The Wilmington morning star., 1945-02-25
Washington Calling
BY MARQUIS CHILDs

II By MAhQU1S CdALOS
U. S. NINTH ARMY HEADQUARTERS IN
HOLLAND-One's first closeup glimpse of
this war is bound to be surprise and shock
First OF all, you are not prepared for the
enormous completely Of even a small section
Of the front. The preconveived picture you
have OF lines and advances is dinamed out in
the face OF the mass movement that seems
to be going on in all directions at once.
Apart from the CT himself and his easy,
good-natured self-discipline which makes you
enormously proud of being American, the
thing that has impressed me most in my
brief stay up here is the scale and diversity
of transport on the roads leading toward The
front. It looks like cross between a pre-
war weekend traffic jam and the kind OF
industrial upheaval that would result if you
were to try to move half Of Pittsburgh a
hundred miles by motor transport over pitted,
broken roads.
In less than fifteen minutes on a highway
to the front in Germany, counted SO different
kinds of vehicles carrying men or guns or
supplies essential to the fighting.
Tank carriers, equipped to 60 onto battle
field, pick UP damaged tanks and bring tham
back, roar along the road looking like dino
saurs. They tower above the ubiquitous jeeps
that flash past them on every kind of errand.
Some of the tanks lined along the highway
have steel blades in front like huge snow
plows, which make it possible to sweep earth
over enemy pillboxes. Every kind OF gun is
being pulled, pushed or carried. Some are
moving forward and some to the rear for
overhaul. Trucks seem to vary Infinitely in
size and type. The variety of vehicles with
the Red Cross symbol is also astonishing.
Besides several types Of ambulances, there
are special haftracks and jeeps flying the
Red Cross flag-al weaving In and out Of
the traffic as fast as possible.
Part Of Machine
The men driving the mud-spattered vehicles
that make up this unending stream look as
though they were moulded into the drivers
seats, part of the machine itself. Their set,
weary faces, many griny and unshaven, are
seen briefly in the high truck cabs as our
ieep swings past.
1t is one Of the monotonous, boring. wearing
Jobs of the war, this pushing Of transport back
and forth over broken, nairy roads. The drivers
must even change places with the CT road
gangs working waist deep in mud and water
trying to patch the worst holes.
The driver Of our jeep, Private Herman E.
Smith of Washington, D. c., is fairly typical
He los been in the European theater, at
tached to tactical air force, for eighteen
months. For eighteen months. seven days
or staff car and he's damned sick Of it.
For one thing, 1t has become, apart from
highway hazards such a safe job Thanks to
the work Of the Ninth Air Force, the German
LuftWaffe is almost never seen over the Amer
lean lines. The monotony Of drivers job
is nowadays rarely broken by enemy strafing
Aerial observers over the front lines have
one sure way of telling where enemy territory
begins. On OUR side of the lines, you can see
On the enemy side, the highways are almost
empty, and with good reason. Because the
attacks OF our Tactical Air Forces are main
tanned whenever even minimum weather con-
ditions permit, the Germans can move on the
roads only at night.
So the brown tide Of our transport GIBBS back
and forth through shattered villages and towns
of Germany. Seeing it, you understand why
no modern army can carry on without fuel
pipelines that follow the advance. The huge
volume of gasoline necessary to support this
movement simply could not be hauled over
road and rail Moreover, two pipelines are
necessary-one for gasoline for road trans
port and the other for aviation gasoline.
You begin to understand, too, why the Allied
armies were held up when after their sweep
across France, supply lines were stretched
almost to the breaking point An army today
travels on those cans Of gasoline you see III
dumps along the highways. And the source
of supply must be never-ending.
The stream OF traffic moves on through
ruined Aachen. The skeleton Of a Quilted
apartment house has fallen across the main
thoroughfare. An MP motions onto a de-
tour. At a depot in the outskirts of the town.
trucks carrying reconditioned tires are being
unloaded. Out Of a heavy tank, which has
stopped off the highway, come the heads Of a
Negro repair crew.
Back somewhere-in Paris or maybe in
Washington-the military have all this swirlng
movement fitted into the vast pattern OF war.
They have it all recorded on paper. But being
an infinitely small part Of it for moment,
you feel like a bit of hotsam tossed on a
flood that moves with blind rush, without
purpose or reason.
Copyright 1945, by UnitDd Feature
Syndicate, Inc.)