". . . To American Editors"

"How the hell can editors and publishers be aroused to the danger of phony headlines?" brooded Nat Floyd, 38-year-old correspondent of the New York Times. That question burned in Texas-born Nat Floyd's soul while he was on Bataan, getting madder & madder as he read the Navy's mimeographed daily digest of the optimistic news from the U.S.--dogfights headlined as major victories, major defeats buried away in the corners.

Back in the U.S. last fortnight, after escaping to Australia by PT boat and bomber. Correspondent Floyd exploded over a new headline: VOLCANIC BLAST TERRIFIES JAPAN. It was about an eruption of Mt. Asama. As an ex-staffman on Tokyo's then--U.S.-owned Japan Advertiser, he knew Mt. Asama was in a sparsely settled region and "could do a double-Vesuvius" without exciting the Japs.

Last week Nat Floyd could contain himself no longer. Digging down into his dwindling funds, he forked over $275 to Editor & Publisher for a full-page ad, addressed "To American Newspaper and Magazine Editors." Excerpts:

"If 3,000 Chinese catch 300 Japs in a canefield and slaughter them, we leave out the numbers and hail Victory. I've seen more dead Japs than that on Bataan, in one bunch, and it didn't change anything. . . . How would it be to start playing war stories on their merit?"

"The theme for a long time has been 'We'll outproduce them.'. . . Then we skip over the killing part and talk about what we'll demand when we've won.

"With all my heart I urge you to stop and ask yourself how in hell we can win without killing Japs and Germans.

"In the name of their lives and freedom, don't keep on telling our people how good we are with unjustified emphasis in stories and misleading heads."

Correspondent Floyd said he had been slow to catch on to the main reason for optimistic headlines. "Now I know what it is. They write the heads to sell the papers." He did not mention that part of the reason was plain press ignorance of military matters.

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