THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 1942 THE AMERICAN FORCES

New Zealand Herald, Volume 79, Issue 24368, 2 September 1942, Page 2

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 1942 THE AMERICAN FORCES

Now that public recognition has beep made of the welcome presence of American forces in New Zealand, no more time should be lost before hailing them as they should be hailed —officially, openly, enthusiastically. They have crossed dangerous seas to bear a part in the defence of this country and New Zealanders wish to hear expressed what they feel about these men and their great Republic. It should not be said as an aside by the Prime Minister in a radio talk delivered thousands of miles away, but proclaimed openly and directly to the men who have come to serve with us in our cause and theirs. What has been lacking publicly and collectively has been in part made up privately and individually. Citizens young and old have been glad to use any opportunity to extend help or hospitality to the Americans, to make them feel as much at home as men and women can feel when far from home. Apart from any question of the gratitude felt to a fighting and working Ally, this exercise of hospitality comes easily because New Zealanders are accustomed to regard Americans as first cousins, and still easier because they have found them all courteous, unassuming and open-hearted and most likeable in themselves. The peacetime American visitors—mostly tourists and salesmen never provided a true cross-section of America in the way the forces are doing. Their modest good nature and happy spirit has for many New Zealanders translated esteem for America into warm affection. Out of this feeling springs the very general desire to make the Americans' sojourn as pleasant as possible in what to them is a remote and foreign land. Individual hospitality and chance meetings and greetings may add up to a good deal, but many feel that the sum is not large or complete enough. So far as the exigencies of war permit, citizens would welcome and support a community effort to organise entertainment, hospitality and outings for the visitors. As much was contrived for other servicemen whose stay in the country was more fleeting. Citizens have no feeling that the Americans are outside and apart—quite the opposite—and wish to express the sense of community in a practical way. Many who are veterans of the last war cherish warm memories of the kindness shown to them in other lands, including the United States. They remember how these human contacts, organised or by chance meeting, lifted the horizon of heart and mind and increased the sense of sharing together for a common ideal. A frequently-heard remark made in admiration of the visitors' organisation is that "They've got everything." However true the observation may be in the material sense, the Americans would not be human if sometimes, divorced from familiar scenes, voices, customs and food, and temporarily accepting a new way of life and unaccustomed disciplines, they were not homesick. Far from feeling they have "everything," they must often sigh for the homespun that makes the very stuff of life. New Zealanders cannot supply that lack, but would wish for the opportunity to assuage it by making the visitors aware of their welcome. Americans may be fortunate that for the most part they are fighting the war far from their own shores. No doubt they prefer it that way. Yet it is eloquent proof of the vision and idealism of a great people that they are willing to make the cause of farthest humanity their cause and to set out to the uttermost ends of the earth to uphold it. Over a million men have already embarked | from the rich life of America to j serve overseas. They are to be found j at the Arctic circle in Iceland and Greenland ; occupying Pacific islands on the equator; returning to homelands in Britain and Northern Ireland ; defending the Antipodes of Australia and New Zealand ; up in ! the damp heat of the Solomons or j the damp chills of the Aleutians; I helping the Chinese in China or from ! India ; convoying supplies to Russia ; j reinforcing the Middle East through ; the Persian Gulf, Eritrea and Suez; J setting guards over Dutch territories I in the Americas ; helping to win the war in five continents and on the; seven seas, and in the air over them all. They are befriending the whole world, and helping redeem it with blood and toil. New Zealand salutes j the great-hearted American people and desires to make some small re-1 turn to their sons and daughters. I