Articles from 1941
The mass arrests of Japanese Americans began the evening of the Pearl Harbor attack:
“As the arrests began last night, Attorney General Francis Biddle announced that FDR had authorized him to apprehend as ‘alien enemies’, Japanese aliens considered dangerous ‘to the peace and security of the U.S.A. He said that at least 1,000 Japanese nationals would be affected, but there would be ‘a fair hearing for all persons apprehended.’ “
“The spy phobia possesses all inhabitants of Nippon. No one believes a foreigner can possibly be living in or visiting Japan for any simple reason such as business or pleasure. He must be in the pay of a foreign government. This entails a counterespionage system in which every Japanese joins with enthusiasm.”
Six months before Japan’s devastating assault on Pear Harbor came this article concerning how remarkable the Navy’s defensive measures were and how unlikely it would be if the installation was ever to be attacked. A large part of the article concerned how overwhelmingly Japanese the Oahu population was, and the many steps taken by the Army and Navy to keep them off-base. How terribly unimaginative of them to think that Japanese Naval Itelligence wouldn’t think to farm-out spying to an Englishman like Frederick Rutland – which they did.
“A German plane dropped a flare. Then the inevitable stick bombs followed and the Savoy [Hotel] trembled. I looked and winced. Two large fires were reaching up into the night. This dwarfed any Blitz I have ever seen. Still both incendiaries and high-explosives screamed down. The night was filled with noise – all of it frightening noise. And above the planes still roared. It was so light that the balloons could be seen clearly. Now and then there would come the rattle of machine gun fire, hardly heard over the crackling of fires and the noise of the bombs. But it told us that the night fighters were up there.”
“A German plane dropped a flare. Then the inevitable stick bombs followed and the Savoy [Hotel] trembled. I looked and winced. Two large fires were reaching up into the night. This dwarfed any Blitz I have ever seen. Still both incendiaries and high-explosives screamed down. The night was filled with noise – all of it frightening noise. And above the planes still roared. It was so light that the balloons could be seen clearly. Now and then there would come the rattle of machine gun fire, hardly heard over the crackling of fires and the noise of the bombs. But it told us that the night fighters were up there.”
“A German plane dropped a flare. Then the inevitable stick bombs followed and the Savoy [Hotel] trembled. I looked and winced. Two large fires were reaching up into the night. This dwarfed any Blitz I have ever seen. Still both incendiaries and high-explosives screamed down. The night was filled with noise – all of it frightening noise. And above the planes still roared. It was so light that the balloons could be seen clearly. Now and then there would come the rattle of machine gun fire, hardly heard over the crackling of fires and the noise of the bombs. But it told us that the night fighters were up there.”
After touring thousands of miles with a German press-pass throughout Nazi-occupied Russia, American journalist Hugo Speck (1905 – 1970) gave a thorough picture of the violence visited upon that land by both Armies:
“German-occupied Russia is in rags and ruins; huge sweeps of European Soviet territory have been systematically destroyed, partly by the Russians themselves and partly by the devastation of Stukas, panzers, guns and fire…”
Blaming it all on an “early winter”, Hitler ordered the volks on the home front to give their furs, woolens and long underwear to the German Army on the Eastern Front.
Even before the Home Front kicked into high-gear, the men who had been picked up in the 1940 draft were causing real problems in every area where a military training camp could be found. Knowing that the enlistments were soon to grow and these problems would be getting worse, the brass hats joined arms with the town elders to curb the drinking and whoremongering. The cure for these difficulties came in the form of the USO, which would be eatablished before the year was out.
A similar article can be read here.
“When most of Manhattan is sound asleep, the free-lance photographer Arthur Fellig (1899 – 1968) – better known as Weegee – begins his wide-awake work of catching the city’s nocturnal drama. Weegee sleeps by day and at midnight sets out to cruse the city in his car, equipped with [a] police radio and bought with the proceeds from crime photos. He earned his nickname through his uncanny Ouija Board ability to know about distant happenings and beat others to the scene.”
Click here to read more about New York City.
