WAR CRY OF THE FREE

Southland Times, Issue 24332, 13 January 1941, Page 5

WAR CRY OF THE FREE

SINGING SOLDIERS OF AUSTRALIA democracy laughs AT DICTATORS (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright) (Received January 12, 8.0 p.m.) NEW YORK, January 11. The New York Times in an editorial says: “It is not merely a picturesque detail that the Australian troops in Africa went into battle singing the chorus from “The Wizard of Oz ” It is hard to get a song from a soldier retreating, or from one not knowing quite wha the is fighting for. The Australians made a noise because they sensed victory, not just the immediate victory in a desert skirmish, but, beyond today’s horizon, the great final victory. “They were formidable troops in the last war. Perhaps, they are more formidable now. In a wide new country, free from the narrower customs of Old England they are yet loyal in heart to the English tradition. They have grown tall and rangy in spirit as in body.

Such is the gift of the Colonial to the Motherland. In Britain we have seen the same spirit miraculously born. Dangerous in battle it creates a new frontier in which there are new pioneers. Distinctions of rank and wealth have lost their sanction. “He who believes so firmly in his cause that he can charge with gaiety into the valley of death, carries the seeds of the future. There is no spark of this splendid mirth in any dictatorial army. This is a war cry of free men,' this is the laughter of democracy at Mussolini. The singing troops that took Bardia carried an immediate threat that the Hermit of Berchtesgaden would have done well to listen to. Their song was meant for his ears.”