"Weakness Can Promote Nothing"

Sirs:

... A strange piece of news is the serious controversy over the peacetime draft. No one wants war less than I or any other soldier, but I can't believe that anyone, even the most cloistered educator, believes that greatness is a by-product of weakness. Power can be used to promote either a great evil or a great good, but weakness can promote nothing.

Until the nations of the world understand each other better there are bound fo be times in the future when the rights and liberties of America will be questioned. ... So until the millennium is at hand our best insurance for peace is the national strength to maintain it. That means every man in our country should be ready to pick up a weapon and use it. ...

In the past our education has lacked certain important elements. One of these is a program to impress the young man and woman with a sense of responsibility to the national society. ... If it were simply taken for granted as part of our educational scheme that every man devote a year of his life directly to the nation, not only would we keep ourselves in fair national physical condition but we would have presented our people with at least one common experience, one duty common to all. From the rich playboy to the sweating coal miner, each man would have this one tiny hook on which to hang a personal understanding of the other man. At present there is none--to the intense weakness of our nation. . . .

CHARLES C. BRADLEY Captain, U.S.A.

% Postmaster Seattle

No Rest for the Weary

Sirs:

For the last seven or eight years I've read your publication. Today I considered giving it up. Every issue leaves me in a troubled, confused state of mind. It's too intelligent, too thoughtprovoking. It insists on reminding me of our world responsibilities.

Why should I worry about Poland, the starving Greeks and Italians? Why should I have an uncle in occupied Germany, and two young brothers who will probably stay behind to guard Japan? The U.S. has become too great, too powerful for an average G.I. like myself to grasp what it's all about. . . .

Tell me, honestly, don't you think I should rest my weary head and discontinue reading TIME? [ARMY SERGEANT'S NAME WITHHELD]

% Postmaster New York City

P:Honestly, no.--ED.

Mt. Suribachi's Flag

Sirs:

In the many stories written about the famous flag-raising on Mt. Suribachi it has never been said where the flag came from. I have that story in two letters from my son, Ensign Alan S. Wood, U.S.N.R., communications officer on an LST, and I thought you might be interested in it:

"The second time we hit the beach at Iwo the marines were taking over Mt. Suribachi. When they raised a little flag on top of the mountain, the marines on the beach cheered. A little later a marine came on board asking for a larger, flag, so I gave him our only large flag--which is the one pictured on the first page of TIME magazine last week [March 5 3:= We are-proud that it is our flag flying there.

"The now famous flag was one I ran across one day at Pearl Harbor while I was rummaging around the salvage depot.-It was in a duffle bag with some old signal flags--probably from a decommissioned destroyer or destroyer escort. It looked brand new. and was folded neatly.

"It seems funny, now that I look back. . . . One might say that that flag was carried from a salvage heap at Pearl Harbor to the bloody heights of Iwo as a symbol of the American fighting spirit to avenge the disaster of Pearl Harbor."

(MRS.) H. RANDOLPH WOOD Sierra Madre, Calif.

Patton's Wounds

Sirs:

In "24-Star General" [TIME, June 18] you say: "on his left sleeve, five overseas bars and four wound chevrons." Patton's ''wound chevrons" are World War I vintage overseas service stripes (bars were authorized for World War II to avoid confusion). Wound stripes, authorized in. World War I, are worn on the right sleeve. Wound stripes are not authorized for World War II; instead, the Purple Heart is given.

T. O. BLACK Major, A.U.S. Arlington, Va.

P:Right is Reader Black. To TIME'S U.S. AT WAR Editor and researcher, three scallions on each sleeve.--ED.

Our Ally China

Sirs:

Permit me to say that "Our Ally China" [TIME, June 18] by Congressman Walter Judd of Minnesota is one of the most concise and factual presentations of our ever-present China controversy that has yet appeared. TIME, of course, would be the one to have it first. It should be reprinted and offered to anyone for discussion and presentation of the facts, to help achieve better unity and understanding if we are to avoid another great war.

RICHARD D. PEARSALL

Long Beach, Calif.

Sirs: There seems to me to be something monstrously unfair in allowing such a loud mouthed champion of the reactionary Gov ernment in Chungking as Dr. Judd to pre judge the case of the government officials arrested in Washington on what appear to be political grounds. Those are four precious pages that you gave Dr. Judd, and I am sure all of us TIME readers would have preferred to have you use that space for a report from the better informed and less-biased Theodore White. In our view of China, we obviously have the choice between Judd and White. Is there any question on who's the better American or the better reporter

WALTER AMORY Brewster, N.Y.

Sirs:

Thanks very much for Walter Judd's clear picture of the situation in China. It is unfortunate, indeed, that our men overseas cannot listen to Walter Judd rather than to Burton K. Wheeler. Some Americans may disagree with Judd; some may think his view of the Yenan Government unfair. But the important point is that Judd's convictions are based on reason; Wheeler's merely betray an old man's emotional unfitness to serve his country.

DOUG KELLEY Chicago

Martyr McGee?

Sirs:

.. . When the news of Pvt. Joseph McGee's sentence [TIME, June 11] was aired in the newspapers, the "bleeding hearts" of the nation raised a mighty sob that one of "our boys" should suffer for having struck a Nazi. And these same ones are most thirsty for the blood of the prisonkeepers in Germany who dealt out brutality to Allied prisoners of war. When is a crime not a crime? When it is committed by a conqueror?

Much of my own reaction to the McGee affair is based on the fact that this man has been a soldier since 1939 (and the fact that he has clung to his original grade is fair evidence that he has transgressed before against Army rules). I cannot help thinking that a bully has simply been permitted to get away with a fairly serious crime. After the great uproar, it may even be that he considers himself something of a hero and martyr. . . .

[ARMY OFFICER'S NAME WITHHELD] Camp Blanding, Fla.

P:The hunch is correct. Pvt. McGee's Army sentence for striking the German prisoners was his ninth. When he slapped them, he had just returned from 46 days AWOL. The Army chose not to court-martial him for that.--ED.

Word of Praise

Sirs: From a mere soldier, a combat infantry man, one of many millions, a word of praise to the gallant staff of TIME for its unfaltering accuracy in reporting the news.

Our armies, divisions, generals, and our men have been heaped with praise in the publications of our country. The foot-slogging infantry, the air corps, the marines, the Navy, the WAC, the defense worker, in fact, any one who has had anything to do with winning the war has been weighted down with acclaim.

Yet, somewhere in all this acclaim there is something definitely lacking. TIME, for one --which has battled magnificently to give the public a true picture of the news, through censorship, through everything -- has not received all the credit it deserves.

The account of the Battle of the Ruhr illustrates well the accuracy of TIME'S report ing. As I read the account of the battle I had the feeling of reliving some of its humor --yes, humor -- its coldness and its bloodiness.

Mention of little (what appear on the surface as insignificant) occurrences give an otherwise lifeless report blood, thereby making it vivid. TIME'S method is inimitable.

TIME'S accuracy in reporting is only one of the many reasons why G.I.S peruse TIME from cover to cover. That's why TIME turns up as one of the most dog-eared magazines over here.

Let this unknown voice, one of the millions, bestow upon TIME the coveted medal of Accuracy in News Reporting for distinguished service in the African campaign, the Sicilian campaign, the Italian campaign, the Normandy invasion. Southern France, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Germany.

This letter is addressed to the Editor, but it is more than that. It is to everyone: the office boy, the proofreader, the executive, the advisory member, to all who help put out this fine magazine every week.

(Ppc.) REG B. CHRISTENSEN

% Postmaster New York City

< Mauldin v. the Stars

Sirs:

Along with Mauldin [TiME, June 18], I have chased the war from Sicily to Germany, and every mile has been the lighter because of him. But you have missed the reason why G.I.s are so fanatically for him. I bitch and the other tired old men around me bitch, but we feel that none of the brass ever hears any of it. And that makes it all seem even more futile than it is. But we know that Mauldin hits home where we can't. Maybe General Patton has only seen two, but every squawk. from him, from Base Section General Wilson, and some of the old-line R.A. Colonels--that makes the next five miles seem like only four! And when General Eisenhower backed up Mauldin against all the stars--well, after that, Ike was our man. Through Up Front we can bitch to the men we want to listen. [SERVICEMAN'S NAME WITHHELD] Westhampton Beach, N.Y.

Sirs:

. . . My highest praise to Mauldin, one of the great reporters of this war, whose efforts may conceivably help stave off future conflict.

DOUGALD MACMILLAN Chapel Hill, N.C.

Hold for Release

Sirs:

In TIME'S Pony Edition [June 4] I read a letter saying that the gentlemen of the U.S.A.A.F. are very much concerned with the marriage of Gloria Yanderbilt di Cicco to Leopold Stokowski.

Now, boys, let's be reasonable. After all, a philatelist won't stop collecting the latest editions of postage stamps after getting hold of a Mauritius, or an) other ancient stamp. You stand a good chance of being collected when "it's over everywhere." So far, you have not been issued . . . yet.

MICHAEL I. YARENICK

Special Agent, C.I.C. % Postmaster New York City

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