Evening star., 1943-09-21
BY the Associated Press.

LONDON, Sept. 21-Follotu-
ing is condensed tert OF Prime
Minister ChurchiHs address to
Parliament today.
l could not embark upon the buSi.
ness which is set down for today
without expressing what is in the
hearts Of all members of this house
our profound regret at the very
sad news it has been your duty, Mr.
Speaker. to announce from the chain
of the sudden death early this
| morning of the Chancellor of the
Exchequer.
Only yesterday evening he sat
with us in cabinet, apparently in the
best health and spirits and now he
has been instantaneously removed
from our affairs in which he was
playing a most important part. ]
would suggest that on the next sit
ting day we pause for a short time
in our business in order to give the
House the opportunity of paying a
more formal tribute to one of its
distinguished members who was
holding an Office of the greatest con-
sequence in the peculiar stresses of
| war
I will defer any remarks I may
make on this sad matter-to me a
very acute personal grief-until the
proper time is reached
now turn to the statement which
understood was desired by the
house that I should make.
have to 90 some way back in
order to put the whole broad scene
before the house.
AT my conference. with the Pres
ident at Washington in June, 1912,
the decision was taken to send an
American army and a strong Brit
ish contingent to occupy French
Northwest Africa and, later on, No
vember 8, 1942, was f1xed for the de-
scent. l was very much in favor
OF this for a variety of reasons
most OF which are now well known.
African Operation
Only Preliminary.
I have never regarded this Afri-
can operation as a substitute for a
direct attack across the Channel
upon the Germans in France or the
Low Countries. On the contrary the
opening of this new front in the
Mediterranean was always intended
by itself and others to be an essen
tial preliminary to the main attack
on Germany and her ring of subju-
gated and satellite states.
At that time, Is months ago, no
decision was taken beyond the occu-
patton of North Africa. There fol-
lowed almost Immediately, in fact
while I was in Washington, the
June, 1912, disaster of Tobruk and
the retreat, with the loss of 10000
men, of our desert army of more
than 400 miles to the approaches to
Cairo and Alexandria.
This raised very grave issues, the
Delta, Nile Valley and Suez Canal
all being in jeopardy at the same
time German attack through the
Caucasus was developing in a way
which seemed to menace the Cas-
plan Basin and the vital oilfelds
of Baku, Iraq and Persia.
As Moscow Premier Stain was
able to speak to me with confidence
in his ability to Withstand the Ger
man attack and he told me before
hand of the counterstrokes by which
he intended to relieve Stalingrad
and if possible to destroy the Ger
man forces before it.
At Cairo Gems. Alexander and
Montgomery were placed in COM
mand and their substantial REIN
forcements which had been sent
from Britain several months before
had arrived to strengthen the desert
army. Plans were made to resist
Rommel's impending attack and
thereafter to regain the initiative
by major battle. These plans
proved successful. Almost exactly q
year ago, on September %, began
the heavy action which resulted in
Rommel's decisive repulse and a
month later the desert army won
a hard and prolonged battle at
Alamein and set forth upon its i'm
yet completed.
Chain of Allied Successes
In Every Theater.
From that time on for a whole
year we and our great allies have
had an almost unbroken success by
land, by sea and In the air. I can
not recollect anything so complete
and prolonged as the series of VIC
tories which have attended our
Allied arms in almost every theater
At the same time that our desert
army has been making its great ad-
vance, with the conquest of North
west Africa and Sicily, the Russian
armies have advanced 1000 miles
OF front from the Volga almost to
the Dnieper, a distance in many
places OF more than 500 miles, driv-
ing before them, with prodigious
slaughter, the hordes of Germans
who had invaded their country and
inflicted so many indescribable par
barities upon its inhabitants.
When next met the President in
January of this year and the com
bined Anglo-American, staffs went
into protracted conference at
Casablanca, the whole scene of the
war was already transformed.
No decision had hitherto beer
taken by us to 90 beyond North
Africa. but now the advance of the
desert army. which already stood
before the gates of Tripoli. brought
another quarter million men into
play and enabled us to carry out the
policy which I mentioned In my
broadcastS of November last of using
North Africa not as seat but as a
springboard,
We resolved, therefore, to COM
! plete the conquest of Tunisia and
meanwhile to make all preparations
for invading Sicily The final VIC
tories in Tunisia were obtained in
May, when the whole of the enemy
forces in North Africa, then a little
short of nalf million strong, were
destroyed ory captured.
When I visited the President
again at Washington in May, l943
after and during the victory at Tu-
/ ~.