Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1941-10-29
Russia at War; Report %;m, %" II Red

their heads in the hospital for brain
wounds; intense in the dim light OF
a blacked-out train; living again the
first weeks Of the retreat across
the frontier; laughing at dinner
and drinking toasts to the Ameri-
canskys; barking their orders to the
anti-aircraft battery guns swinging
skyward; asleep on the top OF tar
paulin-covered trucks.
There are all kinds of faces in the
Russian Army-Mongolian faces, in
tense, dark-eyed, bcny faces from
the Caucasus, jolly Ukrainians-but
mostly they seem the faces. of the
European Russians, and these are
startlingly like the faces Of our own
boys.
Like all soldiers nowadays who
must fight with complicated ma
chinery at high speed, they are
young, modest, shy, direct. They
describe the battles in which they
have fought simply, almost with
diffidence. You like them. Your
heart goes out to them.
You have read many Of their in
dividual stories. I will tell you those
they told me. If they fought for
nothing else but themselves, if their
battle had no significance for us at
all, they would still be worth helping
You would still want to help them.
If you saw the country they have
so painstakingly put together, you
would still feel that way. There
are a thousand things in 1t that
might shock you-mOst of them, /
think, simply because they are
strange, and what is strange is
usually shocking. But do not think
you could ever get SO shocked that
YOU could forget the size of their
ambition or the sweep Of their &C
complishment in one generation.
Put down the idea that they were
bent on revolutionizing the world
and imposing their social system on
us-as so much bunk. What the
wretched little American Communist
party would like to do with us-lf II
could ever elect more than a Con-
gress MEMBERS something else
again. The Russians were much toe
busy working things out for them
selves. They had hardly learned to
feed and clothe themselves; their
state is at least 20 years from being
really sound industrial concern
Already many features of their life
would shock an American radical
more than they would you.
Terrible Sentence.
You might disapprove OF theil
life-and you would certainly not
want to trade it for your cwn-but
would want for them the right tt
finish their experiment, to work on,
their destiny undisturbed by the
tramping boots of the Prussians
And if you had seen and talked with
as many of these young faces as
have. that terrible sentence. 10000
casualties every "a hours" would
have q meaning for you so awful you
could hardly breathe.
Will the Russians themselves col
lapse? I do not think so. At leas'
not as France collapsed. I think
YOU can count of this-in six weeks
study on the spot I found no evil
dence of disruptive political force.
The people who are important ir
Russia-the people who produce 1t:
weapons and who fight with them
are young and vigorous. They know
very little about the other countrie
of the world, but they love their own
They believe in themselves and II
their future. There are many thing
about them that you would find hare
to understandable not their faitf
in themselves and their country.
For it is a rich country and much
of it is a beautiful one, and In q
years they have lifted themselve'
from ignorance and abysmal povert!
to life whose standard is far, fal
below this country's, but which give
them abundant evidence that the,
need never return to the serfdon
that they left.
Most of the things they do. by oul
standards, they do badly. The clotf
they weave is coarse and inferior
The buildings they build look q
years old when they are two. Tn,
trains do not run on time. And ir
their political philosophy men art