LATE NEWS

Southland Times, Issue 24338, 20 January 1941, Page 6

LATE NEWS

AMERICAN AID TO BRITAIN No Thinking In Terms Of Dollars (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright) (Received January 20, 2 a.m.) NEW YORK. January 19.

Colonel Frank Knox, Secretary of the Navy, in an address at the Canadian Society’s banquet referred to the war as an “irreconcilable conflict which must be fought to a finish.” He said that the United States must furnish aid to the democracies without thinking in terms of dollars and cents. “At a time when the very fate of our kind of world hangs in the balance we must not let the British lack dollar exchange or halt the flow of materials to Britain,” he said. “We cannot afford to halt now and bicker about trade. The magnificent fighting spirit of the British—amazing to her friends and devastating to her enemies—must be maintained. There must be no thought that v. hile they fight with their lives a battle so vital to us, we are thinking in terms of dollars and cents.” Colonel Knox said Britain had done more than put cash on the barrel for munitions and supplies already received; she had paid American manufacturers a total of 550,000,000 dollars in excess of the cost of materials delivered to her. This amount was expended by the British to pay for lands, buildings and equipment in the United States to manufacture war materials. He added that only the timid and thoughtless would propose a negotiated peace. The United States must not, and would not, permit the defeat of peoples fighting on land and sea and in the air the battle for freemen everywhere.

“To assume that even if Britain were defeated we would still be free from invasion whenever the German conquerors felt the time was ripe to garner the loot of the greatest treasure house in the world is to be guilty of most colossal, inexcusable self-deception.” he said. “We cannot retain our self-respect and haggle over the terms of the help which we lend the British, Greeks and Chinese when they are baring their breasts to the storm of battle. Our sole hope of avoiding involvement in the world-wide war now in progress lies in the hope that we may become so strong by land, sea and air that aggressor nations will be afraid to attack us. While we are thus making ourselves strong, shall we not lend every possible aid to those who are gallantly holding the lines while we prepare?"

CAPTURE OF FRENCH SHIP (Received January 20, 2 a.m.) RIO DE JANEIRO, January 18. The British naval attache, Captain D. S. McGrath, has confirmed that the French ship Mendoza was captured this morning by an unidentified British ship outside Brazilian territorial waters. It is believed that the Brazilian Government is convinced that the capture occurred outside territorial waters. Hence there will be no Brazilian protest. SWANSEA ATTACKED (Received January 20, 2 a.m.) LONDON, January 18. Swansea was the main objective in Friday night’s raids. The attack started soon after dark and lasted until earlymorning. The usual procedure was followed—first fire bombs, then explosives. A number of persons was trapped when a heavy calibre bomb crashed on houses and shops in a sou'.h-western j town. A woman and two babies were killed. Those trapped were later rescued.

A threatened large scale attack in the West Country petered out in the face of the heaviest gunfire heard in this area. British night fighters harassed enemy raiders, both in south Wales and the West Country. It is believed that they broke up a big formation and considerably reduced the scale of the attack on Swansea.

Five bombs fell in a residential district on the outskirts of London today. Children playing in the street near where one came whistling down threw themselves on the ground and afterwards resumed playing. A bomber flew over the East Coast this morning and machine-gunned a train. COMMUNIST PARTY’S ACTIVITIES LONDON, January 19. The Sunday Express reports that the Government has decided to take action to stop treasonable activities of the Communist Party, which will probably be proscribed and dissolved as a result of a deliberate campaign to cause disaffection in war factories.