The Key West citizen. [volume] (Key West, Fla.) 1879-current, 1945-05-11
Five Tf3ps
VERDI. Worst Disaster
Was Clash Between
Tempers, Ideals
OF Leaders

AZ s'~asmv~s writer

~ " AsA*tNtfts
Through the long years lead
ma 10 The struggle ard the
bloody months Of battle, the des-
Tiny of all creation has rested
IN the hands Of a half dozen
lcaders Of nations.
The dominant figures-Roose-
welt. Churchill. Stain, Hitler
and Musolini--are amen of the
hour. untouched by royal
blood.
And while World War ii has
bcen . struggle OF entire peo-
pies, historians probably will
render the impact of the lead
efx personalities upon events!
Eaeh leader. TOO. has displayed
- marked degree the national
characteristics OF his state or
iis form Of government. sih9y
LIE sinifisz and The Res. .x..
REt ~ fssk 4 tAtofs wfIs III.
dent. aN1aous braggart' Nausea
lint It's stature shrank as that
of ms pupil. sinister Adolf Hit :
lcF. increased. Thwarted. over
wcening in ambition. fanatical,
brutal. the Fuehrcr played upo1
the ingraincd 'militarism of his
people. still singing from de-
feat
q United Nations leadership for
fhe European conflict was in the
hands Of a trio of different
stamp. Churchill. 1.-The rosy lit
Gle man." q master of rhetoric,
hooks like John Bull and clinch-
ed fame BY carrying the torch
for the British Empire through
the dark days Of l940-'41. Rus
xia's fate was entrusted to Jo-
$50 StaAn, inscrutable !. master,
rf1ycr " The intefnationaI Ok
er game of diplomacy. who gain
ed time by siding with the
Nazis AZ first. who let the world
think Russia could not fight
vigorously. and who drew Hit
lsx onto a hsttlefield of death.
The United States was led by
ROOSEVELT 2 phraseinaker him
self. a master of timing and a
leader so popular he could ask
and get for the first time in his
tory a third presidential term.
Re not only helped a peace low
ing, eompIacent country reach
war tempo, but insisted on be-
ing in fact the military head of
the nation. as well as the pc.
litical.
The Might Have Been
What has been the effect of
these personalities on events?
At Munich Hitler pulled gun
On the Allied Leaders of 1888,
Chamberlain and Daladier. They
quailed, and Mussolini who had
been called in to play the role
Of interlocutor. decided history
by putting his chips with Hitler,
whom he had bluffed in similar
fashion on the matter of Aus
tria's freedom in 1884. Church
ia would scarcely have been
bnfffed that way, = sssk AA
Stain v ignSred at 1 Mur6ch,
slowed his disappointment, ~ No
of,e trusted the U.S.S.R.,t hesniust
have thopeht. apd the deed must
have played part in the later
Russian peliCys shifting and aenig-
matte as II seemed to the out
side world ~
n Duce, when the showdown
came in September. 1899, show
ed his inherent weakness by
pulling aside as a non-belliger-
ent. then found outlet for his
hraggadocio in May, 1910, by
Jumping on France when he
thought the battle was over.
His action resulted in Roose-
velt's tide-changing stab in the
back" speech one day later.
The Atlantic Charter
Personalities were transcend
enf when in 1871 the Anglo
American leaders held the first
of their get-togethers and drew
up the Atlantic Charter. With
II. gcneralized as it was. the two
asiuie leaders silenced many
skeptics of Allied war motives
The later meetings of the
leaders prove how their ,domin-
sting beliefs and characteristics
belittled the minor currents in
the stream of conflict.
In the later days of the war,
as the psyches of Roosevelt.
Churchill and Stain came into
permanent dominance over the
lettering personalities of Musso-
lini and Hitler, individual diff
ferences again shaped events.
Hitler. the egotist and mystic,
during the day of German vic
tories, sowed the dragons teeth
of suspicion and contempt among
the professional Prussian mill
taristS. He spurned them, recall
ed them. dismissed them and
caioled them until even the
homefront suspected the omni-
potenee of the Reich's man-god'
Mussolini. when war over
whelmed Italy. found the years