Bill Downs, War Correspondent

January 15, 2015

1944. A Most Secret Memorandum Before Normandy

On His Majesty's Service

This is a note Bill Downs received on May 3, 1944 marked "most secret":

On His Majesty's Service

MOST SECRET

(Tel: KENsington 4891. Ext. 4.)

W. Downs
C.B.S.
49, Hallam Street LONDON.

3rd May, 1944.

Dear Downs:

Will you please report to the above address at 2000 hours on Monday May 8th, as I have an assignment for you.

You should report in uniform, with your full Field equipment properly labelled.

Your personal baggage, to last you one week, should be kept separate from the rest of your kit. For your personal information only, you will be away for approximately one week, but you should not make engagements for the period following your probably return.

The necessity for complete security for complete security in connection with such visits, you will appreciate, cannot be over-stressed. On no account should you discuss your movements with anybody outside this Headquarters.

Please acknowledge receipt of this letter by telephone quoting the above reference (PRS/64/12) to me as soon as possible.

Yours Sincerely,
(?)

Lt. Colonel

A.D.P.R.
HQ 21st Army Group

----------------------------
Will you please have your dinner before reporting.

January 14, 2015

1944. Foreshadowing the Battle of the Bulge

The Allied Advance

"British assault troops advancing near Flushing with shells bursting ahead during the Scheldt operation," November 1, 1944 (source)

Bill Downs

CBS

September 11, 1944

British troops have improved their bridgeheads across the Albert Canal against strong German opposition, and it appears today that a battle of the Albert Canal is developing—a battle which may well be one of the most important of the war.

There have been no major developments on the British and Canadian fronts for the past three days. Over on the coastal front, Canadian and British troops have pressed the Nazis back up against the Scheldt river estuary where the Germans are attempting a miniature Dunkirk operation, trying to get their troops backs into Holland. Allied troops now hold a line that cuts off this corner of Belgium, running roughly from Antwerp to Ghent to Bruges, and then to Ostend on the channel. The Germans have been employing every kind of barge and ship in their attempts to evacuate their trapped forces, and in the past several days Allied air forces have sunk craft ranging from a 5,000 ton ship to small canal barges taking Germans across the Scheldt river bay.

Yesterday alone 105 barges were destroyed or damaged in the Scheldt estuary, in addition to some ten tugs destroyed. The Allied tactical air forces are again operating from forward airfields and yesterday swarmed over German communications in Holland, knocking out eighteen locomotives.

But now it is evident that the German rout that began in the Normandy pocket across the Seine and into Belgium has finally ended. The Germans have marshaled the remnants of their retreating troops and stiffened them with reinforcements from Holland, Germany, and possibly Denmark. They have organized a defense line, the first cohesive defense line that has been met in a 300 mile advance by the Allies.

The Nazis are making a stand on three water boundaries protecting Germany: the Albert Canal, which already is breached in two pieces, and the Moselle and Meuse rivers on the American sectors.

It appears that Hitler does not have as much faith in the Siegfried Line as he once had, although the Siegfried undoubtedly will be used as Germany's western wall as originally intended. It is reported that the Todt organization is now working frantically to reinforce the Siegfried Line and polish it up after letting it go to grass for four years. Many of the guns in the Siegfried Line were shipped to coastal defenses, but this German fortified position is still a formidable barrier.

The German plan right now is one of delay. The Germans now are fighting a battle of maintenance. That is the reason they have left strong garrisons in the ports like Le Havre, Brest, and Boulogne. They want to deny us the use of these ports for as long as possible to keep the Allies from amassing an overwhelming force which will carry us into Germany.

That is as much of the Nazi plan as is evident today. The fight on the Albert Canal and the Moselle and Meuse rivers, all of them backed by the Siegfried Line. Improve and reinforce the Siegfried Line, and hold the channel ports as long as possible to delay our buildup for marching into Germany.

Further than this, it is difficult to know what Hitler will do. In fact, there seems to be little that he can do. A high German general captured recently said that it is politically impossible for Hitler to transfer any divisions away from the Eastern Front to stop the Western Allies. But even the Nazis could justify this move to their best party members. The German high command has ordered its garrisons in southern France back into the fatherland, and many of them have arrived after being badly battered by the Allied forces which landed in southern France. And much traffic has been observed going southward and westward from Denmark, where Hitler is weakening his garrisons there to bolster the forces on the western German frontier. The German forces in Norway are small, and it is unlikely that they could be transported to this front in time to make any difference in the coming battle.

Consequently, it now appears that Hitler has all his chips in the pot. And the coming battles should be decisive.

The other day British troops captured an order to the soldiers of the western German armies issued by its commander, Field Marshal Model. Model is one of Germany's best leaders, a veteran of Poland and Russia, and now in command of the Nazis' western forces.

Field Marshal Model's order to his troops describes better than any account so far the complete rout of the Germans during the past three weeks. He says, and quote, "With the enemy advance and the withdrawal of our front, a great stream of troops has been set in motion. Several hundred thousand soldiers are moving backwards."

The order continues, "Among these troops are headquarters and superfluous columns which have been routed...which have no firm destination and could receive no clear orders...with these columns travel idle talk, rumors, inconsideration, unnecessary disorder, and shortsighted selfishness."

Field Marshal Model threatened severest measures if this feeling of defeat was brought into the rear areas and into the fully intact bodies of the fighting troops.

Model admitted that Germany had lost the battle, but he added that Germany would still win the war, explaining that he could not say any more than that now. He called on his soldiers to believe in their luck. He ordered strict discipline and pointed out that the Belgian and French patriots would rather shoot a weak looking man than a strong one. He urged his soldiers to retreat walking along erect to impress the Belgian and French citizens.

And then he gave official Nazi confirmation of the looting that the German army has carried on everywhere it has fought. The German field marshal said, "Every hand grenade, every rifle, every gallon of gasoline is now needed to arm the new line to receive our troops." And he was forced to add, "These things are more important than suitcases or useless plunder."

This is Bill Downs in Brussels returning you to CBS in New York.

January 13, 2015

1943. The Women Doing the Labor in Moscow

Winter on the Home Front

"Women in the universal military training program marching in Moscow, Russia, late 1941" (Ivan Shagin, Russian International News Agency - source)

The parentheses indicate text that did not pass Soviet censors for military security or propaganda reasons.

(For more, see the complete 1943 Moscow reports.)

Bill Downs

CBS Moscow

January 20, 1943

There's an army of women in Moscow which you have probably never heard of before. They are several thousand strong and made up of housewives and stenographers and clerks who are called into action by the government. Their weapons are picks and scrapers and shovels. Their enemy is the Moscow winter. And their objective is to remove as much ice and snow as possible from the city's streets and sidewalks.

These women have no uniforms. They just pile on as many clothes as possible wearing two or three coats and sweaters until they look like animated sacks of potatoes. (They wrap a couple of shawls around their heads, and about all you can see of their faces is the red tips of their noses. There are no styles in wartime Russia. Everyone dresses as warmly as possible and forgets what they look like.)

It's a tough job they do, and an unpleasant one. But these women are as tough as any American pioneer woman who thought nothing of doing a day's plowing back in the days when we were building a country. These Russian women work in the cold streets all day picking away at the packed ice and snow, clearing a few square yards at a time and carting the ice off in sleds.

It's an important job they're doing. Besieged Leningrad found that out when her ice-choked streets finally burst sewers and disabled public services.

By closely observing this daily battle against the snow, you can pretty well tell how all of Moscow feels about things. When the Red Army isn't doing so well, this army of women prod viciously at the ice. They glare at pedestrians and at each other. They don't do much talking, even when they stop for a breather.

But in the past few weeks, when the Red Army is advancing, you can almost time the increasing rate at which the shovels shovel and the picks pick and the sleds full of ice are pulled away.

Today the girls reached an all-time high. My favorite squad is a group of middle-aged women who are led by a short, stocky grey-haired grandmother. She was chipping away at the street as if it was a German fortification. Her two grandchildren, a boy and a girl who often accompany her to work, were putting the ice on their sled and putting it where it could be taken away.

Every time I've walked past this group, I have always stopped and talked to the kids. We're great friends, although we don't understand each other. Grandma, however, has never even given me a look.

The victory at Leningrad, however, has made everyone here so happy that I scored my own personal victory with Grandma. When I walked past on my way to the broadcasting studio, she looked up, smiled, and spoke to me.

It made me feel pretty good. And "pretty good" is just how the entire Soviet Union is feeling during its army's tremendous winter offensive.

January 12, 2015

1944. Nazi Yearbook for the German Soldiers in the North

Jahrbuch für den deutschen Soldaten im Norden

Bill Downs at some point acquired this yearbook that was distributed to Nazi soldiers in Norway in 1944 (click to enlarge):

"Auch wenn wir vergehen müssen, muss Deutschland bestehen. Auch wenn uns im Einzelnen das Schicksal schlagen sollte, muss Deutschland leben. Auch wenn wir Not und Sorge auf uns zu nehmen haben: Deutschland muss sein trotz Sorgen und Not."

Adolf Hitler.

"Ein Jahr liegt hinter uns, das an Front und Heimat grösste Anforderungen stellte und uns Prüfungen auferlegte, die nur ein wahrhaft starkes Volk zu überwinden vermochte.

"Ein Jahr liegt vor uns, in dem sich wieder die ungebrochene deutsche Kraft aller Welt offenbaren wird und vom Feinde Erfolge und Entscheidungen erzwingt, die uns dem Endsieg näherbringen.

"Der Krieg ist im vergangenen Jahre immer totaler geworden und wird geführt von Alle und gegen Alle, die zum deutschen Volk gehören oder seine Freunde sind. Während die Front gewaltigste Abnutzungs- und Zermürbung-schlachten schlug, tobte gegen die Heimat ein mitleidsloser Kampf, den wir Greisen, Frauen und Kindern ersparen wollten. Der Feind war es, der mit gemeinsten Waffen das Blutvergiessen hineintrug in dicht besiedelte Städte, und damit aus dem Kampf Mann gegen Mann verbrecherisches Morden und kulturzerstörende Barbarei werden liess. Nur jener seelenlose Amerikanismus konnte eine solche Kriegsführung beginnen, der instinktiv fühlt, dass seine Zivilisation zu minderwertig ist, um einen Vergleich mit der ehrwürdigen europäischen Kultur aushalten zu können.

"Beide aber, Front und Heimat, bewährten sich wie nie zuvor in diesem Kriege. Militärische Rückschläge konnten die Front nicht brechen, sondern machten sie nur noch härter, die Deutschen immer mehr zusammen und stärkten jenes Lebensgefühl, das uns zu einer unzerbrechlichen Schicksalsgemeinschaft schweisste.

"Wer dachte in den vergangenen Monaten nicht an all das zurück, was Friedrich der Grosse militärisch und persönlich an Rückschlägen im Siebenjährigen Krieg hinnehmen musste, Schläge, die ihn nicht kapitulieren liessen, sondern zu wahrhaft unvergänglicher Grösse emporführten und mit ihm seine Preussen. Er schöpfte seine ungeheure durch nichts zu bezwingende Kraft aus seinen Soldaten und sie wuchsen mit ihm zur Unbesiegbarkeit.

"Genauso fanden die harten Monate der bewährung das deutsche Volk!

"Ich danke Euch allen, Soldaten, die Ihr im hohen Norden Eure Pflicht für Führer, Volk und Vaterland erfüllt habt und weiterhin erfüllen werdet, für Euren Einsatz und für Eure Härte, die durch nichts, das weiss ich, zu brechen sein wird.

"Eins aber wollen wir geloben:

"Stark zu sein im Glauben an den Führer und die Grösse des Deutschen Volkes.

"Eisern zu sein im Willen, für die Grösse Deutschlands zu kämpfen.

"Aus Glauben und Willen aber wäscht die Tat Der Sieg!"

Oslo, den 31, Dezember 1943.

Reichskommisar für die besetzten norwegischen Gebiete.

"Liber Soldat!

"Zum vierten mal erhältst Du nun dieses Soldatenjahrbuch. Inzwischen ist über Skandinavien und insbesondere Norwegen soviel in Literatur und Tagespresse erschienen, das unser Jahrbuch eine Umstellung in seinem Inhalt erfahren konnte. Da Du das Taschenbuch ja täglich bei Dir hast, soll in ihm auch nur das zu lesen sein, wofür Du Dich täglich interessieren könntest. Auf diese weise ist aus dem Jahrbuch eigentlich ein kleines Nachschlagewerk geworden.

"Diesmal wollen aber auch wir erstmalig eine Bitte an Dich richten. Du weisst, dass das Amt, das Dir auch dieses Jahrbuch zusammengestellt hat, sich im wesentlichen im Norwegen mit den nachfolgenden Arbeitsgebieten beschäftigt: Propaganda, Schrifttum, Sport, Rundfunk, Presse, Kultur, Film, Theater, Schul- und Bildungswesen, Truppenbetreuung usw. Das sind alles Fragen, mit denen auch Du Dich sicher wiederholt auseinandergesetzt hast, wo Du Anregungen geben kannst, Wünsche äussern möchtest oder auch einmal Kritik anbringen willst. Das gerade wollen wir! Schreibe uns deshalb—und wie gesagt, vertragen auch durchaus ein offenes Wort der Kritik. Wenn Deine Wünsche berechtigt sind, werden sie erfüllt, und wenn Deine Anregungen allgemein gültig sind, hilfst Du uns mit, unsere Aufgabe zu meistern."

"Heil Hitler!"

Hauptabteilung für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda beim Reichskommisar für die besetzten norwegischen Gebiete, Oslo, Storting.