To the Finish

The U.S. people learned last week from a smiling, confident, even cocky President that the word for 1943 is action--determined, bitter, bloody action on every battlefront.

At a White House correspondents' dinner (wartime note: no butter, no coffee) in Washington's new and flamboyant Statler Hotel, Franklin Roosevelt gave his first extended account of the Casablanca conference and what was planned there. It was a speech filled with the most self-assured phrases Franklin Roosevelt has yet uttered on the course of World War II.

Said he:

Action In Europe. "Our prime purpose in this battle of Tunisia is to drive our enemies into the sea. . . . Hitler knows the consequences of an Allied victory in Tunisia. They are simple. They are the actual invasions of the continent of Europe and we do not disguise our intention to make these invasions. . . . The pressure on Germany and Italy will be constant and unrelenting. . . ."

Action in the Pacific. "We do not expect to spend the time that it would take to bring Japan to final defeat merely by inching our way forward from island to island across the vast expanse of the Pacific. It would take too many years. Great and decisive actions will be taken to drive the invader from the soil of China. Yes, important actions are going to be taken in the skies over China--and over the skies of Japan itself. . . . Remember, there are many roads that lead right to Tokyo and we're not going to neglect any of them."

Action All Over. "Our determination is to fight this war through to the finish--to the day when United Nations forces march in triumph through the streets of Berlin and Rome and Tokyo. . . . The only terms on which we shall deal with any Axis government or any Axis faction are the terms proclaimed at Casablanca: 'Unconditional surrender!'"

Here was the outline for 1943, for the preparatory battles of late winter, the new thrusts in spring, for the crushing blows to be struck in the clear, hot summer months; the schedule for the bombers droning through fall and into another winter. Together with Winston Churchill's fact-filled, anecdotal discourse to Commons, the speech provided a handy guide to 1943's grand strategy. To the devising of that strategy Franklin Roosevelt had contributed perhaps more than any other. (In his speech, Winston Churchill carefully laid responsibility for "unconditional surrender" on Franklin Roosevelt--"the statement which the President wished to be made on the subject.")

The speech was not a major statement of foreign and domestic policy, but it contained some bold statements on postwar objectives, both political and economic.

No Quislings. Prime Minister Churchill had been at some pains to demonstrate that the political policy in North Africa was of American devising. Although that policy is still far from patent, Franklin Roosevelt attempted to assure his critics that the French people, and the people of all Axis-conquered nations, will have a free choice in their postwar government. Said he: "The world can rest assured that this total war ... is not being carried on for the purpose or even with the remotest idea of keeping Quislings or Lavals in power anywhere on this earth."

To the patent fact that the United Nations as yet have no complete military accord, much less a postwar plan, the President gave his own answer: The United Nations will stay united, and no Nazi propaganda to split them can turn the trick.

Jobs for All. To the 7,500,000 soldiers, sailors and marines now fighting for their country, the President gave a pledge: jobs for all when they come home. Said he: "I am certain that private industry will be able to provide the vast majority of those jobs" (see p. 73); Congress would assure all others of earning a living.

Franklin Roosevelt all but ignored the unsolved problems of the home front. His eyes were across the seas and on the U.S. men fighting there. The real news of Casablanca, he said, would come out in time and in action, and it would be bad news for the Axis. The U.S. people, warned of the cost, hoped and prayed that their President's optimism was right.

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