The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1944-01-04
Owl And War News
By PETER EDISON

The domestic branch Of the Office of War
Information should be lquidated the minute
tne shootlng stops, but as long as the war
asts 1t WILL be necessary to keep some kind
OF centralized government news bureau
manned by civilians
This is the opinion of Palmer Hoyt, for the
past six months director OF Owls domestic
news bureau. He is leaving Washington soon
to return to his job as editor of the Portland
! Oregonian.
He goes back home the usual sadder and
wiser man. He came to Washington full of
beans. He saw his job at owl as one of
| getting out the war news, and he didn't think
the war news was getting Out. He intended
to stay only three months, in which he would
reorganlze the bureau, then ge. out himself.
| He stayed SIX, and things aren all hunkv
dory yet, though Mr.. Hoyt admits freely that
| things are now better than the, were.
| Some of the battles which owl goes through,
internally and with other government agen-
ces, IN just trying to get out the news, are
| really pretty disastrous.
SIX months or year ago, it was the Navy
that was holding onto all its news with a
death grip, for fear someone would find out
about what was going Oh. Today the Navy
is apparently trying to let 60 OF stuff while
It's hot as witness the record on TaraWa
in getting out the story within "a hours after
it happened.
On the other hand, it's the Acmy that now
boards news like an old men with an urge
to set. The walls of the Washington press
corps covering the War Department get louder
| every day. Holding up for TWO weeks on
news OF the German sneak bombing raid
against the Italian port Of Bar; is a case in
point. This disaster, as bad as a second Pearl
Harbor except for the fact that freighters
| instead OF battleships were hit was a greater
blow to the British than Ii was to the Amer
leans and terrible reflection on the British
| lack of antiaircraft defense at an important
port. 1t was all under General Eisenhower S
| top command, however, and the War De-
partment's apparent effort to minimize the
news by burying it in the middle of Secre-
tary Stlmson'S otherwise dull war summary,
two weeks after it happened, is a sad refec-
ton or bad news policy.
While Owl does not deserve all the credit
for speeding up the Navy release of it's war
news, 1t does not deserve all the blame for
the Armys current slcWness. The Bari story
was forced into the open as result of Owl
prodding. AS a matter Of fact, Owl seems
to have let the story leak to make sure that
it would get out.
Trying to get Army and Navy to release
news faster broke one owl deputy, Nicholas
Roosevelt of the Oyster Bay branch of the
family. George H. Lyon. former New York
and Buffalo newspaper editor, has the job
now. He is entitled to al least some of the
| credit for whatever Improvement, if any, has
been made in the release Oh war news in
the last few months. But in this effort to
| get out more news Tor the domestic press,
Lyon has had the full packing of owl Di-
rector Elmer Davis and Palmer Hoyt.
The flasco over the Bari story, the bad
release on the General Patton incident and the
beautiful ball-uL over the release of the Pres
ldents Cairo and Theran conferences indi-
| cate how much room there is foE still further
| Improvement What it really seems to take
to get the mfavorable news pIied out of the
| War and Navy departments is good Con-
gresSional investigation. such as the Truman
committee conducted on the Arnys Canol
oil project in Canada, and the House Naval
Affairs Committee conducted on the Navy's
Brewster Aircraft mess.
| But this very difficulty, according 10 Palmer
/ Hoyt is what makes necessary some kind of
an inside government agency, run by civil
ians, to keep after the news.
| Whether or not Owl stands between the
reporters and the news is |. debatable uues-
ton. Certainly Army and Navy public rela-
tons departments stand between the reporters
and the direct news sources. The reason
given for this interference il, the need for
maintaining secrecy and protecting military
security, with which thele car be no argu-
ment The need for something like owl in
such situation is to keep prodding the old
hens off the Aest eggs of news before those
eggs all turn rotten.