Evening star., 1943-10-04

cumlatlng Of several sensational
pieces of news which he revealed
in his address to the House of Com
mons but which the red tape of
suppression had prevented the news
papers from publishing previously in
the normal way.
Thus there were 10 separate
scoops" in the Prime Minister'S
last speech and most of these i'm
portant pieces of news were known
to the correspondents of American
newspapers abroad, but they were
prohibited from giving these to the
public.
President Roosevelt has made
some unfortunate mistakes in his
handling Of the press, but he has
never been guilty of saving up a
series of sensational news items for
any public address. The Prime
Minister'S speech, moreover, was an
unusually long one and due to the
curtailment of print paper in Amer
lea, many newspapers found it i'm
practicable to print on one day all
the news In the form in which Mr..
Churchill expressed it and were
compelled for space reasons to sum-
Marie what might better have been
released over a period of several
days.
Here Are the 10 Items.
The 10 items of which the Prime
Minister gave first public mention
were these:
/. The German U-boat failure to
sink vessels in the north Atlantic
for a given period.
2. The statistics Of the U-boat's
record against United Nations ship
ping and the circumstances sur
rounding it.
3. American forces landing on
Sardinia.
4. Gen. Eisenhower's decision to
send paratroopers to Rome and the
reasons for the change in plan.
5. Gen. Eisenhower's negotiations
with the Radoglio government In
connection with the Italian surren-
der.
6. Confirmation Of the facts sur
rounding Mussolinis escape.
Z. The plans for the conference
with Stain.
8. Participation Of Italian battle
ships in the seizure Of Corsica.
8. New type of aerial bomb en-
ployed against Allied shipping.
10. Germany's new submarine
tactics and resumption of attacks
on Allied conveys.
Danger in Action.
Now nobody questions the right
Of the Prime Minister to make any
announcement he wishes, or when
he wishes, but it Is difficult to un-
derstand why, when these items of
news arise spontaneously, they are
not given to the press in the GUS
tomary form. Reasons for holding
up certain news for days at time
are, of course, recognized but it
would be difficult to believe that all
the news items released in the
Prime Minister'S speech just hap
pened to break" on the same day.
The danger in Mr.. Churchills &C
ton is that the press, which is
constantly being accused of being
overoptimistic or Of emphasizing
minor items of military progress,
will, because of these unique &C
cunulations of news for use in pub
lie addresses, be less able to serve
the public the way it can and should
In wartime.
Something appears to be vitality
wrong in London and it is no secret
that officials of our own Office of
War Information are dismayed and
discouraged by the manner in which
American and British reporters are
prevented from writing the big news
because it is being saved up for use
in the Prime Minister'S speeches.
This is not a happy commentary
on the freedom to report. For
there is no problem here of COM
plying with the rules of censorship,
but simply question of misuse of
that power by a high official of
government.
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