Evening star., 1945-05-13
Wars End Found
Gloom at the Scribe
The Wonder Is That No Explosion
Had Occurred There Before
BIZ B. NJ. Mex elaDay.

mOnCnS at tFe SCRIBE Hotel IN Paris.
Contributors were the war correspond
ents assigned to Paris SHAEF. The
money was to go for big celebra-
ton on We day. Everything was 60
ing to be free and the party would
last all night. Brig. Gen. Frank A.
Allen, jr., in charge of SHAEF public
relations, undoubtedly would be there.
Col. R. Ernest Dupuy, like beloved
schoolmaster mingling with the boys
on class night, would be there. Old
battles of censorship would be fought
again in retrospect but the hatchet
would be buried. peace and good will
would reign and the censor and re-
porter, like the lion and the lamb,
would lie down together and lick each
others wounds.
Those were the plans on Saturday,
week ago. One wonders, now, how
the party came out. For in the mean
time Ed Kennedy of the Associated
Press had spilled the beans. The tail
end of the war found the correspondents
glaring at SHAEF Public Relations
Officers, the SHAEF PROS glaring at
the correspondents, the correspondents
glaring at each other. Everybody must
have been very unhappy, and while it
is difficult to believe that the party was
Cancelled the money and all that sort
of thing already being in the till-the
libations must have been used to drown
sorrow rather than to stimulate joy.
X
All of which is too bad. 1t is too bad
that Ed Kennedy, an able, respected and
conscientious newspaperman, found his
outstanding career as war correspond
ent crowned on the last night of
long war with abuse from his cronieS
and the condemnation of supreme AL
lied headquarters. What Kennedy did
other growing, angry neWspapermen,
smarting under restrictions of censor
ship which they felt were unnecessary
and which they were convinced were
being put to illigitimate use, have been
threatening to do ever since the war
began. Knowing Kennedy, it is i'm
possible to believe that anything save
the strongest convictions of duty i'm
PEELED him to do what he did. But if
experience under wartime censorship
individual newspapermen cannot as
sumo the responsibility of deciding when
military security is and is not involved;
in deciding when military security is
affected by political considerations or
when political considerations are per-
mitted to influence military censorship.
Constituted authority must do that. And
the remedy for unjust or unwise CEN
sorship lies in the unity of protest.
No one man can ever buck it and
get away with it.
1t is too bad that the war ended on
a sour note over SHAEF's handling of
public relations. For the PROS job
is thankless one at best. The military
authorities hold him, with the military
censors. responsible for the protection
of military information which, if pub
lished, would endanger military security.
The newspapermen hold him responsible
for upholding the traditions of a free
press, to which the suggestion of polit-
ical censorship is repugnant. In total
war military and political considera-
tions are so closely related that at
times it would require the wisdom of a
Solomon to distinguish between them.
The supply of Solomons is running low.
Yet, all in all, SHAEF seems to have
done a pretty good job, considering
the difficulties, in supervising the flow
of war information to the public. When
time has healed more wounds, the
correspondents probably will admit it.
X
There are about 10 public relations
officers under SHAEF. exclusive of en-
listed and civilian personnel. There
are about 900 war correspondents, pho
tographers, radiomen, etc, accredited to
SHAEF, perhaps $50 of them represent
| ing American publications or radio
chains Most of those stationed in Paris,
as distinct from those assigned to any
one of 10 press camps near the European
| theater fronts, live at the Scribe Hotel.
| Their Offices are there, the censors are
| there, the cable and wireless companies
| are there. Business is more or less brisk
| "a hours of the day-or was, during the
war. Three raucous buzzes, sounding
| throughout the hotel, summon the cor
| respondents to the Workroom for a
"readout" of important news. One buzz
| means a handout. Poised at their type
writer's, the correspondents frame their
bulletins as the PRO reads the latest
| news. On his "Go!" there is a dash for
| the censor's Office and the news speeds
| around the world.
| There are. however, different "levels"
| of news. When the 7th Army captured
| Goering, that was on an Army level and
the news originated at the 18th Army,
| rather than SHAEF, by-passing Paris
| and the Scribe. When the &c" group of
| German armies surrendered to Gen.
| Devers of our 9Th Army Group that
news was on SHAEF level and handled
| at the Scribe. The juncture of the
American and Russian armies was evi-
| IDENTIFY mixture of the SHAEF level
and that higher, mysterious plane known
as the political level That was an *
hour" release, with the news prepared in
advance, approved by the censors and
| the tapes of the transmitting machines
all cut, waiting for completion of pa
LAYERS between SHAEF and the Russians.
The surrender news must have been
| held for "X hour" 1t was on a political
level and that is the level at which cor
respondents gnash their teeth, but as a
rule do nothing else. Not only the news
paper correspondents, but some of the
PROS have resented the necessity of
ali 4f,~,~ ~~~,lzo