Third Report

The U.S. people wanted to hear the worst --and they wanted to hear it from their President.

Instead, in his third major report to the nation on the state of the war, the President this week contrived a compromise. He told the U.S., in broadest outline, the sorry truth of the present, but he pointed to a happier truth in the future.

He had told his hearers to get out their maps, and his references to the global war reached to the four quarters of the earth. But with his genius for simplifying a big subject, he made the war seem simple. "The object of the Nazis and the Japanese is to separate the United States, Britain, China and Russia, and to isolate them one from another, so that each will be surrounded and cut off from sources of supplies and reinforcements. It is the old familiar Axis policy of 'Divide and Conquer.' "

He rejected the idea of keeping the U.S. forces home to defend the U.S., pointing out that then no aid could be sent to China; the southwest Pacific would fall to the Japanese, who would then be able to launch large-scale attacks on the U.S. and Alaska; that Turkey, the Suez Canal, North and West Africa would fall to the Nazis; that the British and Russian efforts would be crippled. Such "foolish advice," he said, would result in a "turtle policy": "We prefer to retain the eagle as it is-flying high and striking hard."

The strategic necessity, said the President, was also "a very tough job." This great necessity was to maintain four lines of communication: 1) the North Atlantic, 2) the South Atlantic, 3) the Indian Ocean, 4) the South Pacific. (For a map of the world's battlefront Routes & Roads, see p. 15.) "A vessel can make a round trip by either route in about four months, or only three round trips in a whole year."

He admitted losses, in general ("We have most certainly suffered losses . . . and we shall suffer more. . . . We Americans have been compelled to yield ground, but we will regain it") and-to correct "rumormongers" and "poison peddlers" for "damnable misstatements," gave the final score on Pearl Harbor in particular: killed, 2,340; wounded, 946. "Of all the combatant ships based on Pearl Harbor," added the President, "only three were permanently put out of commission."

He emphasized one piece of reassuring news: that, even including Pearl Harbor plane losses (which he refused to specify), "We have destroyed considerably more Japanese planes than they have destroyed of ours."

Once again the President promised the U.S. people to tell them all-but not everything: "Your Government has unmistakable confidence in your ability to hear the worst, without flinching or losing heart. You must in turn have complete confidence that your Government is keeping nothing from you except information that will help the enemy. . . ."

Again he reminded the U.S. that the "first job is to build up production," urged the U.S. to set itself to three high purposes: "We shall not stop work for a single day. We shall not demand special gains or special privileges. . . . We shall give up conveniences and modify . . . our lives if our country asks us. . . ."

He made good news with a great promise: "On January 6 of this year I set certain definite goals of production for airplanes, tanks, guns and ships. The Axis propagandists called them fantastic. Tonight, nearly two months later ... I can tell you that those goals will be attained."

Mindful of Valley Forge (Washington's Birthday had just been celebrated), he quoted the words Tom Paine wrote, "with a drumhead for desk." on a bitter winter night in 1776: " 'These are the times that try men's souls.' "

The President spoke quietly throughout, coughing occasionally. He tried for no dramatic effects, spoke directly and simply; it was no oratorical triumph. He did not mention Singapore, nor speak of the Gneisenau and the Scharnhorst. He did not need to; he knew that all who heard him were aware of such past disasters. With his eye on the future, he ended with great words from the past: "Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered ; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the sacrifice, the more glorious the triumph."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.