1939. Germany Prepares for War

William L. Shirer Reports From Berlin

William L. Shirer

CBS Berlin

August 28, 1939

ROBERT TROUT: Now let's hear from the German capital, where high government officials are awaiting the arrival of the returning British ambassador. To hear the Chief of Columbia's Continental Staff, William L. Shirer, we take you now to Berlin.

WILLIAM L. SHIRER: Hello America. Hello CBS. This is Berlin. The sands are running fast. Tonight, here in Berlin, we should have a decision whether it's to be peace or war.

It's just eight minutes to 8:00 Berlin Time, and Sir Neville Henderson, the British ambassador, is due to arrive any minute now from London. A big Mercedes car is waiting for him out at the Tempelhof Aerodrome, and will rush him to Herr Hitler's Chancellery in the Wilhelmstraße as soon as he arrives. The outcome of this historic meeting is now in the lap of the gods.

Although word has sifted through this afternoon that the British government cannot accept the demands which Herr Hitler made public last night—namely a return of Danzig and the Corridor to Germany—the Wilhelmstraße, when I left it a few minutes ago, was maintaining silence, preferring to wait until it knew what Ambassador Henderson brought back.

The feeling in German government circles on the eve of this crucial meeting is still firm, and the entire press this evening maintains that Germany cannot and will not compromise; that the Reich will not budge an inch from its demands on Poland for the return of Danzig and the Corridor.

It is not entirely ruled out of course that the British answer, which it's believed contains certain counterproposals, may necessitate a reply. But the tension has become so terrific that it does not seem possible to anyone here that it can long continue—probably not past tonight without events taking a turn one way or the other. Or as the Germans say, "so oder so."

In the meantime, Germany seemed already on a complete war footing today. Housewives stood in lines beginning early this morning to get their ration cards. It was the first time since the war that these cards had made their appearance. And the people, who had hardly believed a couple of days ago that war was possible, certainly looked grimmer as they stood patiently waiting for their cards.

With true German efficiency, the rational system swung into operation very smoothly. At any store today, if you wanted certain foodstuffs or soap or shoes, you had to show your card. Otherwise you were politely turned down.

The newspapers and the radio have assured the population several times today that there is food and clothing and soap and shoes and fuel enough for every German; that the rationing was only resorted to in the interest of fairness to all. But everyone taking the new measures with good—by taking these measures with good grace, the people are told, they are helping to defend the freedom of Germany. Most papers praise the German woman for the calmness with which she has taken not only the rationing of foodstuffs and materials, but also the spirit with which she has seen her menfolk, husbands, sons, or fathers off to the army in the last few days.

The military took an ever-increasing part in the picture in Berlin as today advanced. Cars with high army officers sped up and down the Wilhelmstraße, or down the Tiergartenstraße to the War Ministry in the Bendlerstraße.  Many cars and motorcycles were requisitioned. I saw several civilian motorcyclists who had been called up with their vehicles. They received an army armband, and you could see them speeding through the streets carrying messages.

Despite the needs of the armed forces, the gasoline situation improved today. I was able to buy two gallons a few minutes ago, which enabled me to get here in time for this broadcast. Men from the air service supervise the tanking up. Squadrons of big bombers have also been whirring low over the city in formation. In other words, though the talking situation has not yet been completely abandoned, the grim preparation for the worst goes on.

I understand no trains from Germany crossed any borders today, but those foreigners trying to get out were able to proceed as far as the frontier and then either walk or get some kind of transportation to the other side of the border.

Note that Germany has already assured Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Switzerland that it will respect their neutrality in case of war. But tonight we heard that Holland had decided to mobilize.

Well, all depends now on the talks which will be beginning here in a few minutes between Herr Hitler and the British ambassador. I hope to be on the air later tonight to tell you what I can about those talks.

This is William L. Shirer and returning you now to New York.

1965. Regarding the United States' Intervention in the Dominican Civil War

Senator Fulbright Criticizes the President's Foreign Policy

U.S. troops search a man in Santo Domingo during the U.S. intervention in the Dominican Civil War in 1965 (Photo by Harry Benson)

The text of Senator J. William Fulbright's 1965 speech is available here.

BILL DOWNS SUBSTITUTING FOR EDWARD P. MORGAN

ABC News

September 21, 1965

Senator William Fulbright made a speech in the Senate last week that still has official Washington talking to itself.

The Arkansas Democrat, speaking as chairman of the powerful Foreign Relations Committee, in effect charged that President Johnson had been duped—in fact, bamboozled into sending the Marines into the Dominican Republic to put down a rebellion which the United States should have supported.

Whether it was an act of moral courage or public folly for a Senator to say that Lyndon Johnson had been the victim of duplicity within his own official family remains to be seen.

But the Fulbright speech prompted the most vociferous bipartisan support for the President's Dominican intervention policy than Mr. Johnson has received at any time since the post-assassination days when he was taking over the White House command from the late John Kennedy.

Deliberately or not, Senator Fulbright succeeded in making a lot of people angry. He escalated the ire of the State Department by charging that Ambassador W. Tapley Bennett not only missed a couple of good chances to forestall the Dominican uprising, but also that Bennett made a panic call for the Marines when they were not really needed.

The Arkansas Senator also gored the sacred cows of the federal intelligence community. He implied that the CIA and FBI operatives in Dominica [sic] deliberately favored a corrupt military oligarchy to the self-appointed colonels of the unwashed insurgent movement.

So, he said, the United States authorities in Santo Domingo raised the false cry of "Communist takeover." But the statement that caused White House temperatures to pop the highest was Fulbright's declaration that the Marines were ordered to Santo Domingo not "to save American lives...but to prevent the victory of a revolutionary movement."

Pulled out of the text of the speech—as it is and was—the statement questions the motives of the White House. And in the understated patois of present-day Washington, that's an "imprudent" thing to do. Still there has been no public word from Mr. Johnson about how he feels about the allegations of his old friend, Bill Fulbright.

What the Senator evidently overlooked was that it was just as politically impossible for President Johnson to sit back and risk another Cuba-type takeover in the Dominican Republic as it would be, say, for the Oxford-educated Mr. Fulbright to go back to Arkansas and campaign for miscegenation.

Almost lost in the verbiage and political acrimony which is still simmering on Capitol Hill is Senator Fulbright's main point—that the United States is being forced into the impossible position of virtually opposing all reform movements in Latin America only because some native Communist might approve the same reforms.

It was in March last year that the Senator from Fayetteville made another unorthodox Senate speech on foreign policy. At that time, Fulbright urged a fresh, new approach to American diplomacy, saying that the country has been saddled with "old myths" and a false self-righteousness toward the changing world. Americans tend to regard hostile philosophies like Communism as some kind of "original sin," he said; and to be effective in dealing with our enemies, United States leaders should "act wisely and creatively upon the new realities of our time..." and even think "unthinkable thoughts."

Among the "unthinkable thoughts" suggested was the possibility that "Communism might not be the monolithic bugaboo it pretends to be..." The Chinese Communists seem to be proving Fulbright's point.

It was also suggested that "the United States might be able to trade with the Iron Curtain countries without selling her freedom-loving soul." American trade missions now are testing out this thesis.

And Senator Fulbright also suggested that Fidel Castro's Cuba is likely to be around the Caribbean for quite some time; it just won't sink into the sea and there's no point in getting hysterical about it.

All in all, last year's Fulbright address on "old myths and new realities" gained the Senator the reputation as the Senate's most forward-looking philosopher of American foreign policy. By contrast, last week's speech has brought him more brickbats than kudos, and it will be interesting to see what happens if and when the record of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee investigation into the Dominican crisis is published.

For, agree with him or not, Senator Fulbright raises many questions about the Dominican affair which need to be answered—for example, were there undercover attempts to manipulate the Santo Domingo government before and during the insurrection?

The record of the sub rosa operations by United States government agencies preceding the Bay of Pigs fiasco form a sad chapter in United States relationships with her Latin American neighbors.

If something similar has been happening in Santo Domingo as Senator Fulbright suggests, then the sooner it's exposed the better. A lot of American soldiers died and were wounded in the Dominican crisis. If there is any question about the worthiness or purpose of their sacrifice, the nation deserves to know why.

This is Bill Downs, substituting for Edward P. Morgan, saying good night from Washington.

1943. The Red Army's Major Fronts

"Stalin's Fronts"

"The Russians divide the fighting line into these twelve fronts," p. 27 (Map illustration by Marc R. Fore)

From Newsweek, September 13, 1943, pp. 25-27:

Fourteen Fronts

The guns spoke in Moscow again last week. Nearly every night 124 cannon[s] boomed out a message of victory across the blacked-out capital. They were saluting Russian triumphs on the long front to the west . . . Taganrog . . . Yelnya . . . Sumy. Nearly every day there came from the Kremlin an order of the day, congratulating whole armies, giving divisions the right to call themselves Taganrog divisions, Yelnya divisions, and so on. For as the third winter of the war approached the Germans all along the line were in retreat toward new positions they think they can hold.

The biggest and most important battle developed in the Ukraine. There the Nazis were being driven out of an area important to them in every sense, industrially as well as strategically—the Donets Basin with its net of railways, factories, and coal mines. Plunging on from Taganrog, the Russians freed one industrial city after another and rolled forward on Stalino, which the Germans had once called Russia's Essen.

North of the great Donets battle, three German positions were threatened—Kiev, base of the southern Dnieper line; Bryansk, under multipronged Russian attack; and Smolensk, the object of a direct Russian drive, when the hard driving Red Army made a double thrust along two rail lines to the east.

The Germans, for their part, admitted that they were withdrawing in most sectors. The tone of their High Command communiqués was more defensive than at any other time since the start of the war. But there were still no indications of a Nazi rout or a disaster approaching that of Stalingrad. One sure sign of disaster is large-scale surrender and even the Russians did not claim the capture of any great numbers of Nazis.

Front: The Russian front is so tremendous and the place names so confusing that the moves and countermoves on this vast checkerboard are hard for even military experts to follow. The Soviets themselves have divided it into fourteen separate fronts. Bill Downs, Newsweek and CBS correspondent in Moscow, last week cabled the first definite news of where these fourteen fronts are (see map, page 27).

Here is Downs's listing of the twelve most important of the fourteen, along with the commanding general of each (he omits two, the Karelian and the Murmansk, facing Finland, because they are at present inactive and the commanders on them have not been announced):

Leningrad, commanded since Jan. 16 by Col. Gen. Leonid Govoroff, the heavy-set artilleryman who helped defend Moscow in the dark days of 1941 and last year commanded the troops that broke the German ring around Leningrad.

Volkhov, headed by Gen. Kyril Meretskoff, who led the Soviet campaign against Finland in 1939, and at Leningrad helped breach the German lines.

Northwestern, last reported under the command of Marshal Semyon Timoshenko, who once was top man in the Red Army, fell into oblivion after the loss of Rostov last year, then re-emerged as commander of the line guarding Moscow on the northwest.

Kalinin, in charge of the least known commander of all—Col. Gen. Maxim Purkaeff, whose sole publicized job was that of military attaché in Berlin in 1939.

Western, under Gen. Vassily Sokolovsky, who was promoted to the rank of full general on Aug. 28 for his flank attack on Orel which resulted in the fall of the city. Last March he captured Vyazma; now he is presumably leading the attack from Spas Demensk.

Bryansk, headed by Gen. Markian Popoff, who before the war was commander of the Leningrad military district. Last winter he won fame at Stalingrad, then swept on to make the winter campaign's deepest penetration into the Donbas. This summer he helped break the abortive German offensive at Kursk and later led troops striking eastward for the Orel breakthrough.

Central, under Gen. Konstantin Rokossovsky, the "boy wonder" of the Red Army. At 38, tall, handsome Rokossovsky is one of the most experienced commanders in Russia. In 1941 his cavalry helped halt the German attack on Moscow; last winter he led the break-through from the Don that saved Stalingrad and trapped the German Sixth Army; this summer he fought against the Germans at Kursk.

Voronezh, commanded by Gen. Nikolai Vatutin, the tank expert who headed the southwestern front in last winter's offensive and broke across the Ukraine to Voroshilovgrad. This summer he led the attack on Belgorod and then pushed south to flank Kharkov from the north.

Steppe, under Gen. Ivan S. Koheff, 46-year-old veteran of the Czarist Army, who grew up with the revolution and the Red Army. In 1941 he fought in the battle of Moscow, and later became commander of the Kalinin front. For his part in last month's victory at Kharkov he was raised from the rank of colonel general.

Southwest, commanded by Gen. Rodion Malinovsky, stocky, dark-haired, 44-year-old veteran of the last war. Last winter his tanks and cavalry whipped a German army sent to save the troops trapped at Stalingrad, pushed them back through Rostov, and then swung down to the steppes of the Northern Caucasus. At Kharkov he set the pace in the hard fight from the southwest.

Southern, under Col. Gen. Fedor Tolbukhin, who led an army that routed Marshal von Paulus's Sixth Army at Stalingrad, and whose encircling tactics are rated tops by the Red Army.

Caucasian, commanded by Col. Gen. Ivan Maslennikoff, who helped save Moscow when he recaptured Kalinin, northwest of the capital. Last winter he led the drive which pushed the Germans out of the Caucasus to the present Kuban bridgehead.

These, then, are the sectors which make up what is called the Russian front. As much as anything else they indicate the vast nature of the conflict in the east for any one of these sectors would be a full-scale front anywhere else in the world.

1939. Edward R. Murrow Four Days Before the Start of World War II

Edward R. Murrow in London Before the War

Edward R. Murrow

CBS London

August 28, 1939

ROBERT TROUT: The news of Europe, as it occurs. The world is now awaiting the arrival in Berlin of Sir Neville Henderson, British Ambassador to Germany, who took off from England's Heston Aerodrome nearly three hours ago, flying to Berlin with the British Cabinet's answer to German Chancellor Adolf Hitler.

Now, during this broadcast period we shall hear the latest word direct from the two key cities of London and Berlin as our CBS representatives speak to us across the ocean by shortwave radio. First, in London waiting to speak to us now, is the chief of Columbia's European staff, Mr. Edward R. Murrow. And to hear Mr. Murrow, we switch you now to London.

EDWARD R. MURROW: This is London. Europe is all paradox these days. For instance, one of the few places in Europe where international railway traffic is undisturbed is the Polish corridor. Germany's transit arrangements continue to function without a hitch. Trains continue to cross the corridor without a hitch, and Germany is said still to be sending military transport over the line.

Now, here in London today the Chinese and Japanese ambassadors called at the Foreign Office, and they called together. That's something that London hasn't seen for a long while. It's also just been announced that Germans have been instructed to leave Hong Kong.

Croydon Airport will be blacked out tonight, and the Admiralty has forbidden the use of wireless transmitting apparatus from any seagoing ship in British territorial waters. And I should not be surprised to see certain steps taken during the next twenty-four hours to establish what would be called a "voluntary censorship" over certain other forms of communication.

The first Defence order—or decree—was issued here today. They cover a lot of territory. Power is given to order compulsory evacuation for both people and animals. In other words, if the government says go, you've got to go whether you like it or not. Compulsory billeting is provided for, and that means that if you had a house in the country with an extra room, the government might billet without your consent two or three people in that room. Private premises may be taken over. Traffic on the roads may be regulated. And the carrying of cameras will be prohibited in certain areas.

And there's another provision: it states that no person shall have under his control or liberate any racing or homing pigeon. Prices of food and other commodities may be controlled, and a dispatch from the United Kingdom of material other than that handled by mail may be controlled or stopped altogether. There are more than a hundred separate items in the list, and there will probably be others to follow.

Well, those surprising rations are still handing out surprises. Voroshilov, the War Minister, says there's no reason why Russia should not supply the Poles with arms and materiel, just as the Americans. And incidentally, the British have been supplying them to Japan for the last two years.

The feeling is growing here that the agreement with Russia may in the end of the day do Germany more harm than good. We should probably have more information on that point after the speeches in Moscow tonight.

As you know, the House of Commons meets tomorrow 3:45 London Time. And I can tell you that the Prime Minister is being urged very strongly not only to outline the recent exchange between Hitler and the British government—which so far remains a secret—but he has today been urged by certain opposition leaders to tell the whole story of the breakdown of negotiations with the Soviet Union. If he does tell that story, we shall be in for further surprise.

Mr. Chamberlain has been told that Parliament will provide a good sounding board; that a full, complete statement would convince doubters. But he has no appetite for personal government, and is prepared to defend Britain's actions in the open. Of course, what he says will, in large measure, depend upon whether or not he has received Herr Hitler's reply to Britain's message, which Sir Neville Henderson is now taking to Berlin by air.

On the whole, I should say that the possibility of avoiding war has not increased during the day. Government circles are in fact exceedingly pessimistic. But there is a general belief that the strategic position has improved; that Hitler is hesitating; that the Russians may betray the Germans. You are already aware of the reaction in Tokyo and Madrid as a result of Hitler's retreat to Moscow. We are not yet certain of its full effect in Rome. Italy still has only a quarter of her army under arms, and if war comes and Italy stands with the Germans, she will suffer more terrible havoc than will Germany.

There is still hope that Hitler may pause and think again. There is still the possibility of a conference. The people with whom I have talked in London today certainly haven't expressed any optimism, but their spirit is better. They believe the Germans are worried and uncertain, if not frightened, and that's a pleasant situation to most Englishmen. They think, rightly or wrongly, that they now have the initiative; that if war comes, they will win it. But if we have a conference instead, the result is likely to be more postponement.

That view is reflected in The Evening News, which says, "What can Britain or France do to prevent war at the last moment? Unless Herr Hitler takes some steps towards calling off his dogs and agreeing, in the words of President Roosevelt's appeal, to 'refrain from any positive act of hostility for a reasonable stipulated period.' Even if Herr Hitler did so agree, it would but postpone the day of reckoning so long as he is in his present mood, which is that of a wayward child who has never been caught."

So far as I can learn, the Poles have not been subjected to pressure by Britain. England could truthfully say that the alliance with Poland has never aroused and popular enthusiasm in Britain. Britishers know very little about Poland. The necessary historic and sentimental ties are missing.

But the matter is not now so much one of Poland as it is of Britain's pledged word, and the determination to move in one direction or the other out of this twilight of peace. Hitler has made a demand, now he pauses. It is difficult to see how any solution can be reached on Hitler's terms; that is to say, any solution that would provide anything more than a temporary relief.

Now the Queen is returning from Scotland tonight, and the two princesses are remaining there. Everything is being prepared for zero hour. Britain is moving up to the line, and I should be less than truthful if I had failed to report that some people see it coming with almost a sense of relief. Those are the people who maintain that the retreat has gone on far too long, and that strength and determination are now required. They feel that perhaps war is the only solution, and that the resulting world order will be different than the one we have fumbled with for the past twenty years.

I don't know. But the decision must be made. The folks here seem to think it will be made during the next thirty-six hours.

I return you now to America.