Kiska. We have been told that the Japs never surrender; their headlong retreat satisfies us just as well.

Great councils are being held here on the free and honored soil of Canada- councils which look to the future conduct of this war and to the years of building a new progress for mankind.

To these councils Canadians and Americans alike again welcome that wise and good and gallant gentleman, the Prime Minister of Great Britain.

Mr. King, my old friend, may I through you thank the people of Canada for their hospitality to all of us. Your course and mine have run so closely and affectionately during these many long years that this meeting adds another link to that chain. I have always felt at home in Canada and you, I think, have always felt at home in the United States.

During the past few days in Quebec, the Combined Staffs have been sitting around a table—which is a good custom—talking things over, discussing ways and means, in the manner of friends, in the manner of partners, and may I even say in the manner of members of the same family.

We have talked constructively of our common purposes in this war-of our determination to achieve victory in the shortest possible time—of our essential cooperation with our great and brave fighting allies.

And we have arrived, harmoniously, at certain definite conclusions. Of course, I am not at liberty to disclose just what these conclusions are. But, in due time, we shall communicate the secret information of the Quebec Conference to Germany, Italy, and Japan. We shall communicate this information to our enemies in the only language their twisted minds seem capable of understanding.

Sometimes I wish that that great master of intuition, the Nazi leader, could have been present in spirit at the Quebec Conference- I am thoroughly glad that he wasn't there in person. If he and his generals had known our plans they would have realized that discretion is still the better part of valor and that surrender would pay them better now than later.

The evil characteristic that makes a Nazi a Nazi is his utter inability to understand and therefore to respect the qualities or the rights of his fellow men. His only method of dealing with his neighbor is first to delude him with lies, then to attack him treacherously, then beat him down and step on him, and then either kill him or enslave him. And the same thing is true of the fanatical militarists of Japan.

Because their own instincts and impulses are essentially inhuman, our enemies simply cannot comprehend how it is that decent, sensible individual human beings manage to get along together and live together as good neighbors.

That is why our enemies are doing their desperate best to misrepresent the purposes and the results of this Quebec Conference. They still seek to divide and conquer allies who refuse to be divided just as cheerfully as they refuse to be conquered.

We spend our energies and our resources and the very lives of our sons and daughters because a band of gangsters in the community of Nations declines to recognize the fundamentals of decent, human conduct.

We have been forced to call out what we in the United States would call the sheriff's posse to break up the gang in order that gangsterism may be eliminated in the community of Nations.

We are making sure- absolutely, irrevocably sure—that this 'time the lesson is driven home to them once and for all. Yes, we are going to be rid of outlaws this time.

Every one of the United Nations believes that only a real and lasting peace can justify the sacrifices we are making, and our unanimity gives us confidence in seeking that goal.

It is no secret that at Quebec there was much talk of the postwar world. That discussion was doubtless duplicated simultaneously in dozens of Nations and hundreds of cities and among millions of people.

There is a longing in the air. It is not a longing to go back to what they call "the good old days." I have distinct reservations as to how good "the good old days" were. I would rather believe that we can achieve new and better days.

Absolute victory in this war will give greater opportunities to the world, because the winning of the war in itself is certainly proving to all of us up here that concerted action can accomplish things. Surely we can make strides toward a greater freedom from want than the world has yet enjoyed. Surely by unanimous action in driving out the outlaws and keeping them under heel forever, we can attain a freedom from fear of violence.

I am everlastingly angry only at those who assert vociferously that the four freedoms and the Atlantic Charter are nonsense because they are unattainable. If those people had lived a century and a half ago they would have sneered and said that the Declaration of Independence was utter piffle. If they had lived nearly a thousand years ago they would have laughed uproariously at the ideals of Magna Charta. And if they had lived several thousand years ago they would have derided Moses when he came from the Mountain with the Ten Commandments.

We concede that these great teachings are not perfectly lived up to today, but I would rather be a builder than a wrecker, hoping always that the structure of life is growing— not dying.

May the destroyers who still persist in our midst decrease. They, like some of our enemies, have a long road to travel before they accept the ethics of humanity.

Some day, in the distant future perhaps—but some day, it is certain—all of them will remember with the Master, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself."

Monsieur le Premier: Ma visite a la ville historique de Quebec rappelle vivement a mon esprit que le Canada est une nation fondee sur l'union de deux grandes races. L'harmonie de leur association dans l'egalite peut servir d'exemple a l'humanite toute entiere—un exemple partout dans le monde.

Monday, August 23, 1943. Kharkiv changes hands for the last time.

Today in World War II History—August 23, 1943: Soviets take Kharkiv, Ukraine, the fourth and final time it changes hands during World War II, and the Germans lose the Donets Basin industrial area.

From Sarah Sundin's blog.

Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=593872

And that was a big deal in the war, we might note.

We should also note that the Red Army took massive casualties in the Battle of Kursk and its independent subparts, and in the counteroffensive following it.  While putting it oddly, an achievement of the Red Army by this point of the war was being able to sustain huge manpower and material losses and not disintegrate.  On the other hand, while the Red Army has numerous fans, it was fighting in a style that simply tolerated losses at a level that anything other than a totalitarian state could not endure, something the Germans also would do, but with the Soviets taking much larger casualties.

Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky, a Polish born senior Soviet commander, had his illustration appear on the cover of Time.  The painting, which we cannot put up here as it is copyright protected, featured the Soviet general looking forward with piercing blue eyes and the words "USSR" behind him.  He was painted seemingly thinner than he was in real life.  Rokossovsky had been arrested during the Purge but had amazing survived, and then was dragged back out of confinement when it ended and the Red Army was in need of experienced commanders, which he was, after the disaster of the Winter War.  He never blamed Stalin for his confinement, but rather the NKVD, taking a politic, if toady, approach to both the horror and his ongoing servitude to the monstrosity of the USSR.

Orphaned as a child, he'd joined the Imperial Russian Army during World War One, then went over to the Reds during the Revolution.  After the war, in 1949, he became the Polish Minister of Defense under Stalin's orders, showing the extent to which Communist Poland was a puppet. He was not popular with the Poles, which he knew, commenting;  "In Russia, they say I'm a Pole, in Poland they call me Russian".

Rokossovsky and his wife Julia had a daughter named Ariadna.  He cheated on his wife with Army doctor military doctor Galina Talanova during the war, with whom he had a second child named Nadezhda.  He was fond of hunting.

He died in 1968 of prostate cancer in Moscow at age 71.

Life magazine, in contrast, had a black and white portrait of a young couple dancing the Lindy Hop.

Uruguay transferred German sailors of the battleship Graf Spee and auxiliary ship Tacoma to an internment camp at Sarandi Del Li after they violated the conditions of their internment in Montevideo boarding houses.

The Pasadena Post reported on the cast of Poppa is All touring military bases, which included Casper born and Lander raised former Miss Wyoming Helen Mowery.

Fairly forgotten in our present age, she was born Helen Inkster to parents who parents who owned the Quality Grocery in Casper, back in an age when Casper, like most communities, had a large number of local grocery stores.  Her father worked at a local refiner as well, and died in an industrial accident there when she was five.  Her mother then moved to her parent's ranch in Fremont County, while also giving birth to her only sibling at that time, the boy being born after the father's death.  When of high school age, she was sent to Cheyenne to complete her public school education.  Her popularity was notable even at that early age.  She became Miss Wyoming in 1939 in a competition that didn't qualify for the national one, as it was essentially a rodeo queen competition, with riding part of it.

She attended the University of Wyoming for two years after graduating from high school in 1940, but became an actress after that.  Never a big screen name, she acted as late as 1961, and died in 2008 in Pasadena at age 86.

Friday, August 20, 1943. Hard fighting near Kharkiv.

The Kingdom of Thailand and the Empire of Japan entered into a peace treaty providing that four Malayan provinces would become part of Thailand.

Thailand is one of the unique Axis powers of the war in that the Allies simply chose to ignore its declaration of war upon them.  It had actually been invaded by Japan in December 1941, before becoming a Japanese ally, so at least there was some reason to disregard its status, but only some.

The Red Army captured Libedin, west of Kharkiv.  However, as Sarah Sundin notes:

Today in World War II History—August 20, 1943: 80 Years Ago—August 20, 1943: In a battle near Kharkiv, Ukraine, Germans defeat Soviets and destroy 184 tanks.

 CBC war correspondent Matthew Halton preparing to broadcast from Sicily, August 20, 1943

Tuesday, August 3, 1943. The Patton Slapping Incidents, part one.

"Operation Husky, July-August 1943. Navy Comes Ashore. His and of the landing operations of Sicily successfully begun, Rear Admiral Alan G. Kirk, USN, (rear), goes ashore to watch Major General Troy H. Middleton, (second right), direct ground tactics near Scoglitti. Photograph released August 3, 1943. Photographed through Mylar sleeve. U.S. Navy Photograph."

Georgia lowered the voting age to 18.  It was the first state to grant 18-year-olds, at that time liable for the draft and fighting in World War Two, the right to vote.

The Red Army launched Operation Rumyantsev aimed at recovering to recapture Belgorod and Kharkov. As with many such actions, the offensive would gain ground, but feature huge Soviet material and manpower losses.

Gen. George S. Patton visited the 15th Evacuation Hospital in Nicosia, Cyprus and slapped Pvt Charles H. Kuhl with his gloves.  Kuhl was in the hospital for malaria, dysentery and shell shock, and made the mistake of giving Patton the incomplete answer to an inquiry about why he was there with  "I guess I just can't take it."  The level of his illness was not appreciated until after the incident, and he had in fact been in the hosptial on two prior occasions prior to it occuring and returend to the front.  The "can't take it" line had been put on his admittance notes.

Kuhl's malarial infection was undiagnosed at the time, and he was actually much sicker than initially believed.  He passed off the Patton incident and didn't seem to think it a big deal.  Patton later apologized directly to him, following the firestorm of bad publicity and official reprimand this incident was partially responsible for, and noted that Patton hadn't realized he was so ill.

Kuhl noted later that when he met Patton, Patton seemed to be quite worn out.  Depictions of Patton fail to appreciate this, but he was constantly ill during World War Two, a condition probably partially brought on by chain-smoking cigars.  Additionally, there is reason to suspect that he suffered from lingering after affects from horse accident related head injuries.

The incident is depicted in the movie Patton, although a second incident that would occur on August 10 is not.  They would ultimately hit the press, but the public, contrary to what might be suspected, largely supported Patton.

Kuhl died at age 55 from a heart attack.

OS2U-3Kingfisher being lifted off a recovery sled  to be swung aboard the USS Pennsylvania (BB-38) on August 3 1943.  I had no idea how they did this.

Thursday, March 18, 1943. 1st Rangers take El Guettar.

The U.S. 1st Ranger Battalion, "Darby's Rangers", took El Guettar Tunisia from surprised Italian forces.

William O. Darby, their commander, was a pre-war artilleryman who was exposed to British Commandos while stationed in Northern Ireland.  Darby sought and was granted a leadership role in the 1st Ranger Battalion when it was formed in 1942.  The Rangers at that time were heavily made up of volunteers from the 34th Infantry Division, which was a National Guard division made up of units from several states.  That the rangers had this origin is often missed.

Darby was killed in action in Italy shortly before the war ended.

United States Army Air Corps bombardier Jack Warren Mathis was killed in action.  He'd be awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions on this day. The citation reads:

For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty in action with the enemy over Vegesack, Germany on 18 March 1943. First Lt. Mathis, as leading bombardier of his squadron, flying through intense and accurate antiaircraft fire, was just starting his bomb run, upon which the entire squadron depended upon for accurate bombing, when he was hit by the enemy antiaircraft fire. His right arm was shattered above the elbow, a large wound was torn in his side and abdomen, and he was knocked from his bombsight to the rear of the bombardier's compartment. Realizing that the success of the mission depended upon him, 1st Lt. Mathis, by sheer determination and willpower, though mortally wounded, dragged himself back to his sights, released his bombs, then died at his post of duty. As the result of this action the airplanes of his bombardment squadron placed their bombs directly upon the assigned target for a perfect attack against the enemy. First Lt. Mathis' undaunted bravery has been a great inspiration to the officers and men of his unit.

Mathis had joined the Army in 1940 and had served as an enlisted artillerymen until his brother joined the Air Corps.  He then transferred to it. 

The German recapture of Kharkiv was completed.  The Red Army evacuated Belgorod.

Of note, now regarded as a Russian city, it had been a Ukrainian one prior to the USSR redrawing the map.

The British Canadian Star, Clarissa Radcliiffe, Dafila, Kaying, the US SS Ogelthorpe, Molly Pitcher, Walater Q. Gresham and  the DutchTerkolei went down in the Battle of the Atlantic.

The Vichy administration of French Guiana was deposed.

American Nazi leader, German-born Fritz Kuhn, was stripped of his U.S. citizenship.

Deportation of Jewish residents of Bulgarian occupied Thrace commenced.

Monday, March 15, 1943 A Wyoming Federal Reservation, Germans retake Kharkiv

Today In Wyoming's History: March 15: 1943  Franklin Roosevelt used executive authority to proclaim 221,000 acres as the Jackson Hole National Monument, the predecessor to today's Grand Teton National Park.  Governor Hunt threatened to use the Highway Patrol to prevent Federal authority on its grounds.  Congress, for its part, refused to appropriate money for the monument. 

Demonstrating how Wyoming really hasn't changed much, the move was hugely unpopular in Wyoming, or at least was politically unpopular.  

The history of the reservation dated back to 1924 when John D. Rockefeller, Jr. purchased a collection of ranches and amassed 37, 117 acres in the valley. The area was always spectacularly beautiful, but ranching conditions were generally poor.  Rockefeller's intended purpose from the onset was to donate the land to the Federal Government, something which of course appealed to him but much less to locals who were scraping by in industries derived from the region's natural resources.  In 1929 Rockefeller's initial donation of land went forward on a reduced basis, with only the Grand Teton National Park coming into existence.  The donation was smaller as Wyoming's Congressional representation opposed the larger donation, leaving Rockefeller with 32,000 acres and an annual tax bill of $13,000.

In 1942 Rockefeller informed Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes that if the project did not go forwad, he would sell the land.  This resulted in President Roosevelt's Federal reservation.

On March 19, Wyoming's Congressman Frank A. Barret introduced a bill to return the land to National Forest status.  In Congress, he based his argument on preserving the grazing permits in the former Federal domain that was part of the reservation.  Teton County Commissioner Clifford Hansen, who would later become Governor, and whose Mead family contributed a later Governor and other significant state politicians, also spoke against, although he was directly impacted, holding grazing permits in the area.

The bill passed both houses of Congress, but Roosevelt issued a pocket veto that contained a memorandum stating:

The effect of this bill would be to deprive the people of the United States of the benefits of an area of national significance from the standpoint of naturalistic, historic, scientific, and recreational values,

Campaigning by conservationist deterred any further legal effort to abolish the reservation, and its being opened to grazing in 1945 due to wartime conditions somewhat allayed local fears.  In 1950 the controversy was resolved through S. 3409 which merged the monument and neighboring national park, but also provided: no further extension or establishment of national parks or monuments in Wyoming may be undertaken except by express authorization of the Congress."  This did not prevent later wilderness designations, which have continued to be opposed in ways that can be argued to be short-sighted.

The Third Battle of Kharkiv resulted in a German victory.

By Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-J22454 / Zschäckel, Friedrich / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5434453

The heavily photographed German victory saw German troops reenter and take the city, including a spearhead featuring the SS.

By JonCatalán(Talk) - Own work (Original text: I created this work entirely by myself.), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6646109

The Red Army lost 45,219 men as killed, or missing, in action and another 41,250 were wounded.  The Germans lost 4,500 killed or missing from the SS Panzer Corps, and 7,000 wounded.  The Soviets could afford to lose more, of course, but the battle demonstrated that even at this mid-point in the war, the Germans could afflict outsized casualties upon the Soviets and still make significant advances.

Bundesarchiv, Bild 101III-Zschaeckel-189-13 / Zschäckel, Friedrich / CC-BY-SA

The German victory set the stage for the Battle of Kursk, which exhaustion precluded them from advancing on at this time.

The 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment, which was sometimes attached to the 82nd Airborne and the 11th Airborne, but which was often an independent combat team, was formed.  The unit fought in Italy, southern France, and Belgium during the war, and was slated to be deployed against Japan when the war ended.

Today In Wyoming's History: March 15: 1943  The French Line ship Wyoming sunk by the U-524.

The submarine USS Triton was sunk by the Japanese off of Kairiru,

February 19, 1943. Donets Campaign launched

The Germans went on the offensives in a region of Ukraine which is in the news constantly now, seeking to regain territory recently lost around Kharkov. They were successful in their month-long effort.  Moreover, Soviet casualties were massively outsized compared to the Germans, which were comparatively light.

Members of the 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler stand by a Marder III tank destroyer at the time of this offensive.  The Marker series of tank destroyers used both German and Soviet guns and was built on a Czech 38(t) chassis. By Bundesarchiv, Bild 101III-Roth-173-01 / Roth, Franz / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5478279

Amos 'n' Andy appeared for the first time on NBC.  It remains popular with fans of old radio shows, although I've never grasped how that it continues to be, as it suffers, even in the radio format, from the white in blackface situation.  Having said that, by the fall of 1943 black supporting actors were included.

U.S. forces continued to retreat in Tunisia.