"Never Give Up"

"Somewhere in France" last week, four men held the first of what, if World War II is to continue, will be a series of solemn meetings to embody and express concretely the joint determination of Great Britain and France to lick Hitler. Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and Admiral of the Fleet Lord Chatfield, his Minister for the Coordination of Defense, flew over in a Royal Air Force plane. They closeted themselves with Premier Edouard Daladier and Generalissimo Maurice Gustave Gamelin as a four-man Supreme War Council.

First fruit of the Council's first meeting was another adamant statement that France & England were in this war full force. But events of the week continued to give neutral observers the impression, even allowing for the time and care required to prepare a grand attack, that the Allies were still trying mass psychology before mass power. Instead of raining bombs on the Westwall supply lines, to hamper reinforcements while the frontal attack was prepared, British planes continued to rain pamphlets on German civilians. Excerpt from the latest edition: "You go into this war isolated from the commonwealth of civilized people and having the support of nobody but Communist Russia. . . . Remember that Britain never gives way. Our nerves are tougher and our sinews of war stronger than yours. We shall never give up."

About the war on land, the French War Ministry issued 14 terse communiques, the Germans a half dozen. From these, since news correspondents were still kept back from the fighting, the situation could only be deduced roughly, as follows:

Pushing out from the Maginot Line across the German border, the Allies aimed their penetration movements: 1) to surround industrially important Saarbrikken (heart of the coal-bearing Saar Basin); 2) to gain command of the Saar River valley to the northwest; 3) to seek footholds on the southern slopes of two highlands called the Hunsrueck and the Hardt, stretching toward the Rhine and known to be buttresses for the deep, fortified networks of the Westwall. Until they are solidly established at the base of the hills, the attackers cannot hope to begin their main assault on the Westwall.

Capturing Saarbruecken was France's first (and almost last) victory against the Prussians in 1870. Steady counterattacks by the Germans last week apparently kept the French spearhead projecting out of Sarreguemines from making much progress beyond the seven miles it drove last fortnight, halfway to Neunkirchen. Northwest of Saarbruecken the Germans counterattacked up the valley of the Nied River, tributary of the Saar. They sent infantry over in waves, World War I style. French fire smashed the waves, left the Allies dominating all the Saar Valley from Saarlautern downstream to Merzig.

To stem the French push over toward the Hiansruck, the Germans tried another flank maneuver, a counterattack up the right bank of the Moselle, through Perl toward Sierck. They took a few acres of French soil, but soon were hurled back beyond Perl. Heavy tanks and artillery barrages prepared the way for the slow, steady French advance. Hand grenades were found useful for blowing the doors off pillboxes.

P:If Chopin wrote the score for Poland's agony (see p. 25"), Walt Disney supplied a marching song for the Western Front. British Tommies reworded the work carol of the Seven Dwarfs in Snow White and, as they moved toward their posts in the Maginot Line last week, sang: "Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, it's off to war we go."

P:French communiques mentioned Ger man prisoners for the first time. By making them tell what areas they had orders to avoid, the captors located land mines.

P:During heavy fighting north of Sarreguemines, German fighting planes flew out in force for the first reported time, to strafe advancing ground troops. Allied pursuits whipped out to meet them, claimed the upper-hand at dogfighting.

P:As they withdrew toward their West-wall, the Germans razed whole villages rather than leave shelter for the Allies. They were careful to fill in cellars.

P:German troop concentrations observed behind the Westwall from Coblenz to Mannheim were believed to be preparing, not for any major counteroffensive, but to reinforce the Wall, to counterattack locally, to engage the Allies in field fighting if & when they ever do break through.

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