World Battlefronts: Amazing and Fearful

Two months had passed since Mussolini’s fall. Now Winston Churchill had come before the House of Commons to give account of the blood and tears it took to score this victory, to warn of the sacrifices yet to be demanded, to make bold and confident prophecy.

To hear him, all who could pushed their way into the House. They sat in the narrow, uncomfortable balconies, squatted on the floor, endured stoically the stale air loaded with the aroma of codfish served to the M.P.s during a recess for lunch, and warmly cheered.

Into his 14,000-word 125-minute speech Churchill crammed the treasure of facts saved up during his six weeks overseas. Into it he packed drama, the finely chiseled word, the sense and feel of history which are his. He had not come to apologize or to defend himself. Rather, he had come in triumph: “I cannot recollect,” said he, “anything so complete and prolonged as the series of victories which have attended our Allied arms in almost every theater.” He proclaimed progress in Anglo-American relations with Russia (see p. 38), but his speech was largely a report on “this amazing and fearful world war.”

Second Front. The previous night a crowd of Second Front advocates milled before 10 Downing Street, and Churchill must have been mindful of it when he said:

“I call this front which we opened first in Africa, next in Sicily and now in Italy the third front. A second front, which already exists potentially and which is rapidly gathering weight, has not yet been engaged. . . .

“On the day when we and our American allies judge to be the right time this front also will be thrown open . . . and a mass invasion of the Continent from the west . . . will begin. . . . The present Government will never be swayed … by an uninstructed agitation. . . .”

Third Front. To the front he called third Churchill gave nearly a half of his speech. He rigorously defended the planning and execution of the Italian landings, said that Salerno was a gamble which came off: “The possibility of a large-scale disaster could not be excluded . . . [but] results show the enemy has been worsted. . . . [We have won] an important and pregnant victory.”

Of the future in his favorite area of strategy and action, the Mediterranean, he said:

“We are prepared to place large armies in Italy and to deploy a wide, active fighting front against the enemy . . . and to maintain the offensive . . . with increasing weight and vigor, if need be throughout the autumn and winter and beyond.”

Fourth Front. By inference, Churchill again promised full British participation on the fourth front to which the Allies will have to dedicate themselves when Germany is crushed—the Pacific front against Japan. He laid heavy stress on Japan’s losses in shipping (see p. 36) and aircraft, adding: “In both these vital respects . . . the strength of the enemy must be considered a wasting asset.”

Air Front. Churchill briskly argued what Russia denied: that the Allied air offensive had effectively hampered the Germans on the Russians’ first front. Said he:

“There has been an enormous diversion of the German energy from the war fronts to internal defense . . . and the offensive power of the enemy has been notably crippled thereby. …”

But he definitely discouraged any hope that bombing alone may knock out Germany this year; indeed, he thought that the Allies would be lucky if they achieved a decisive air blow by next year’s end.

He said:

“.The continued progress of Anglo-American preponderance . . . opens the possibilities of saturating German defenses. … If a certain degree of saturation can be reached … we shall create conditions under which . . . the actual methodical destruction … of the enemy military target . . . will become possible.

This destruction … is not necessarily beyond our reach even in 1944.”

Sea Front. His account of the war at sea was the brightest yet: “. . . For the four months which ended Sept. 18 no merchant vessel was sunk by enemy action in the North Atlantic. . . .”

Brain Front. Churchill also revealed what Allied airmen have known for some time: that the Germans have brought against U.S. and British bomber formations a new type of weapon — “a sort of rocket-assisted glider which releases its bombs from a height and is directed toward its target by a parent aircraft.” He did not add, but London heard, that other “surprises” had been detected in Western Europe’s defenses. Clearly, the Prime Minister in his hour of triumph was not forgetting that all the blood and tears have not yet been shed.