TITO CLIMBS DOWN

Grey River Argus, 24 August 1946, Page 5

TITO CLIMBS DOWN

PRISONERS FREED AT U.S.A. DEMAND Full Satisfaction Promised LONDON, August 23. The seven crew members and two passengers from the Dakota shot down on August 9, who were released yesterday, arrived at an American military outpost near Gorizia last night. All are reported to be in good health. Members of M. Kardelj’s Yugoslav mission at the Paris Conference* hinted Yugoslavia might defy America’s ultimatum. However, the seven members of the crew and passengers of the first American transport Dakota shot down bv Yugoslav fighters on August 9 have been released from internment at Ljubljana. One passenger, a Turkish captain, who was injured in the forced landing, is still in hospital, but is expected to recover. Two Hungarian passengers were also freed.

RELEASE OF AMERICANS PLAYED UP BY U.S. PAPERS (Rec. 9.50). NEW YORK, Aug. 23.The release of the victims' of the first two Yugoslav attacks on United States air transports was announced ’n New York with streamer headlines, which often were in postersized type. According to a New York Times Washington correspondent, the release brought visible relief to official tension in the capital. The Associated Press correspondent quotes one member of the crew as saying that the Yugoslavs accorded them “'excellent treatment”. TITO’S ATTITUDE Marshal Broz-Tito summoned foreign relations experts to join him at Bled, where he is meeting the United States Ambassador, Mr Richard Patterson, in connection with the shooting down of American planes. Yugoslav Army headquarters stated that two men who are reported to have parachuted from the second aircraft which was shot down in flames last Monday, cannot be found. People in the first aircraft were offered transport to the Morgan line. Those released are going to Trieste, accompanied by the American viceconsul at Zagreb, Mi’ Hohenthal. Marshal Broz-Tito said to Yugoslav workers: “However much certain imperialistic Powers may accuse us, we want peace—a just peace, not peace at any price, such as the peace wanted by those who wish to achieve imperialistic aims at the expense of peoples who sacrificed for the common cause all they possibly could. I do not wish to speak to Allied countries as a whole. I have in mind a minority which imposes its will on the peoples of those countries. The reactionaries in such countries want to misrepresent affairs.. They want to set their own people against those who want justice and peace. The question is one of true ' democracy against reaction. In no case is it a question of a struggle between East and West”. Yugoslav representatives stated unofficially that Yugoslavia would not be afraid to have the dispute brought before the Security Council. They were speaking boastfully, blaming the United States for the situation. Mr Byrnes in Paris, made contact With the Washington State Department several times to discuss the situation. ■ “’America is determined to have a showdown”, one correspondent says. “When it speaks to Yugoslavia, it is speaking to Russia”.

SOVIET’S PART The report of the airmen’s release, says the Daily Mail, topped off a day of tension and rumour in Paris and Washington. M. Molotov and M. Kardelj in Paris, “cut” the Peace Conference while they earnestly discussed the American Note in an antechamber of the Luxembourg Palace. The Daily Mail’s Paris correspondent says; Opinion is divided whether Marshal Broz-Tito was acting alone in tantalising America. The majority believe that Tito always had, and will have Moscow’s backing. Some reliable observers think the latest development is no more than a trial of strength dictated by Moscow to test Washington’s determination. The Daily Express, in an editorial, says: It is common knowledge that behind Tito is Russia and, in the interests of the Russians’ own good name, M. Stalin would be well advised to press Yugoslavia to modify its conduct. Tito and his friends are playing a most dangerous game. The world hopes that Yugoslavia will have the good sense to accede to the very reasonable American requests. Tito’s Assurance NO MORE FIRING AT PLANES (Rec. 5.5). LONDON, August 23. Marshal Broz-Tito' has submitted a reply to a written question by the Associated Press. He declared that Yugoslavia would no longer fire on United States planes, even if they flew over Yugoslav territory without a clearance. His reply read: “I have given the strictest orders to the Yugoslav Fourth Army Commanders not to fire on foreign planes, civil or military”. <

Communist Front OUT TO LOWER U.S. PRESTIGE (Rec. 9.5). NEW YORK, August 23. The New York Times, in an editorial, points out that Russia’s military, political, and ideological expansion is impelling the Communist Front to precipitate incidents against the United States throughout the world, these being done in the obvious effort either to induce the United States to withdraw, or so to impair American prestige that the nations’ will look to Russia rather than to Britain and America for leadership and protection. It says: “It is hoped that the present showdown will persuade Russia and Yugoslavia that the United States, while patient, is neither de-

cadent, as Hitler and the Japanese once thought, nor so innocent of the game they play as to suffer injuries through it forever”. LONDON, August 22. The United States is considering fighter plane protection for American transport planes flying near the Yugoslav border. Such a plan would retain the present ban against American flights over Yugoslav territory. Diplomats point out that the whole consideration is based on the point that the United States planes attacked might not have been ovei’ Yugoslavia at all. There was no official comment from The American authorities in Paris about the reports that America will in future provide fighter escort on the route from Vienna to Udine, but it is stated that America does not intend to abandon the route. BRITISH ATTITUDE A British spokesman at Paris said Britain was not joining in the American action, although British-Yugoslav relations were not good. At Athens the British Embassy stated R.A.F. planes used a stranded Yugoslav ship, the Kraljaleksander, for target practice. The treatment of the stranded ship vras the subject of a Note from Yugoslavia to Greece. The British Embassy admits damage caused to the ship, “under the mistaken impression that the ship was German, and past salving”.

TITO BLAMES U.S.A. (Rec. 9.5). LONDON, August 23. ' Marshal Broz-Tito, replying to questions from a correspondent, declared he thought infringement of Yugoslav frontiers had been deliberate. so as to create an impression among Yugoslavs that the forces of the United States Government were so overwhelming that the Yugoslav Government must take everything. He said: “The appearance of a Flying Fortress over Ljubljana a few days after the first United States plane was forced down was a pure demonstration of this”. THE CLIMB DOWN (Rec. 10.5). NEW YORK, Aug. 23. The Herald Tribune, in an editorial, says: “The American ultimatum has gained in significance, because the United States, in effect, is asking for a showdown, not merely with the Tito dictatorship, but regarding the whole existing international system. The reference of this dispute to the Security Council would force a searching review of the real basis of the existing order, a review from which, that order might not survive. However, the prompt release of the prisoners implies that Tito, and presumably the Kremlin at Moscow, are unwilling to make such a test. Ambassador Patterson, after seeing Marshal Tito, said he had promised to give “full satisfaction”.

Another Incident U.S. ARMY VEHICLE FIRED ON (Rec. 9.15). LONDON, August 23. An American army vehicle was fired on three miles outside Caporetto yesterday, says Reuter’s Trieste correspondent. Two shots pierced* the windscreen. The driver dismounted. He fired four times in the direction ot the assailants. Patrols* searched the area, without result. TRUMAN’S CRUISE IN ATLANTIC. HAMILTON (Bermuda), Aug 23, President Truman, is on an 18-day vacation cruise aboard the Presidential yacht “Williamsburg.” He arrived in Bermuda on an unofficial visit of at least a week. Mr Truman, when he went ashore to return a call by the Governor, Admiral Sir Ralph Leatham, was the first American President to do so while holding office. Mr Truman was driven south"by cold weather in New England waters, where he first proposed to spend his vacation. The Presidential Secretary denied knowledge of any intention by Mr Truman to meet one or more of the Big Three, as has been rumoured from Paris.