Reading the paper on December 21, 1944.
At least thirteen German motorized and infantry divisions have driven through a fifty-mile-wide gap in Allied lines in Belgium and Luxembourg in an offensive of mounting intensity.
The German columns are cutting through Allied defensive lines and isolating pockets of Americans as they loot and destroy supplies and cut off communications.
There are reports of German troops employing ‘dirty tricks’ to kill Americans, such as waving a white flag of surrender only to advance to a favorable position, drop down and open fire.
German radio claims ten thousand Americans have been taken prisoner.
Unofficial sources say General Eisenhower has rushed reserves from other areas into the fight.
Losses have been heavy on both sides.
While predicting eventual Allied victory, an Allied spokesman has called the current situation ‘grave,’ noting that bad weather has prohibited the use of Allied air support.
But unidentified Washington military advisors have urged the American public not to panic.
Despite the ferocity of the current German advance, they say the enemy lacks the resources to parlay these gains into a final victory.
American forces are claiming victory on Leyte Island in the Philippines as fighting there winds down.
Remaining Japanese troops are in disorganized retreat.
Six months of Japanese supplies have been captured and the whereabouts of their commanding officer is unknown.
General Douglas MacArthur has presented the Congressional Medal of Honor to Major Richard Bong, of Poplar, Wisconsin, a fighter pilot who is credited with downing forty Japanese aircraft.
The recapture of territory in Northern Burma from the Japanese has enabled the US Air Transport Command to substantially increase its delivery of supplies ‘over the hump’ of the Himalayas to embattled Chinese forces.
Earlier today, two B-29 Superfortress aircraft bombed factories in an industrial area of Tokyo.
President Roosevelt greeted troops at Camp LeJeune during a stop on his return trip to Washington from Warm Springs, Georgia.
California agricultural groups have announced their opposition to the return of Japanese Americans to the state’s agricultural regions before the war’s end, despite the lifting of the Japanese exclusion rules on December 17th, noting that California vegetable production has increased since the Japanese evacuation.
The Russian Army newspaper has warned that ‘Hitlerites’ have been active among US isolationists in an effort to block the formation of a world organization for international security.
With the resumption of some whiskey imports, New York City’s liquor stores are reporting their best Christmas selling season since the repeal of Prohibition in 1933.
Bars and taverns, however, report slow sales as people spend their free time finishing their Christmas shopping.
The children of London will have full stockings this year in their sixth wartime Christmas.
But it comes as parents are ignoring the advice of officials and purchasing toys on the black market and from street peddlers.
Prices for second-hand toys made before the war have skyrocketed, with parents paying the equivalent of $98 for doll carriages and $68 for bicycles.
Amateur toy-making has become popular in Britain during these war years.
Recently, a shabbily dressed man carrying a beautifully made rocking horse was repeatedly stopped as he walked down London’s Oxford Street.
People wished to know where he had gotten his toy.
And they were disappointed to learn he had made it himself from wood salvaged from his bombed home.
And finally…
A new joint Congressional committee is seeking ideas from business management experts, journalists and political scientists on ways to ‘modernize’ Congress.
Suggestions for ‘streamlining’ Congressional hearings are especially wanted.
And as if to prove the worth of their endeavor, committee members say that, once they become operational, their first item of business will be to request an extension of the deadline for submitting their report.
Some things never change…
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I’ll see you on Monday.
— Brenda
Stories from the New York Times.
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