SECOND FRONT

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23749, 22 September 1942, Page 5

SECOND FRONT

SOVIET VIEWS ON ALLIED AID IMPRESSIONS OF MR WILLKIE (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright.) (Rec. 11 p.m.) MOSCOW, Sept. 20. “The second front has become almost a kind of symbol for the Russians of the kind of aid they are entitled to receive from Britain and America,” said Mr Wendell Willkie on his arrival from Kuibishev. “The Russians appreciate the materials being sent, but they think them inadequate. They,think they are carrying the brunt of the war, which is as much Britain’s and America’s as their own. “I have been asked about a second front 50 times a day. I regard Stalingrad as being as much a British and American front as a Russian front, because the war is global, and all fronts belong to all the Allies. No nation can afford to become individually self-pro • tective."

Mr Willkie said his dominant impressions thus far were of the high morale of the Russians, who were showing no signs of weakening anywhere in their determination to carry on to victory, and their prim realisation of military realities. The Russians had no phoney notions about the strength of the German army. Absolutely no limitations have been placed on his inspections or inquiries in RusAccording to the "Daily Mirror," a "noted Washington social celebrity with White House connexions” said that an agreement was reached before the departure of Mr Wendell Willkie on his present tour, that he' should succeed Mr Cordell Hull as Secretary of State, after his return. x The informant adds that Mr Hull has been in ill-health for some time and that he even interviewed the Japanese envoys before the Pearl Harbour attack while confined to his bed.