Tuesday, May 5, 1942. The beginning of the end for the US at Corregidor and Vichy France on Madagascar.

Today in World War II History—May 5, 1942: First 29 Navajo recruits begin boot camp with the US Marine Corps; they will pioneer code-talking.

Sarah Sundin's blog catalogs a lot of significant Second World War Events for today's date, including the Japanese landing on Corregidor, the beginning of the end of the Battle for the Philippines, as well as the British Commonwealth invasion of Vichy France's colony of Madagascar, the latter undertaken out of fear that the Japanese would land there.

The Germans, it might be noted, had urged the Japanese to do just that.  The Japanese, for their part, had acknowledged that the island was strategically important, but had not committed to landing there, perhaps realizing that by this point they were at the absolute limits of their logistical abilities and such an operation would have been massively exposed to Allied strikes.

The action was at least the third time that the British had attacked the French in the war, which is of note. The French had resisted every time, but up to that point they had not declared war against the United Kingdom in spite of it. This invasion was undoubtedly a massive violation of French neutrality, but would not lead to such a declaration.  Of course, by this point, the Vichy French had sustained a similar usurpation of their sovereignty in Indochina by the Japanese. 

The Germans relieved the Kholm pocket in the Soviet Union.  The German troops there had been encircled since January and had been resupplied by air, something that would make the Germans overconfident about the ability to accomplish that for surrounded troops.  During the long siege the Germans had sustained 3,500 casualties including 1,500 dead, meaning that well over 50% of the surrounded force had become casualties.  The Red Army, however, sustained 20,000 casualties attempting to take the city.

Sundin also note the commencement of sugar rationing in the United States on this date.

Tuesday April 14, 1942. A Naval First.

 

USS Roper.

Today in World War II History—April 14, 1942: Off North Carolina, destroyer USS Roper sinks U-85 in the first US naval victory over a German U-boat (all 46 killed).

From Sarah Sundin's blog.  A U.S. Navy victory in the Battle of the Atlantic.  The U-85 was the first casualty for the Germans in Operation Drumbeat.   The U-252 went down the same day in the Atlantic when attacked by ships of the Royal Navy.  The British submarine Upholder was sunk, however, by the Italians in the Mediterranean.

On the same day, Philippe Petain reinstated Pierre Laval as Vice Premier of France due to German pressure to do so.

Tuesday, November 11, 1941. Armistice Day on the Eve of War.

Franklin Roosevelt delivered an Armistace Day address at Arlington National Cemetery.  It reads:

Among the great days of national remembrance, none is more deeply moving to Americans of our generation than the Eleventh of November, the Anniversary of the Armistice of 1918, the day sacred to the memory of those who gave their lives in the war which that day ended.

Our observance of this Anniversary has a particular significance in the year 1941.

For we are able today as we were not always able in the past to measure our indebtedness to those who died.

A few years ago, even a few months, we questioned, some of us, the sacrifice they had made. Standing near to the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Sergeant York of Tennessee, on a recent day spoke to such questioners. "There are those in this country today," said Sergeant York, "who ask me and other veterans of World War Number One, 'What did it get you?'"

Today we know the answer-all of us. All who search their hearts in honesty and candor know it.

We know that these men died to save their country from a terrible danger of that day. We know, because we face that danger once again on this day.

"What did it get you?"

People who asked that question of Sergeant York and his comrades forgot the one essential fact which every man who looks can see today.

They forgot that the danger which threatened this country in 1917 was real-and that the sacrifice of those who died averted that danger.

Because the danger was overcome they were unable to remember that the danger had been present.

Because our armies were victorious they demanded why our armies had fought.

Because our freedom was secure they took the security of our freedom for granted and asked why those who died to save it should have died at all.

"What did it get you?"

"What was there in it for you?"

If our armies of 1917 and 1918 had lost there would not have been a man or woman in America who would have wondered why the war was fought. The reasons would have faced us everywhere. We would have known why liberty is worth defending as those alone whose liberty is lost can know it. We would have known why tyranny is worth defeating as only those whom tyrants rule can know.

But because the war had been won we forgot, some of us, that the war might have been lost.

Whatever we knew or thought we knew a few years or months ago, we know now that the danger of brutality and tyranny and slavery to freedom-loving peoples can be real and terrible.

We know why these men fought to keep our freedom-and why the wars that save a people's liberties are wars worth fighting and worth winning-and at any price.

"What did it get you?"

The men of France, prisoners in their cities, victims of searches and of seizures without law, hostages for the safety of their masters' lives, robbed of their harvests, murdered in their prisons-the men of France would know the answer to that question. They know now what a former victory of freedom against tyranny was worth.

The Czechs too know the answer. The Poles. The Danes. The Dutch. The Serbs. The Belgians. The Norwegians. The Greeks.

We know it now.

We know that it was, in literal truth, to make the world safe for democracy that we took up arms in 1917. It was, in simple truth and in literal fact, to make the world habitable for decent and self-respecting men that those whom we now remember gave their lives. They died to prevent then the very thing that now, a quarter century later, has happened from one end of Europe to the other.

Now that it has happened we know in full the reason why they died.

We know also what obligation and duty their sacrifice imposes upon us. They did not die to make the world safe for decency and self-respect for five years or ten or maybe twenty. They died to make it safe. And if, by some fault of ours who lived beyond the war, its safety has again been threatened then the obligation and the duty are ours. It is in our charge now, as it was America's charge after the Civil War, to see to it "that these dead shall not have died in vain." Sergeant York spoke thus of the cynics and doubters: "The thing they forget is that liberty and freedom and democracy are so very precious that you do not fight to win them once and stop. Liberty and freedom and democracy are prizes awarded only to those peoples who fight to win them and then keep fighting eternally to hold them."

The people of America agree with that. They believe that liberty is worth fighting for. And if they are obliged to fight they will fight eternally to hold it.

This duty we owe, not to ourselves alone, but to the many dead who died to gain our freedom for us-to make the world a place where freedom can live and grow into the ages.

This would, of course, be the last peacetime Armistice Day/Veterans Day address delivered by a President until November, 1946.

Under Secretary of State Sumner Wells delivered one as well, in Washington D. C. In it, he stated:

Twenty-three years ago today, Woodrow Wilson addressed the Congress of the United States in order to inform the representatives of the American people of the terms of the Armistice which signalized the victorious conclusion of the first World War.

That day marked, as he then said, the attainment of a great objective: the opportunity for the setting up of "such a peace as will satisfy the longing of the whole world for disinterested justice, embodied in settlements which are based upon something much better and much more lasting than the selfish competitive interests of powerful states".

Less than five years later, shrouded in the cerements of apparent defeat, his shattered body was placed in the grave beside which we now are gathered.
He was laid to rest amid the apathy of the many and amid the sneers of those of his opponents who had, through appeal to ignorance, to passion, and to prejudice, temporarily persuaded the people of our country to reject Wilson's plea that the influence, the resources; and the power of the United States be exercised for their own security and for their own advantage, through our participation in an association of the free and self-governed peoples of the world.

And yet, when we reflect upon the course of the years that have since intervened, how rarely in human history has the vision of a statesman been so tragically and so swiftly vindicated.

Only a score of years have since elapsed, and today the United States finds itself in far greater peril than it did in 1917. The waves of world-conquest are breaking high both in the East and in the West. They are threatening, more nearly each day `that passes, to engulf our own shores.

Beyond the Atlantic a sinister and pitiless conqueror has reduced more than half of Europe to abject serfdom. It is his boast that his system shall prevail even unto the ends of the earth.

In the Far East the same forces of conquest under a different guise are menacing the safety of all nations that border upon the Pacific.

Were these forces to prevail, what place in such a world would there be for the freedoms which we cherish and which we are passionately determined to maintain?

Because of these perils we are arming ourselves to an extent to which we have never armed ourselves before. We are pouring out billions upon billions of dollars in expenditures, not only in order that we may successfully defend ourselves and our sister nations of the Western Hemisphere but also, for the same ends, in order to make available the weapons of defense to Great Britain, to Russia, to China, and to all the other nations that have until now so bravely fought back the hordes of the invaders. And in so doing we are necessarily diverting the greater part of our tremendous productive capacity into channels of destruction, not those of construction, and we are piling up a debt?burden which will inevitably affect the manner of life and diminish the opportunity for progressive advancement of our children' and of our children's children.

But far graver than that-for the tides are running fast-our people realize that at any moment war may be forced upon us, and if it is, the lives of all of us will have to be dedicated to preserving the freedom of the United States and to safeguarding the independence of the American people, which are more dear to us than life itself.

The heart-searching question which every American citizen must ask himself on this day of commemoration is whether the world in which we have to live would have come to this desperate pass had the United States been willing in those years which followed 1919 to play its full part in striving to bring about a new world-order based on justice and on "a steadfast concert for peace".

Would the burdens and the dangers which the American people might have had to envisage through that "partnership of democratic nations" which Woodrow Wilson then urged upon them, have represented even an infinitesimal portion of the burdens and the dangers with which they are now confronted?

Solely from the standpoint of the interest of the American people themselves, who saw straight and who thought straight 20 years ago? Was it Woodrow Wilson when he pled with his fellow Americans to insure the safety and the welfare of their country by utilizing the influence and the strength of their great Nation in joining with the other peace-loving powers of the earth in preventing the outgrowth of those conditions which have made possible this new world upheaval? Or was it that group of self-styled, "practical, hardheaded Americans", who jeered at his idealism, who loudly proclaimed that our very system of government would be destroyed if we raised our voice in the determination of world-affairs, and who refused to admit that our security could be even remotely jeopardized if the whole of the rest of the earth was plunged into the chaos of world anarchy?

A cycle in human events is about to come to its end.

The American people after full debate, in accordance with their democratic institutions, have determined upon their policy. They are pledged to defend their freedom and their ancient rights against every form of aggression, and to spare no effort and no sacrifice in bringing to pass the final defeat of Hitlerism and all that which that evil term implies.

We have no doubt of the ultimate victory of the forces of liberty and of human decency. But we cannot know, we cannot yet foresee, how long and how hard the road may be which leads to that new day when another armistice will be signed.

And what will come to pass thereafter?

Three months ago the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom signed and made public a new charter on which they base their hopes for a better future for the world".

The principles and the objectives set forth in that joint declaration gave new hope and new courage to millions of people throughout the earth. They saw again more clearly the why and the wherefore of this ghastly struggle. They saw once more the gleam of hope on the horizon-hope for liberty; freedom, from fear and want; the satisfaction of their craving for security.

These aspirations of human beings everywhere cannot again be defrauded. Those high objectives set forth in the Charter of the Atlantic must be realized. They must be realized, quite apart from every other consideration, because of the fact that the individual interest of every man and woman in the United States will be advanced consonantly with the measure in which the world where they live is governed by right and by justice, and the measure in which peace prevails

The American people thus have entered the Valley of Decision.

Shall we as the most powerful Nation of the earth once more stand aloof from all effective and practical forms of international concert, wherein our participation could in all human probability insure the maintenance of a peaceful world in which we can safely live?

Can we afford again to refrain from lifting a finger until gigantic forces of destruction threaten all of modern civilization, and the raucous voice of a criminal paranoiac, speaking as the spokesman for these forces from the cellar of a Munich beer hall, proclaims as his set purpose the destruction of our own security, and the annihilation of religious liberty, of political liberty, and of economic liberty throughout the earth?

The decision rests solely with the people of the United States-the power is theirs to determine the kind of world of the future in which they would live. Is it conceivable that, in enlightened self-interest, they could once more spurn that opportunity?

When the time for?the making of that great decision is at hand, I believe that they will turn again for light and for inspiration to the ideals of that great seer; statesman, patriot, and lover of his fellow men-Woodrow Wilson-whose memory we here today revere.

Then, again, they will remember that great cause he once held up before their eyes-"A universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.

Australia dedicated its war memorial on this day.

In the Philippines, a general election won a second term for Manuel L. Quezon, the incumbent President. This was the first time a Filipino President had been reelected because it was the first time its constitution allowed for it.

Quezon was a lawyer and former insurrectionist, from the US point of view, who had come around to supporting the US created government, as most prominent Filipino figures had.  He would occupy the position of President until his death on August 1, 1944.

Vichy France suffered the loss of the commander of its ground forces, Charles Hutzinger, in an air accident. The aircraft in which he was a passenger was on an inspection tour of Vichy military facilities in North Africa when it attempted to land in bad weather with poor visibility in an aircraft whose radio equipment was obsolete.

Hutzinger, who had been one of the officials to sign Vichy France's anti-Semitic laws of 1940, was perhaps a natural for his position, as he was of German descent.

Movies In History: Casablanca

First of all, let me note that I made an error in my review of The Maltese Falcon.  The 41 variant of that film was released first, not Casablanca.  I don't know why I reversed the order, but I did.

Casablanca was released for general circulation on January 23, 1943.

At that time, Morocco was just recently brought into the Allied orbit.  Allied troops had landed there in November, 1942 with the landings being part of Operation Torch.  The Moroccan landings, much less discussed than the Algerian ones, actually took place at Casablanca.  French forces resisted the Allies briefly in Algeria and Morocco, before formally switching sides as part of a negotiated turn about in early November, 1942.  Casablanca was the host that January to the Casablanca Conference between Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt, where the policy of unconditional surrender was announced and agreed upon.

So how's the film hold up?

Well, the movie doesn't take place in 1943, it takes place in December, 1941, just before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The US isn't yet in the war.  Morocco is in the hands of the Vichy French, although at the end of the movie we learn about a Free French garrison in Brazzaville, a city in French Equatorial Africa.  Casablanca is, as the movie depicts it, as sweaty den of vice, filled with refugees seeking desperately to get out of Morocco and on to freedom somewhere else.  In the center of it is Rick's Cafe American, where everyone goes.  Working into this, we have Victor Laszlo, a Central European resistance leader and his beautiful wife Ilsa Lund, played by Ingrid Bergman.  Lund, we learn, was the girlfriend of Rick of Rick's Cafe, who proposed to her just as Paris was set to fall, not knowing that she was already married to Laszlo.  Laszlo and Lund need "letters of transit" to leave Morocco, and Vichy French control, and the cynical world-weary Rick is believed to have obtained them from the oily Signor Ugarte, played by Peter Lorre.  Through it all a charmingly corrupt Inspector Renault, played by Claude Rains, weaves his way.

If you haven't seen it, see it.  This is another film which, by some people's measure, is the "greatest" movie ever made, although it isn't as great as the film commonly taking that prize, in my view, that being Citizen Kane.  It's a great movie, however.  And it's all the more amazingly great when you realize how much the making of the film was beset by all sorts of difficulties.

But what of its place in history. Was Casablanca of 1941 like the way it was portrayed in this 1942/43 film?

Well, probably surprisingly close.

Places under European colonial administration were bizarrely reservoirs of traditional cultures, advancement of European ideas, and massive corruption.  All three are shown to exist in the film and, if in exaggerated fashion, probably not too exaggerated really.  Morocco was controlled by Vichy at the time.  Brazzaville actually was beyond Vichy control and French Equatorial Africa was held by France Libre, a Free French movement.  Portugal was a neutral and a destination for people trying to get to the United Kingdom and beyond, or for that matter into Spain and then Nazi Germany through France.

Letters of Transit?  Nope, no such thing.  It is, after all, fiction.

In terms of material details, well the film was a contemporary picture, and it has the pluses and the minuses noted in our review of the Maltese Falcon.  Male costumes, more or less correct, with Bogar again wearing a Borsolino fedora, maybe the same one. Women's fashion?  Well, women refugees probably almost never traveled with a radiant wardrobe.

Well worth seeing, however.

Friday August 29, 1941. Shifting sands

On this day in 1941, Charles Lindbergh at a rally of the American First Committee in Oklahoma City warned the audience that the United Kingdom might turn against the US "as she had turned against France and Finland". 

Senator Burton K. Wheeler of Montana.

Lindbergh was backed up by Montana Senator Burton K. Wheeler who counseled that "If our interventionist want to free a country from the domination of another country, we ought to declare war on Great Britain and free India.  I have never seen such slavery as I saw in India a few years ago".

Wheeler was an outspoken left wing Democrat who had at one time crossed over to the Progressive Party and then back.  He opposed entry to the war right up until December 7, 1941 and was instrumental in the leaking of US plans to aid the British prior to the war, which went to press on December 4, 1941.  His isolationist stances caused him to suffer defeat in the first Montana election in which he was up after December 7, and he never returned to politics. A lawyer by training, he returned to practicing law and defended Max Lowenthal in front of the House Committee On Un American Affairs in the 1950s.  He's an example of how opposition to entry into the war was not, as sometimes imagined, politically uniform.

The rally itself was not well received by the public, and polls started increasingly swinging towards the Administration's interventionist policies.

Speaking of Finland, the Finns retook Viipuri.  Not forever of course, its Vyborg, Russia.

Flag for the city of Vybork, in the Leningrad Oblast.

The city did have a Finnish population at the time, but its entire population was evacuated in 1944 with the collapse of the Eastern Front.  It is, therefore, an example today of the massive population disruption brought on by the Second World War.

Finnish victory parade, August 31, 1941.

In Serbia, the puppet collaborationist Government of National Salvation commenced control of the country.

Vichy authorities arrested American journalist Varian Fry.  Fry was running an underground railroad effort helping Jews escape from France and to the United States, using Spain and Portugal as conduits.  He'd be expelled from the country.

Arthur McFadden became Australian Prime Minister in a coalition government.  He was a member of the minority Country Party.  The National Country Party, the "Nats" is a center right party that's strongest in rural areas and which has a focus on agrarian issues.

Monday August 11, 1941. Conscription extended, Atlantic Charter signed.

The House of Representatives voted to extend the Selective Service Act of 1940 by a single vote.

Soldiers examining an experimental "trackless tank" in April, 1941.

The vote had authorized conscription starting in September 1940, with the first conscripts called up in October 1940. Those drafted in October of that year were due to be discharged in October 1941 and the introduction of the bill caused a movement among the early conscripts in which they threatened to desert if that month if the draft was extended.  Part of the bill extended the original one-year service term they were under to 30 months.

Delegates of the New York Youth Congress with an anti conscription petition in June 1940.

The narrow passage of the bill showed how unpopular conscription was.  Included among those voting no was a former FDR Secretary of Defense who argued that voluntarily enlistments had not been given a fair try. 

The bill also showed how the House and Senate really differ, something quite obvious in our modern politics.  It passed by a larger margin in the Senate when it shortly came up for consideration.

I suppose this also serves to show how Americans have a long history of resenting government instructions to personally do something, even in times of emergency.

Of note, conscripts were not allowed to serve outside the U.S. This differed from National Guardsmen, who had been called up separately, and who were already at this time serving in the Philippines.

Somewhat ironically, on this day Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt signed, but did not release, the Atlantic Charter. The document read, as  Churchill's hand edited version below sets forth, as follows:

The document was not issued to the public until two days later:

Set out here, the document states:

The President of the United States and the Prime Minister, Mr. Churchill, representing His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom, have met at sea.

They have been accompanied by officials of their two Governments, including high-ranking officers of their military, naval, and air services.

The whole problem of the supply of munitions of war, as provided by the Lease-Lend Act, for the armed forces of the United States, and for those countries actively engaged in resisting aggression, has been further examined.

Lord Beaverbrook, the Minister of Supply of the British Government, has joined in these conferences. He is going to proceed to Washington to discuss further details with appropriate officials of the United States Government. These conferences will also cover the supply problems of the Soviet Union.

The President and the Prime Minister have had several conferences. They have considered the dangers to world civilization arising from the policies of military domination by conquest upon which the Hitlerite government of Germany and other governments associated therewith have embarked, and have made clear the steps which their countries are respectively taking for their safety in the face of these dangers.

They have agreed upon the following joint declaration:

"The President of the United States of America and the Prime Minister, Mr. Churchill, representing His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom, being met together, deem it right to make known certain common principles in the national policies of their respective countries on which they base their hopes for a better future of the world.

First, their countries seek no aggrandizement, territorial or other;

Second, they desire to see no territorial changes that do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the peoples concerned;

Third, they respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live; and they wish to see sovereign rights and self-government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of them;

Fourth, they will endeavor, with due respect for their existing obligations, to further the enjoyment by all states, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity;

Fifth, they desire to bring about the fullest collaboration between all nations in the economic field with the object of securing, for all, improved labor standards, economic advancement, and social security;

Sixth, after the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny, they hope to see established a peace which will afford to all nations the means of dwelling in safety within their own boundaries, and which will afford assurance that all the men in all the lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want;

Seventh, such a peace should enable all men to traverse the high seas and oceans without hindrance;

Eighth, they believe that all of the nations of the world, for realistic as well as spiritual reasons, must come to the abandonment of the use of force. Since no future peace can be maintained if land, sea, or air armaments continue to be employed by nations which threaten, or may threaten, aggression outside of their frontiers, they believe, pending the establishment of a wider and permanent system of general security, that the disarmament of such nations is essential. They will likewise aid and encourage all other practicable measures which will lighten for peace-loving peoples the crushing burden of armaments.

FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT

WINSTON S. CHURCHILL.

Notable, the document referenced "the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny", committing the Administration publically to the destruction of Nazi Germany even though the US was technically a neutral at the time.

Tyranny of the Vichy type was extending itself in France.  On this same day, Vichy French Vice-Premier Darlan was made the French Minister of Defense while Marshall Petain issued a series of harsh measures to address the situation in Vichy France.  Political parties were declared to be dissolved and officials were required to give a loyalty oath to Petain.

Canada ordered Japanese Canadians to carry a registration card.  It's often forgotten that Canadian actions in regard to its Japanese ancestry residents and citizens was every bit as harsh as that of the United States during World War Two.

The Soviet Union officially issued an amnesty for Poles living in the Soviet Union.   Effectively, it was an amnesty for the crime of merely existing.

Friday, July 25, 1941. The U.S. Freezes Assets, Churchill Plans a Trip, Germany Advances Horrors.

Franklin Roosevelt froze Japanese assets in the United States, with the immediate cause of this being the Japanese occupation of French Indochina.

The Japanese entering Saigon. Bicycles were a common means of conveyance in most armies at the time, with the U.S. being a real exception.

It'd be a mistake, of course, to view that as the sole cause, but it was instrumental in it.  Japan was getting more aggressive in its expansion, having now moved its military into Indochina.  It technically had French acquiescence to this, but as a practical matter, Vichy had little it could do about it.  Japan had already intervened militarily in the northern part of Indochina a year prior, so they were already there.   That had in fact resulted in fighting between the Vichy French and the Japanese, but Japanese occupation was a fact.  Indeed, Japan had already secured permission to garrison troops in southern Indochina.

Free French poster criticizing the Vichy administration's collaboration with Japan.

It hadn't because it remained concerned about the Soviet Union.  It's presence in Indochina had been ancillary to their war with China, but with increasingly difficult relations with the United States, and the United Kingdom, that focus changed once Germany invaded the Soviet Union.  The Japanese correctly guessed that the Soviets wouldn't interfere with them in any fashion while they were fighting the Germans.  Given that, Imperial Japan set its sights on the Dutch East Indies, and its oil, and war with the United States.

While Japanese occupation of Indochina was already a fact, the formal change is something that really couldn't be ignored by the U.S.  It was one step closer to war by both parties.

Oddly, China's assets were also frozen, and this by request of Chiang Kai Shek, the leader of Nationalist China.  While not exactly knowing why, this may be because Chiang had concerns about Chinese assets being used by the Japanese and, of course, he also faced a domestic competitor in the form of the Chinese Communist Party, which was contesting the Nationalist for control of China.

Also, on this day King George VI gave permission for Prime Minister Churchill to travel to the United States to meet with Roosevelt.  Permission was a formality, of course.

Not a formality was the growing relationship between Churchill and Roosevelt, often described as a friendship but in reality a species of alliance.  Churchill's visit was to be a secret and was part of the building of that alliance.

Germany established Reichskommissariat Ostland, the administrative unit for the occupied Baltics and Belarus, on this day.  The plan for the region was to Germanize the Baltics and to settle it with Germans.  The region was regarded as "European" by the Germans due to the prior influence of Germany, Sweden and Denmark.  The Belarusians were regarded as hopelessly backwards peasants who would be exploited.  Jews, of course, were to be killed.

Germany began to act on these plans immediately, which is somewhat of a surprise in context.  Not only did the Germans begin to slaughter Jewish residents of the area, along with Communists, but it also began to move German settlers into the areas it had taken.  Indeed, while he has said little about it, one individual I know had a grandfather who had moved into the Eastern lands, resulting of course in his status as a refugee later on.

July 22, 1941. Vichy France and Imperial Japan entered a mutual defense pact . . .

 as hard as that is to envision.

For all practical purposes, the Vichy administration in Indochina was practically on its own during the war and saw itself as fairly helpless in regard to Japan. The following day, it would allow Japanese troops to enter French Indochina.

Slovak forces engaged in combat for the first time with the Red Army at Lypovec.

They did not cover themselves in glory, from the prospective of the invading Axis forces, as they reacted poorly to combat and suffered defections.  Indeed, the Slovaks withdrew some of their forces all the way back to Slovakia on the pretext that they couldn't repair equipment in the field.

While this was an extreme example, it showed a weakness in the German efforts.  By and large, the rank and file of Germany's allies in the USSR were not enthusiastic about the cause, and indeed some of the nations that had sent them into it were lukewarm. The national reasons for joining Germany varied, but at the troop level it was an unwelcome war against a powerful enemy.  Of Germany's allies that were full participants in the war, only Finland really had troops that were first-rate.

The Vichy government again restricted Jewish participation in French civil life, now requiring the registration of their businesses, as noted here:

Today in World War II History—July 22, 1941

Monday, July 14, 1941. Bastille Day and the Armistice of Saint Jean d'Acre

On this day in 1941 French forces in Lebanon and Syria officially ended hostilities with the British Commonwealth in what is known as the Armistice of Saint Jean d'Acre.  

It was Bastille Day.

The day was marked in British Palestine at a hospital for Free French troops.

That day had been transformed into a sort of memorial day by the Vichy regime.  It remained on France's official calendar of holidays, but was altered from a celebration of the initiation of the French Revolution to one commemorating France's war dead.  This was part of an overall Vichy struggle with republican symbols and holidays that saw efforts to recast many such things, where they were not discarded.

Hitler, if he took note of the day at all, obviously didn't celebrate it.  Rather, he was still pondering the imminent defeat of the Soviet Union, revised his directive of the previous day with a part "A", which read:

The Führer and Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces

Führer Headquarters, 14th July 1941. 13 draft copies

On the basis of my intentions for the future prosecution of the war, as stated in Directive 32, I issue the following general instructions concerning personnel and equipment :

1. General:

Our military mastery of the European continent after the overthrow of Russia will make it possible considerably to reduce the strength of the Army. Within the limits of this reduced Army, the relative strength of the armoured forces will be greatly increased.

The manning and equipment of the Navy will be limited to what is essential for the direct prosecution of the war against England and, should the occasion arise, against America.

The main effort of equipment will be devoted to the Air Force, which will be greatly strengthened.

2. Manpower:

The future strength of the Army will be laid down by me, after receiving proposals from Commander-in-Chief Army.

The Replacement Army will be reduced to conform with the diminished strength of the Army.

The Chief of the High Command of the Armed Forces will decide, in accordance with my directives, on the employment of the manpower which will become available for the Armed Forces as a whole and for the armaments industry.

The Class of 1922 will be called up at the latest possible date, and will be distributed by the High Command of the Armed Forces in accordance with the future tasks of the various branches of the Armed Forces.

3. Arms and Equipment:

(a) The Armed Forces as a whole.
The arming and equipment of troops will be reduced to the requirements of the situation in the field, without reference to existing establishment scales.

All formations not intended for actual combat (security, guard, construction, and similar units) will be armed basically with captured weapons and second line equipment.

All requests for 'general Armed Forces equipment' will be immediately reduced or rejected in relation to available supplies, need, and wear and tear. Continued manufacture of such weapons as can be proved to be necessary will be decided in agreement with the Minister for Armaments and Munitions.

Plant (buildings and machine tools) already in use will not be expanded unless it can be shown that existing equipment cannot be put to full use by the introduction of shift working.

Work on all such permanent buildings for industry and the Armed Forces as are intended for use in peace-time, rather than for the immediate prosecution of the war and for the production of arms, will be halted. Construction directly necessary for the conduct of the war and for armaments will remain subject to the regulations of the General Plenipotentiary for Building. Buildings erected by civilian contractors will be limited by him to such as are most essential to the war effort.

Contracts of all kinds which do not comply with these principles will be immediately withdrawn.

The manpower, raw materials, and plant released by these measures will be made available for the main tasks of equipment and placed, as soon as possible, at the disposal of the Minister of Armaments and Munitions for use elsewhere.

(b) Army:
The extension of arms and equipment and the production of new weapons, munitions, and equipment will be related, with immediate effect, to the smaller forces which are contemplated for the future. Where orders have been placed for more than six months ahead all contracts beyond that period will be cancelled. Current deliveries will only continue if their immediate cancellation would be uneconomic.

The following are exceptions to these limitations:

The tank programme for the motorised forces (which are to be considerably reinforced) including the provision of special weapons and tanks of the heaviest type.

The new programme for heavy anti-tank guns, including their tractors and ammunition.

The programme for additional equipment for expeditionary forces, which will include four further armoured divisions for employment in the tropics, drawn from the overall strength of the armoured forces.

Preparations for the manufacture of equipment unrelated to these programmes will be halted.

The Army's programme for anti-aircraft guns is to be co-ordinated with that of the Air Force, and represents a single unified scheme from the manufacturing point of view. All available plant will be fully employed in order to achieve the delivery targets which I have laid down.

(c) Navy:
The Navy will continue its submarine programme. Construction will be limited to what is directly connected with this programme. Expansion of the armaments programme over and above this is to be stopped.

(d) Air Force:

The overall armaments program will concentrate on carrying out the expanded 'Air Armaments program' which I have approved. Its realization up to the spring of 1942 is of decisive importance for the whole war effort. For this purpose all available manpower from the Armed Forces and industry will be employed. The allocation of aluminum to the Air Force will be increased as far as possible.

The speed of the programme, and the extent to which it can be fulfilled, will be linked to the increased production of light metals and mineral oil.

4. The programme for powder and explosives will concentrate upon the requirements of the Air Force (bombs and anti-aircraft ammunition) at the expense of the requirements of the Army. Buildings will be restricted to the barest essentials and confined to the simplest type of construction.

Production of explosives will be limited to the existing basis.

5. It is particularly important to ensure supplies of raw materials and mineral oil. Coal production and the extension of the light metal, artificial rubber, substitute materials, and liquid fuel industries will be supported by the Armed Forces in every way, particularly by the release of miners and specialist workers. The construction of the necessary plans for the extended air armaments industry will be developed simultaneously.

6. The allocation of manpower, raw materials, and plant will be made in accordance with these principles.

7. The Chief of the High Command of the Armed Forces will issue the necessary orders for the Armed Forces, and the Minister for Armaments and Munitions for his sector, in mutual agreement.

signed: ADOLF HITLER

These directives are interesting not only in that he thought he'd won the war, by this time, against the Soviet Union, but that in he thought it would still require some prosecution against the British, and perhaps the United States, about which he didn't seem overly concerned.  That war, in his mind, was going to be primarily an air and naval war, and his decisions to start shrinking the German army as soon as possible reflected that.

In New York some kids were still acting normal.

Vladeck Houses, Madison St., New York City.   This was a housing project.

Saturday July 12, 1941. The Vichy end in Syria and Lebanon, the USSR and UK come to an agreement.

The Battle of Beirut brought to an end the British Commonwealth Syria-Lebanon campaign with a successful Commonwealth outcome.  An armistace between the Vichy French and the British Commonwealth would be signed that day.

An interesting overall feature of this campaign is that it never resulted in a declaration of war by Vichy France.  The fighting was outright, of course, but the French held back on formally entering the war in spite of it.

The Soviet Union and the United Kingdom signed an agreement that they would render each other assitance and that neigther would negotiate a seperate peace.

Saturday July 5, 1941. The Ecuadorian-Peruvian War commences.

Border disputes between Ecuador and Peru erupted into full scale war.  Who started full scale combat is disputed, but the war generally went Peru's way during the month long fighting.

Ecuador was very outmatched in the fighting and has always maintained that it was invaded by Peru, which Peru has always denied.  At any rate, Peru's military was much more advanced than Ecuador's and this showed in the short war.

In 1942 Ecuador declared war on Japan, but not Germany, in order to improve its international position and in order to receive American military material support, which it did receive.  Peru declared war on the Axis powers in 1945.

The countries would fight two more border wars in the 20th Century.

This war was the first South American war to feature paratroopers, which Peru used in the war.

The Battle of Damour commenced in Lebanon. Damour was the French seat of government in Lebanon and is located to the south of Beirut.  The battle was fought principally by Australians on the British side.

On the same day, Auchinleck assumed his duties as the British Commander in Chief in the Middle East.

Auchinleck would be initially successful but would prove to be one of several British commanders in the Middle East who was unable to bring about a British victory.  He achieved early success against the Africa Korps after being assigned as CoC in the Middle East, but then suffered setbacks that Churchill felt merited a replacement.

Auchinleck had a major role in preparing the British Empire in that he modernized the Indian Army between the wars.  During that time, he met and married American Jessie Stewart who was regarded as a great beauty. She was 16 years his junior.

Jessie would in turn have an odd role in the British command during the war in that she commenced an affair with Auchinleck's friend, RAF commander Sir Richard Peirse.  The affair caused Peirce to be regarded as neglecting his duties and caused him to be recalled to the UK, with Mrs. Auchinleck going with him.  Peirse would be accordingly retired during the war, his career ending in a type of disgrace during the war itself.  Auchinleck never recovered from the divorce and carried Jesse's photograph in his wallet for the rest of his life,   That he genuinely adored Jesse is clear, and that the divorce also changed him is clear, but there remains a scholarly debate on whether Auchinleck himself my have had homosexual inclinations.  His biographer maintains that these rumors are false, but another writer asserts the opposite, citing "moral aversion" for Montgomery's inability to get along with him.

And as detailed here, German U-boats began patrolling in the Arctic.

Today in World War II History—July 5, 1941

Tuesday, July 1, 1941. The dawn of the Television commercial.

On this date in history, the first television commercial ran, which you can now watch above.

It was an interesting day in the history of television overall:

Today in World War II History—July 1, 1941

On this day in 1941 a Federal photographer was photographing defense housing in Marrimack Park, Virginia.  You can tell which photographer it is by the fact that one of them consistently could never fully focus his camera.  Perhaps it was his equipment, but the photos are always out of focus.

Defense housing. Merrimack Park, Norfolk, Virginia. This project to house married enlisted personnel of the Norfolk naval base has 500 units which include single-story detached dwellings, two family houses, two-story group houses and apartments. Built at a cost of $1,980,000 by the US

Defense housing. Merrimack Park, Norfolk, Virginia.   Enlisted housing.

On the same day, the British took took the Syrian location of Palmyra.

British troops in Palmyra.

The battle featured mechanized British cavalry, and the Arab Legion, which would become famous post war in regard to the early Arab Israeli conflicts.  The location was inhabited since vastly ancient times, but was abandoned in 1932.

A press photographer photographed a convalescent home for British officers.  One of the photos appears here:

Lady MacMichael, at the Knights of St. John's Br. Red Cross, convalescent house for officers.

The Germans and Finns were also advancing, in the northernmost front of the war.  They jointly commenced Operation Arctic Fox, which aimed to capture Murmansk.  The operation would run until November, and fall short of its goal.

That failure was significant, as was the Finnish participation in the effort to seize the port.  The seizure would have choked off Allied supplies from that port, one of the most significant routes to the Red Army by sea.

The Vichy French government froze Soviet assets in France.

The Germans killed a small number of Polish academics and their families in Lwow, a targeted strike against the Polish intellectual community.  The death tole was 25, small in comparison to the number of people being executed elsewhere, but its still significant nonetheless.

Thursday. June 26, 1941. Germany's Neutral Allies

Symbol of the Spanish Blue Division 

On this date in 1941, the Spanish government began to organize a division to serve with the Germans against the Soviet Union.  It's effort would be the most successful example of a non German contribution to the German armed forces during World War Two, outside of the complicated topic of Soviet volunteers to the same.

The German government requested that Spain contribute to Operation Barbarossa on June 22, 1941, the date of the opening of the offensive, hoping for a Spanish declaration of war.  Spain did not take that step, but as the Spanish army was favorable to a contribution, Franco agreed to it on June 24, providing that the Spanish army be in charge of the organization of the unit.  Organization commenced on this day and recruitment the following day.  Technically the unit was not to be a unit of the Spanish armed forces and therefore its contribution not a causa belli.

By early July the unit was sufficiently manned, with over 18,000 volunteers, that it was sent to Germany for further training.  It acquired its nickname the "Blue Division" as it adopted a dress uniform that features the Falangist blue shirt, most of its volunteers being Falangists.  The same uniform featured a red Carlist beret and the Spanish Legion's khaki trousers.  In combat it wore German uniforms.  It was incorporated into the Wehrmacht on July 31.

It's performance inside the Wehrmacht would be a good one, showing the dedication of its Falangist volunteers.  Ultimately 47,000 Spaniards would serve in the unit, and less than 200 fascist Portuguese, and it would inflict 49,000 deaths upon the Soviets.  The unit was responsible for the desecration of the Church of the Transfiguration on Ilyina Street in Novgorod, which perhaps says something about the often mistaken assumption that the Falangist held a charitable view on religion.

Indeed, inside of Spain, while Falangist celebrated the German invasion, conservative Spaniards and the Catholic Church opposed the contribution to the German cause and Allied pressure made it increasingly uncomfortable for Franco.  In October 1943, by which time the handwriting was on the wall on an eventual German defeat, he ordered its official withdrawal.  3,000 mostly Falangist refused Franco's order and remained, and were incorporated into the SS.

At the same time, but with an undeterminable date in June, French far right politicians approached the German ambassador in France about contributing up to 30,000 volunteers for the same cause.  Notable among them was Jacque Doriot who had been a former Communist, but had turned to the hard right.

The symbol of the Legion of French Volunteers Against Bolshevism.

The Germans accepted the idea, but not trusting the French, limited the contribution to 10,000 men and began organizing them in July.  Less than 3,000 volunteers, however, came forward to serve in the unit, showing that it the German cause was not popular even among the hard French right. The Vichy government tolerated its formation but didn't support it, unlike the Spanish government.  The unit was ordered disbanded after the western Allies landed in Normandy and its surviving members were incorporated into the SS.

Ironically one of its members was Said Mohammed, a notable member of the Algerian independence movement after the war.  He was later sent by the Abwehr into Algeria where he was caught and arrested.  He seemed to somehow associate his membership in the unit with Algerian independence.  Completing the irony of his life, he died in Parish in 1994.

As noted, the largest number of individuals who served with the Germans during World War Two who were not German, were Soviet citizens, with the numbers ultimately being massive.   Their story, however, is much more complicated than those discussed above, so it'll have to be addressed elsewhere.

Kassa Hungary was bombed by unidentified aircraft, which was used as a pretext by the Hungarian government to declare war on the Soviet Union.  The event remains controversial today as the origin of the aircraft remains unknown, with the two likely suspects being the Germans, in a clandestine role with the cooperation of the Hungarian government, or the Soviets, by accident. The latter seems the most likely.  In any event, Hungary was going to join in with the Germans, so it was a mere pretext no matter who was responsible.

What all this tends to show is how bad the ability of humans to predict the future really is.  Germany was receiving support for its invasion of its massive neighbor right and left, but the outcome was very far from certain at the time.  With the first couple of days being successful, and with the German record up to that date seemingly in their favor, it was simply assumed they'd win.

Saturday, June 21, 1941. Revealing open secrets

On this day in 1941 mine layers of the German navy, the Kreigsmarine, deployed from Finland's Archipelago  Sea and deployed to large marine minefields across the Gulf of Finland, followed by the Luftwaffe mining Leningrad's harbor that night. 

While German troops would not commence operations until 0300 the following morning, Operation Barbarossa was effectively on, although Finland itself would not commence offensive operations until July, and after the Soviets had conducted air operations against Finnish targets.

Finnish troops in July 1941.

Earlier in the day in 1941 Hitler informed Mussolini that Germany would invade the Soviet Union the following day, although he claimed that the decision would be held until 7:00 p.m. Berlin time.  In doing so, he stated:

I earnestly beg you, therefore, to refrain, above all, from making any explanation to your Ambassador at Moscow, for there is no absolute guarantee that our coded reports cannot be decoded. I, too, shall wait until the last moment to have my own Ambassador informed of the decisions reached

Mussolini seems to have already known somehow, probably due to Italian intelligence and certainly on troop movements, that a German invasion of the Soviet Union was immanent.  None the less, one can only image what he must have felt knowing that his only solid ally was about to commit to an invasion that, historically, had a bad chance of working out.

Italy would also sustain a loss of its consulates in the US, a reprisal for it joining Germany in closing its, which was in reaction to the US closing of German consulates.

On the same day, the Vichy forces were defeated at Damascus.  Vichy, however, also limited its Jewish university population to 3% of the overall total.

Churchill relieved Wavell and replaced him with Auchinleck.  Wavell went to India, replacing Auchinleck there.

Thursday June 19, 1941. Blackout

U.S. Tank in training accident in Tennessee, June 19, 1941.  The US was engaged in full scale training in anticipation of war at this time.

Germany and Italy retaliated for the closure of German and Italian consulates in the US by closing US consulates in the two countries, something no doubt expected.  We learned of that here:

Today in World War II History—June 19, 1941

As you can also see from that item, the Soviet Union, realizing that things were looking ominous along its long border with the Axis, ordered a nighttime blackout on the border and camouflaged its airfields.

The Battle of Merdjayoun commenced in southern Lebanon, pitting British Commonwealth forces against Vichy French and Colonial Lebanese forces.

Australian artillery during the Battle of Merjayoun.

Wednesday June 18, 1941. The Middle East

 The Battle of Damascus began on this day in 1941.

Free French Circassian cavalry in Damascus.

The battle pitted Allied forces, lead by Indian troops on the ground, but including various Commonwealth countries and Free French forces against Vichy French and colonial Syrian troops.

The battle ran until June 21 and resulted in the surrender of the Vichy French administration to the Allies, thereby closing an Axis rear door in North Africa.

Germany and Turkey signed a treaty of friendship.

The treaty closed the door to the possibility, in German minds, of the Allies wooing Turkey, which was unlikely in the first place. Turkey, for its part, was on a dedicated path of neutrality.

The treaty would benefit both Germany and Turkey, with the Turks benefitting in some unexpected ways.  The Germans received a guaranteed supply of chromite from turkey through the treaty, putting the Turks basically in the same position as the Swedes in buying neutrality through raw materials, although in both instances the countries would have been a handful for the Germans to attack if they'd thought it necessary.  Indeed, in Turkey's situation the country was far more valuable to Nazi Germany as a neutral than as a combatant, as that closed the door to the British to the south who, as can be seen from the above, were defeating the Vichy French in Syria and who had already defeated an attempt at fascism in Iraq.  Unbeknownst to the Turks, the treat also shortened German lines, already pretty stretched, for Operation Barbarossa, which was just about to commence.

The Turks received cash, for chromite, but they also received a large guaranteed supply of arms which, in the dangerous world in which they were living, were something they very much needed.  Germany actually took advantage of this provision to supply the Turks with a large supply of unfinished Polish arms, which were of very high quality.  Polish small arms were partially based on German designs and the Germans themselves had put them to use in their own armed forces, but Poland had used "small ring" Mausers rather than the "large ring" ones used by the Germans which made finishing them off unattractive to the Germans.  This was not the case for the Turks.

The treaty did not preclude other nations, including belligerents, from trading with Turkey and the treaty would inspire a chromite buying effort on the part of the Allies.

The treaty's term was ten years, but the Turks would terminate the agreement in 1944, seeing which way the war was going, and they declared war on Germany on February 23, 1945.  Their declaration did not mean that they contributed troops in the final months of the war but can be seen as a means of attempting to protect themselves against a potential Soviet incursion into their territory.

Joe Louis knocked out Billy Conn in a heavyweight boxing match.

Sunday June 15, 1941 Battle of Kissoué and Operation Battleaxe. The death of Evelyn Underhill.

 The Second World War became, for a time, a French civil war at the Battle of Kissoué where French "Free" forces fought "Vichy" forces in Syria. The Free French forces were part of an overall Allied force which flanked the Vichy forces and caused them to withdraw.

Fort Capuzzo.

On the same day the British launched Operation Battleaxe in North Africa which had the goal of relieving Tobruk. While it gained ground, and the British retook Ft. Capuzzo, it suffered disastrous armor losses and was an overall failure.  The results proved German superiority in the use of armor, and perhaps the superior nature of German armor itself, and lead to the British quietly sacking their command structure in Libya.

Also on this day Anglican writer  Evelyn Underhill died at age 65.  She is highly regarded in Anglican circles, having a place on the Church of England's and the US Episcopal Church's calendars on this day.  As an Anglican writer, she is regarded as being in the Anglo Catholic category.  

Anglo Catholicism was a strong movement within the Anglican Communion, particularly in England itself, in the second half of the 19th Century and emphasized the Anglican Communion's Catholic roots to the extent that it sought to emphasize that it shared Apostolic succession and, therefore, was a full Catholic church, somewhat sharing the status of the Orthodox Church, or perhaps even closure to Rome than that.  It ultimately resulted in a Vatican decree that its holy orders were "completely null and utterly void", which it has reacted to on more than one occasion by seeking ordinations from clearly valid Bishops in other denominations  The movement still exists within the Anglican Communion.

June 13, 1941. The Lutzow damaged, the Resistance receives supplies from the air, Vichy arrests Jewish residents

The Royal Air Force commenced dropping supplies to the French Resistance.

Today in World War II History—June 13, 1941

The Australians defeated the French in the Battle of Jezzine in Lebanon.  

On the same day, the French announced the commencement of a campaign to arrest 12,000 Jews for "plotting to hinder Franco-German cooperation".

In spite of a Luftwaffe escort, the RAF torpedoes and damages the German battleship Lutzow, which then returns to port.

The Lutzow torpedoed by Coastal Command

The Lutzow would return to service and end up being sort of emblematic of the German surface navy.  In 1943 she was involved in a failed effort to intercept a convoy off of Norway which so enraged Hitler that he ordered the surface navy broken up for scrap. That event lead Admiral Raeder to resign his position.  Raeder therefore missed the last two years of the war, but was convicted of war crimes in any event, serving prison time until 1955.

His successor, Karl Doenitz, convinced Hitler not to scrap the navy, and the Lutzow went on to serve for the remainder of the war, subsequently being damaged by the RAF in an air raid, and then her fate remained undetermined for years.  It turned out that the ship had been sunk as a target by the Soviets in 1947.

The name of the ship itself is interesting in that the ship had originally been named the Deutschland, after the nation whose service she was in, but Hitler had required the name to be changed.  The German navy had a cruiser by the name of Lutzow which was slightly newer than the Deutschland.  Indeed, the ship was incomplete when the Soviets asked to buy her in 1940 and she was, bizarrely, sold to the USSR.