25. Notes, 26-100
26. New Masses (July 8,1941), p. 6. The New Masses was the only
weekly journal presenting the "Marxist outlook on world events"; it
also presented an undeviating Stalinist outlook at any given moment
and was probably the most articulate reflector of Stalinist opinion
in the U.S.A. during World War II among the journals which were frankly
Moscow transmission belts. To many people, it and the Daily Worker constituted
the totality of the Communist press here, but there were others of some
importance, such as Soviet Russia Today, People's World, The Communist,
(official organ of the CPUSA), Amerasia, and the Far Eastern Survey
of the Institute of Pacific Relations, which were the two centers for
the dispersal of Chinese Communist propaganda, for the most part, while
Science and Society specialized mainly in Marxist theory. But there
were at least three dozen other publications of far greater circulation,
and incredibly more affluent, whose editors and contributors numbered
several warmly pro-Soviet partisans of the pen, and whose output and
influence were thousands of times more significant. On the other hand,
it is not known that a single pro-American journal or writer existed
or was produced in the Soviet Union during the entire war.
27. A careful reading of the business and finance sections of the nation's
newspapers and magazines 1939-1945 will open up to one an aspect of
World War II which is almost entirely lacking in what passes for the
history of that time in most conventional tomes to this day.
28. "Soviet Ambassador Oumansky, Back in Favor in Washington's Social
and Official Circles," U.S. News (July 11, 1941), p.41. Oumansky was
the beneficiary of a sustained news picture campaign which made him
appear almost winsome.
29. On Steinhardt and related matters, see "Life in the Capital," "People
of the Week" and "Washington Whispers" columns in U.S. News duly 4,1941),
pp.38, 40. Said the editors, "U.S. diplomatic advisers were almost unanimous
in urging President Roosevelt to support Stalin as against Hitler, on
the ground that Hitler was the real threat."
30. Letter from Paul Jones of Columbia, Ohio, in Time July 21,1941),
p.4.
31. Newsweek (August 5,1941), p.25.
32. Christian Century July 9, 1941), pp.881-882.
33. Catholic Times and London Tablet quoted in Christian Century July
16,1941), p. 900.
34. "Catholics Will Not Join Hitler's Crusade," Christian Century July
16,1941), pp. 900-901. How British intelligence were able to recruit
so many notable Catholics into their fraudulent "Fight for Freedom"
organization is a matter worthy of respectful consideration as well
as suspicion of their powers of discrimination.
35. New Masses (July 8,1941), p.21. On Col. Donovan's new post in the
Roosevelt amateur spy and psychological warfare agency being created
at this same moment, see below, note 181.
38. "Bishop Speaks," Time (July 14,1941), pp.42-43.
37. Catholic World July, 1941), p.395.
38.Catholic World (August, 1941), pp.515-516. The Pro Red Orchestra
in the U.S.A. 345
39. Maynard, "Catholics and the Nazis," American Mercury (October, 1941),pp.
399-400.
Rev. Gillis was affronted by Willkie's 180-degree turnabout on foreign
policy, especially as represented by the latter's speech of June 18,1940:
"I want to repeat what I have said on several occasions, that despite
our sympathy for the Allied cause we must stay out of the war. In these
times, when our hearts are confused, we must keep our heads clear. We
do not intend to send men from this continent to fight in any war. We
shall not serve the cause of democracy by becoming involved in the present
war; we shall serve that cause only by keeping out of the war. It is
the duty of the President of the United States to recognize the determination
of the people to stay out of war and to do nothing by word or deed that
will undermine that determination. No man has the right to use the great
powers of the Presidency to lead the people indirectly into war; only
the people through their elected representatives can make that awful
decision; and there is no question as to their decision."
40."Cantuar and Commissars," Time (August 4,1941),p.28.
41."Hitler Attacks Stalin," Christian Century Uuly 2,1941),pp.855-856.
42.Editorial, Christian Century (July 9, 1941),p.875.
43.Holmes, "If Russia Wins," Christian Century Uuly 30,1941),pp.954-956.
44."Shall We Fight for Russia?" Christian Century (September 10, 1941),pp.
1104-1105. Wieman's letters in response to this (Christian Century,
September 10, 1941,pp. 1114-1115, and September 24, 1941,p.1180) went
into greater detail, which sounded like much domestic reform talk being
heard in Britain at that moment; the U.S.A. could avoid going Communist
only by massive post-war economic reform, and that could be achieved
only by breaking down domestic hostility to Communism, the main barrier
to reform. The latter could best be realized by joining with the USSR
in the current war. This was amazing reasoning, in view of the utter
absence of the slightest tendency to "go Communist" registered anywhere
in the U.S.A. at that moment.
45. Newsweek (July 28,1941),p.26.
46. On reportage of Conant's speech see "Tepees and Propaganda," Time
July 14,1941),pp.51-52. Time continued its booming of war mongers from
the respectable side, and teased the chastened Communists continually.
The most recent target after Conant's speech was the Red-lining head
of the National Maritime Union, Joe Curran, and the NMU's about-face
in now supporting the Anglo- Russian cause. "Hail A-Starboard," Time
July 21,1941),p.17.
47. Newsweek (September 15,1941),p.28.
48. Newsweek {September 22,1941),p.24.
49. Time (December 29,1941),p.26.
50. On Caldwell's estimate of the war in Eastern Europe on his return
from Russia four months later, see below. Caldwell and his wife, the
famous photographer, Margaret Bourke-White, were in Moscow between May
1 and October 1, returning to the U.S.A. by way of Siberia just before
the Pearl Harbor attack.
51. Straight, "For a Free World," New Republic (August 11, 1941), p.
182.
52. New Masses (August 12, 1941),p. 19. Other stirring testimonials
of Prod Perry's sort were also published from the artist Max Weber and
Emil Lengyel.
53. Christian Century (August 6,1941),pp.986-987. He returned to the
fear- Communism theme in his report published in the issue of October
15, 1941,p. 1285.
54. "We have not heard that he is agitating for the intervention of
Switzerland,his own country, as a belligerent," the editors concluded
pointedly. Editorial, "Barth Says Britain's War Is Christian," Christian
Century (September 17,1941),p. 113Z.
55. Kilpatrick, "Karl Barth and His Times," Christian Century (October
8,1941), pp.1235-37.
56. Editorial, "Is It a Holy War?" Christian Century (October 8, 1941),
pp. 1230-32.
57. Christian Century (August 27,1941), p.1061.
58. Time (August 11, 1941), pp.9-10.
59. Time (August 11, 1941), pp 10-12.
60. Time (August 18,1941), p. ll.
61. Hopkins' visit was originally interpreted for its readers as a gesture
to offer "moral support" to Stalin. U.S. News (August 8,1941), p.4;
the editorial position was somewhat braver shortly thereafter.
62. On the above see "War Dramas, Old and New: Praise for Prowess of
Soviet Troops," U.S. News (August 8, 1941), p. 17. On p. 40 of the same
issue it was reported, "Harry Hopkins, in and out of Moscow, is dealing
with matters involving delicate political relationships as well as matters
of supply.... Some important officials in Washington are wondering if
something Mr. Hopkins told him caused England's Prime Minister Churchill
to say that U.S. was very near the verge of war."
63. "Role of Harry Hopkins in Forming a World-Wide Anti-Nazi Front,"
U.S. News (August 15,1941), pp.7-8.
64. U.S. News (August 15,1941), p.17. The preservation or restoration
intact of the European colonial domination of Africa and East Asia also
appeared to be taken for granted.
65. "Roosevelt-Churchill: Inside Story of Meeting," U.S. News (August
22,1941), pp.7-9, contained the material under the heading, "What it
means to Russia." U.S. News (September 12,1941),p.5, reported the first
U.S. tanker carrying gasoline to the Soviet had arrived in the Siberian
port of Vladivostok.
The preaching fervor and deep religious faith of David Lawrence in the
Roosevelt-Churchill "Atlantic Charter" laid out in a two-page editorial
("The Eight Points," U.S. News, August 22,1941,pp.18-l9),is one of the
most painful things of the 1941 public opinion molding journalistic
propaganda to retread, especially his profound conviction that it was
unfailing evidence that the "Allies" planned a "peace without vengeance"
and that the German government's warning to their people that they would
be dismembered if defeated and that their economy would be locked up
behind punitive walls could be dismissed as idle talk by Germans and
all others as well. But the German propaganda to their people in 1941
as to their fate if vanquished came closer to actuality by at least
a light year than did the vaporings of the "Atlantic Charter"; for five
years after defeat their worst fears were realized. Had it not been
for Anglo-American panic that the Russians might end up with all of
Germany as a satellite, the punitive program in Germany after the war
might have gone on indefinitely. When Lawrence burbled about "our humane
peace terms," he created an embarrassment for the future of no small
dimensions. But he was right in one prediction, when he declared, "We
are to be part of the European orbit for generations to come."
It is indeed a tribute to the human powers for self-delusion that over
40 years after the event we still see books published which talk about
the issuance of something called the "Atlantic Charter" and "signed"
by Roosevelt and Churchill on a British warship off the coast of Newfoundland
in August, 1941. What was originally a simple press release handed to
a radio operator, and intended largely to be a diversion and concealment
for what they had really talked about, quicklv became a noble document
rivaling the Magna Carta, The Petition of Right, the Declaration of
Independence and the Emancipation Proclamation. That there was no such
document was admitted as early as 1944 but writers by the hundreds since
that time wearily attest to there being a stately position-paper supposedly
outlining the reverent state of affairs which was to prevail in perpetuity
once the enemy of 1941 had been annihilated and the planet redeemed
in a vast bath of hot lead and blood.
66. U.S. News (September 26,1941),p.12.
67. U.S. News (October 10, 1941),p.6.
68. Fortune (August, 1941),pp.4S47,136-146.
69. Hopkins, "Hitler Won't Win," American Magazine (July, 1941),pp.
24-25, 123-124.
70. Hopkins, "The Inside Story of My Meeting With Stalin," American
Magazine (December, 1941),pp.14-15,114-117. Political leadership of
this kind largely explains the predicament of the West from mid-1945
on, but the beatification of Churchill in the Anglo-American press made
criticism almost impossible. The ex post facto yarns about Churchill's
attempts to recoup lost ground in 1943 and 1944 described a largely
impossible situation.
71. Newsweek review in issue for September 1, 1941,p.42. That by Roosevelt
in New York Herald Tribune Books (September 14,1941),p.4. Roosevelt
repeated in his review Lyons' criticism of the New York Times and Herald
Tribune "for having given space deliberately or gullibly to radical
reviewers," when in a few weeks both were to expand upon this practice
many magnitudes.
72. American Mercury (August, 1941),pp.135-143; Lyons was sure Stalin
was going to be overthrown in a very short time.
73. American Mercury (November, 1941),pp.583-589.
74. Pp.5,20. Said Eastman, echoing Lyons, "Stalin is the weaker of two
gangster- tyrants, and common sense demands that we support him in his
resistance to Hitler."
75. New Masses (December 9, 1941),p.21.
76. Newsweek (September 8, 1941),p. 12. As a 100% creation of British
intelligence services in the U.S.A., it must have been a little trying
for the latter to gear up its fraudulent organization in this country
against the Communists when at home Churchill and prominent people in
his government were continuously huzzaing Stalin and the British home
front was vociferously acclaiming all things Communist. But such difficulties
were not discernible to the American public, the imposture having been
executed so skillfully.
77. Newsweek (September 22,1941),p.9.
78. U.S. News (September 19,1941),p.13.
79. "Communist Muffling," Newsweek (September 15,1941),p.9.
80. There is ample evidence that the economic involvement of the U.S.A.
in the war, 1940-1941, had as much to do with the steady involvement
in the war as the economic aspect of Anglo-American affairs, 1915-1917
had with the entry into the war of that time, despite the steady efforts
of a regiment of obscurantist academics to expunge this from the record.
81. Time (September 8,1941),p.10.
82. The first week of December, 1941 newspapers in the U.S.A. were printing
pictures of weeping Russian peasants outside their burning homes, with
the captions frankly ascribing such firings and the general destruction
in the neighborhood to the Red Army. It was significant that no soldiers
of either side appeared in these photographs, which suggested that the
damage was being done to the home front far behind the battle lines.
See the general approval of this destruction by the Red Army in Time
(September 1, 1941), pp. 22-23. On Time's reproduction of Stalinist
propaganda from Red Star as "news," see the issue for September 8, 1941,
p. 15.
83. Time (September 22, 1941), p. 52. This effusion was accompanied
by a cheap, subtle attack on the music of Richard Wagner, though this
time there was no suggestion for the extirpation of German music. For
the embarrassingly fulsome description of the first performance of this
new Shostakovich symphony in the U.S.A. see below.
84. Time (September 29, 1941), p. 12. Oswald Garrison Villard reported
that the Legion's vote was "under direct pressure from President Roosevelt,
according to Gov. Heil of Wisconsin, who was at the convention." "The
Military Outlook," Christian Century (October 8, 1941), pp. 1240-1241.
85. Christian Century (September 24, 1941), p. 1190.
86. Newsweek (September 29, 1941), p. 10.
87. Mowrer, "44 Ways to Beat Hitler," Look (September 23, 1941), p.
10. Look became part of the liberal press with a vengeance in 1941,
and as the wartime '40s wore on, it, more than the liberal literary
weeklies, became the special organ for the more spectacular trial balloons
of the liberal correspondents, columnists and radio commentators. The
Nation gradually became the forum for European left wing refugees more
than of any other attitudinal group, while even such a staid agency
of Eastern Anglo-American-controlled financial voices and its associated
world politics as Foreign Affairs opened its pages more and more year
by year to pro-war leftist liberals, especially from the fall of 1941
on, when the various impulses for interventionism began to grow together,
regardless of their differing strategies and objectives.
88. "Iranian Aftermath," Time (September 15, 1941), pp. 21-22 89. Newsweek
(September 1, 1941), p. 13
90. Time (September 15, 1941), p. 18.
91. New York Herald Tribune Books (November 23, 1941), p. 18. Cripps
was the founder of the London leftist paper Tribune, which, along with
Laski's Herald, were far more the sources of British collectivist, and,
at the same time, pro-Soviet, ideas, than any of the organs associated
with left partisan sects.
92. Look (September 9, 1941), p. 38.
93. "Biz Meets Facts," Time (July 21, 1941), pp. 73-74.
94. Villard, "This Global War," Christian Century (September 10, 1941)
pp. 1108-09. A decade and a half later, Wm. F. Buckley, Jr. and Brent
Bozell and their associates were tormenting these same liberals with
this identical language and rhetoric, only this time in promoting a
war against the liberals' erstwhile Communist "allies," even if it meant
"burning out the farthest star." as. Villard, "The Military Outlook,"
Christian Century (October 8, 1941), pp. 1240-41.
95. On Dewey's views see Ruth Byrns, "John Dewey on Russia," CommonutZl
(September 18, 1941), pp. 511-513.
97. See Prof. Childs' letter to the New York Times for January 11, 1942,
reprinted in Frontiers of Democracy for March 15, 1942.
98. "Progressives for War," Time (July 7, 1941), p. 48.
99. "Switch," Time (October 13, 1941), pp. 6849. The colleges selected
were Princeton, Yale, Harvard, Cornell, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Iowa, Chicago,
Missouri, Minnesota, Northwestern and Stanford. The Pro-Red Orchestra
in the U.S.A. 349
100."Tanks and Thanks to Russia," Time (October 6,1941),p.25.
Reprinted by permission of The Journal of Historical Review,
P.O. Box 2739, Newport Beach, California 92659, United States of America.
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