The French in Africa

Sir:

Congratulations on Frank White's daring report [Aug. 23] from Morocco. It reminds me of the brutal French ratissage which characterized their rule in Syria.

JULES KAGIAN

New York City

Sir:

That the French colonial contraption is weak I never doubted, but now I have also seen how brutal and cowardly it is. For an action such as you described in "Running the Gauntlet" to be perpetrated by a civilized people seems incredible. After this revelation I firmly side with the Arab patriots, and hope that they will soon send the French packing back to their homeland . . .

CHRISTOPHER TRUMP

Washington, D.C.

The Long View

Sir:

Senator Russell Long [TiME, Aug. 16] should be saluted by every American taxpayer. Foreign aid has too long been considered a sacred cow opposed only by Communists. When will Congress realize that the free world must stand on its own feet, not ours? Friendship isn't a purchasable commodity. Why shouldn't our policy be: friends to all, Santa Claus to none?

HOWARD W. ANDERSON

Grand Rapids, Minn.

Hiding Behind the Dior

Sir:

. . . I, as an ordinary, middle-aged female, married ... and of generously sculptured proportions, wish to add my two cents' worth on Dior's new styles [TIME, Aug. 9 et seq.]. What's so new about this new look? There must be plenty more biddies like myself who remember the so-called fashions of the '20s that made decently shaped women look like sacks draped with rags . . .

ALEXANDRA K. FIETZ

Downey, Calif.

Sir:

This unwarranted attack upon the bust of the American female both by foreigners without and traitors within must not go unimpeded . . .

MURRAY CURTIN

Utica, N.Y.

Sir:

. . . I would enjoy more writing like that in your Aug. 9 report, in which "belts slide down to embrace the haunch where a girl has most to embrace." And "the plunging neckline is an enticing vista down which men have been peering happily for years . . ."

RALPH W. B. READE

Clearwater, Fla.

Sir:

Re the new Dior flat look--the French improvement on nature's design for a woman: If a stylist directs a woman to be flat one year and curved another year, and in each case offers the reason that the woman looks best that way, the stylist has to be wrong one of the times. If he is now wrong, why obey him ? If he was wrong before, then he is subject to error, and may be wrong still; why obey him? . . . If I had a wife, I'd beat her for this sheeplike following of irresponsible leaders.

WARREN SNYDER

Evanston, Ill.

Sir:

Christian Dior should be hanged from the nearest coat hanger, and so should American designers who slavishly follow the dictates of Paris when their own work is so much more attractive, becoming, wearable and original, without being fantastic, as so many French models are . . .

KATHERINE CURL

Lima, Peru

Sir:

For those of us who have sailed under false colors for so long, our problems are miraculously solved. We may now carry our heads high again, with nothing to hide. But, alas, for those of us who were so proud. Perhaps the, bra companies will come to our rescue with a "Smash-it" or a "Cave-in."

MARTHA NORD

New Richmond, Ohio

Sir:

. . . Anger with this man Dior forced me to this bit of verse:

I'd like to tar and feather Dior, and run him out of town. Why did he have to build me up just to let me down? I can hang my head, and drop my bra and appear a flattened frump, But Christian, tell me dear, how do I batten down the rump? . . .

DOROTHY B. McGRAW

Lima, Peru

P: After the first shocked reports of Dior's new collection, fashion editors decided that he had not, after all, declared total war (TIME, Aug. 16). For developments showing that Dior is prepared both to reshape the female form and leave it alone, see cuts.--ED.

Retreat in the Orient

Sir:

If the British wanted any more positive proof of the contempt in which they are held at the present time by the Chinese Communists, the shooting of the airliner over the China Sea [TIME, Aug. 2] is it . . . To those of us who have watched the cowardly retreat of the great powers in the Orient during the past seven years, this shooting came as no surprise immediately after the Geneva Conference . . . If the British do not retaliate in kind next time they are attacked, there will be many more shootings . . . I have seen the show in China, Korea, Japan and the Philippines since 1947. I know how those Communists feel.

GEORGE TAYS U.S. Army

c/o Postmaster New York City

Sir:

I, and many of my countrymen, blush scarlet with shame at the love affair now going on in the East between Mr. Attlee and the Chinese Communists. While we in Britain deplore the extremes of McCarthyism, millions of us are nauseated by the way certain members of the Labor Party play "footsie" with the Reds. Mr. Attlee, an ex-soldier, should know better, or at least have some vestige of pride in his country . . . I can only hope that as these ambling dreamers wander around the Orient as guests of the Reds . . . the British dead in Korea don't get up from their graves with disgust . . .

JOHN G. BEITH

London

U.H.F.

Sir:

You said in the Aug. 2 Cinema review of Rear Window that Grace Kelly has "a sort of U.H.F. sex that not everybody will be able to hear." What does the abbreviation stand for ... Upper High Falutin?

A. BENJAMIN

New Britain, Conn.

P: Ultra-High-Frequency.--ED.

Armies in Exile

Sir:

Thank you for your story on the interim report of our committee [Aug. 16]. However, the interpretation of "the intent of the 1951

Mutual Security Act provision" . . . is not "to reimburse NATO countries that recruit escapees into their armies . . ." The intent of the provision is the creation of separate national military units from escapees from captive nations (such as units of Poles, Hungarians, Czechs, Slovaks, and even national units formed from escapees from the U.S.S.R.) . . . The idea is that such units, with identifying national uniforms and the non-Communist flags of the enslaved nations, be joined with the defense forces of Western Europe to support and symbolize a united Europe against the . . . threat of Communism . . . The creation of such units is based on the conviction that men presently in Communist armed forces do not willingly support international slavery . . .

The free world [should] provide the visible and tangible mechanism to activate potential defection, so that freedom-starved men of the captive armed forces may escape from the ranks of slavery to join the ranks of liberty.

CHARLES J. KERSTEN Chairman, Committee on Communist Aggression

House of Representatives Washington, D.C.

Italian Dishes

Sir:

After TIME'S Aug. 16 illustrative article on Gina & Co., all good little girls will be eating their spaghetti without hesitation . . .

ROBERT THOMAS ELLISON

Chicago

Sir:

The most delicious phrase I've ever read was the one about that most delicious dish,

Gina Lollobrigida: "In Europe she is the most famous seven syllables since 'Come up and see me some time.' "

JOSEPH STOCKER

Phoenix, Ariz.

Sir:

. . . We, the wives, the ugly ones, seem to be in the way. A lot of advertising space, literary space and screen space is taken by the Miss Lollobrigidas who can, as she boasts, break up families. It must be terribly frustrating for men in these times. By comparison with all this half-clad beauty (with measurements to substantiate), ordinary wives, children, and plain-little-girls-next-door aren't sexy at all . . .

MRS. W. C. LEHMAN

Oakland, Calif.

Comrades in Arms

Sir:

There must be some mistake! The picture of Gina Lollobrigida . . . looks more to me like Georgy Malenkov. Please check. This comes as quite a blow.

JOSEPH LAR.OSA

Massapequa, N.Y.

Mash Note

SIR:

RE YOUR AUG. 23 REPORT ON THE CONGRESS AND YOUR ALLUSION TO MINNESOTA'S SENATOR ED THYE AS A REPUBLICAN IRRESPONSIBLE: WE CONSIDER THYE A MOST RESPONSIBLE MEMBER OF THE U.S. SENATE, AND BEG TO INFORM YOU THAT WHILE HE MAY NOT AGREE WITH EVERY MEASURE IN THE ADMINISTRATION'S LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM, HE IS DEFINITELY REPRESENTATIVE OF A LARGE BODY OF REPUBLICAN OPINION HERE . . . WE HAVE NEVER HAD CAUSE TO QUESTION HIS LOYALTY . .

LOUISE MILLER YOUNG REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEEWOMAN FOR MINNESOTA

ST. PAUL

Eggs for the Skillet

Sir:

Having grown up in Switzerland, I enjoyed your story [Aug. 9] on Businessman Gottlieb Duttweiler . . . After World War II the Swiss government decided to continue egg rationing indefinitely, saying it was impossible to produce more than the 1 1/2 eggs per month each Swiss had been allotted during the war. Duttweiler promptly made a deal to import several million eggs, sold them unrationed through his stores, and made the government look awful silly--needless to say, egg rationing was . . . canceled.

I wish there were more men of his financial and organizing ability who understand that the skillet is more effective in fighting Communism than the sword.

LOTHAR SALIN

San Rafael, Calif.

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