DEBT TO BRITAIN

Greymouth Evening Star, 22 June 1945, Page 3

DEBT TO BRITAIN

PEOPLE OF AMERICA.

The feeling prevails in England that Americans do not duly value the contribution which the British people have made to the common war effort. That feeling is justified, writes Mi. Sumner Welles, former United States Under- Secretary of State. . •We are too prone here m America to believe that the military and material help which the United States has rendered Britain cancels out the fact that from the fall of France to Hitler’s attack on Russia, Great Britain stood out practically alone against the Axis Powers. In modern times no people have shown greater courage, and none have done more to save our civilisation. This was done by a people with one-third of the United States population, still suffering from their losses in the World War, with none of the United States geographical advantages, and with only a fraction of the United States’ resources. Had thev not done so the United States would have been forced to face a hostile world by itself. We do not visualise very clearly what the average citizen of England has suffered during these five and ahalf years of war. It is not only the slaughter of civilians and the destruction of homes, but the ever-con-tinuing shortages of food and of clothing. nightly blackouts, interminable months without heating, and, above all else, the lack of assurance of any future individual security, which wear down men’s hearts. And British men and women have borne all this without complaint and with unflinching fortitude.