Evening star., 1944-01-23


Is in the hands of the United States.
The Russians are fighting VIGOROUSLY
on the eastern front and the British
are doing f1rst-class job in Italy and
in their bombings Of the Reich. But
1t Is the manpower Of America, together
with her tremendous production capac-
ity, which is the determining factor
as to who is going to win the war
Little has been said on this score In
the last few months. The subject was
not raised at the conferences in Mos
COW and Teheran by the American rep
resentatives because they felt there was
no good reason why the susceptibilities
Of our Allies should be wounded.
But there Is no question that both
the Russians and the British are fully
aware that If, by some unimaginable
trick of fate, the American Govern
ment were to remove its men from the
European battlefronts Hitler would have
better than IS per cent chance of
winning the war or making peace with
his enemies on his own terms.
This purely academic question Of
America being the dominating factor
In the Allied victory In Europe is being
raised because many quarters feel that
the voice of the American people in
the postwar settlement of Europe should
be heard more than at any previous
time.
We Want Only Peace.
1t is unpleasant to think Of it, but
true, that American diplomacy has been
tagging after the British and the Rus
slams. The situation Is easily under
standable, however. Both our Allies
have definite aims and desire concrete
gains at the end of the war. The
Russians want territories which would
assure the security of their borders
against any future combination of
forces in Europe. The British want to
be safe" in the Mediterranean and also
want to reconquer the rich territories
they have lost to the japanese in the
Far East. All America desires is long
peace so that We will not be compelled
again to send millions of men across
the seas and spend billions Of dollars,
danger point
Fundamentally, all we have a right to
expect from Europe as a reward for our
heavy sacrifices is the assurance that
the people of that continent will agree
to live in peace with each other Twice
we have had to intervene The result
of the first intervention, which deprived
the Kaiser of certain victory, was
second World War within less than a
quarter of a century. In the inter-
vening period, because we insisted on
the payment of the billions advanced
to the warning Europeans, Uncle Sam
was described frequently as Uncle Shy
lock. Because we endeavored to sell
our goods all over the world we were
often described as an imperialistic Ma
ton
But in spite of the attitude Of many
foreign governments the peoples Of the
world and especially those of Europe
had a latent confidence in the spirit
of justice of the United States. In
spite of our apparent isolationism most
of the nations of Europe. and particu-
larly the smaller ones, had a firm belief
that the United States would jump to
the rescue of the downtrodden if neces-
sity dictated.
Backed Atlantic Charter.
When, four months before the Pearl
Harbor attack, President Roosevelt met
Prime Minister Churchill in the Atlantic
and drafted the Atlantic Charter, the
people of this country were almost
unanimous in accepting that instrument
for peace although it had loopholes and
deficiencies, especially in regard to the
Far East Americans as q whole had
more perspicacity than the trained poll
ticians who criticized the charter be-
cause it did not cover India and China
They felt that the danger of becoming
involved in another war came from
Europe and not from the Far East And
the people had implicit faith in the
charter, which originally was signed by
the leaders of the United States and
Britain and subsequently by heads of
all those governments which formed the
great family of the United Nations. 1t
seemed to guarantee perpetuation of the
independence of those nations which
had been engulfed in the avalanche of
the Axis military machine.
The controversy between Poland and
Russia came as an unpleasant awaken
ing, not so much because there are some
10000, 900 Americans of Polish, Finnish,
Baltic and Yugoslav stock in this coun-
try, but because 1t shows that unless
Russia treats the matter of the .nde-