TllYO _...,_.._ The story of the B-29 attack on Tokyo is almost twenty-four hours ol d , but it r e mains the exciting new of the day. Brigadier Gener a l O'Donnell of the Twenty first Bomber Command, who led the fo m ation, reports that this historic attack on the iikado's capital was a complete s u c c e s s . - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ~ The B-29s went in without any fighter protection whatsoever. Each plane, we learn, carried more than ten tons of bombs. There were more than a hundred Superforts on the raid, so they dropped altogether, on Tokyo, more than a thou ■and tons of explosives. The biggest raid that land-based bombers have ever made in i~t the Pacific theatre of war. Among the targets they hit was the important Nakajima aircraft factory in the western part of the city. And photographs taken by reconnaissance planes show th G t fires today were still burning in the central part of Tokyo. Gene r al Arnold, as Commander of the Twentieth Air Force, reports smoke risin at great heights in all the industrial a reas of ~okyo. The Japanese radio claimed that the fires were small, confined to civilian bo~es and hospitals. Ho ever, the airmen took photographs as they bombed. And these show no fewer than six fires in another aircraft factory, one of the most important that make the J ap plan as. The Japanese say they shot down three of the Superforts. On tbat General Arnold say~notbing. A correspondent of the United Press, who rode in one of the giant planes, reports that there were perfect bo■bing conditions. Be safs that General O'Donnell took Tokyo by surprise. Also, that the big bombers were flying at a ai■ height where only a few Jap interceptors could climb to reach them. And, that their ack-ack fire •as inaccurate and spotty. The airmen got the~r first great thrill when they saw the snowcapped peak of Mt. Fujiyama, through the clou•a; shortly ~ efore noon. By eight minutes past twelve the target was in sight. ThEf spotted a stadium TOlYO =-l -- and a r a etr ck, then g roups of factory i•• buil d ings. Presently ov e r the interphone communication came the cry - "two fi g hters at ten o'clock. 9 Th a t was the first re p ort they h ~1 d of enemy interceptors. There were others under them that couldn't climb high enough, and some ten tho~•and feet below the B-29s. At twelve minutes past noon the bombardier in the correspondent's plane called out - 9 boabs away!" Or whatever the latest Pacific slang phrase is that the airmen are now using. They saw the gray walls of E ■peror Hirohito's moated palace, jut after an observer reported that the bombs were right on the target. As they turned to go back to base the flak was more intense, but didn)t touch the planes. *ith a one-hundred and twenty knot tailwind, they raced back to Saipan. The ten ton ■ the B-29s carry ie/more thah twice the wei g ht ihe hu g e Britiah Laniaster hauls on a miss ion over Ge r many. ==- - TOKYO - If._ -- 1h e B - 2 9 s also t a k1along one hundrd and sixty dru ms o f g a soline contai n ing fifty gallons apiece, eight thousand gallon ■, as much ••Jta as the load of a full tank car. --o - - In a special re p ort to the President, General Arnold as Chief of the Twentieth Air Force, reports that thill operation was not a mere hit-and run- raid., but a calculated extension of our air power. And~ he added that this is juat a beginning of the systematic demolition of Japan's war production. He didn't say exactly how many of the big planes made this trip. but the inference is that there were more than a hundred. --o-- " T he att a ck was almCBt. as much of a triumph f'or 1.be engineers a s f or the p ilots and crew of the bombers. For it w as the engineers who built the hu g e base that made the raid p ossible. For sev e ral months they've been du mp in g coral, w orkin g furiously! until some of the a irfiel d s have as much a s seve}l.m1les of run w ays. Al~o today we le ar a for the first ti e of the existenceof the 21st Bomber Command under Brigadier Generd Heywood Haasel ,Junior. InNew York tonight there is a proud young man, seven-year-old P a trick O•Donnell, t~e Brigadier General Emmett V•Donnell's boy. He said he was glad Daddy had bo ■bed the Japs, but hopes they didn't hurt Sumi, a maid who used to work for the O•Donnels in pre-Pearl Barbor iJ days. ADD TOKYO -------- Tokyo is the third largest city in the world. The systematic raids that General Arnold proposes will be just. as important to the war effort as the bombing of Ber in. For Tokyo is the industrial and nerve center of the entire Japanese empire. tr James R. Young, author of the Road to Tokyo..., says we have to th ink of it as being »l:lfM;l;II larger than Philadelphia, Detroit or Chicago. Downtown are modern buildings but the outlying districts at the northeast, south and west are jammed with hundreds of thousands of wooden houses with paper doors and windows, In two sections are tens of thousands of fire trap buildings and small factories.1PThere are forty-one fire stations in the ikado's capital, wagon but not a book and ladderA•••**•" that can reach more th an three stories. Superficially it is a modern city. But from V . Y7 eo .e12c 'it- the ~ -ideal target or ADD T O KY O - 2 --------- ••8•f ma g n e sium b orn s , incen d aries,and, d emoliti o n explosive s , o f a l l k in d s. It is an easy place to bomb because on one side is a b a y w ith two large rivers, many canals and an elevated railroad. ••• You cana\.t mask any sizeable bodies of water so that they can.:.t be seen even from high up in the a1r. On the other hand if the tide goes out at noon, when the superforts roared over fro m Saipan,the canals would be useless as a water supply. And • if the reservoirs were cut . . it would shut off the main pumping station so that the city's fire h y drants •••ii would go dry. A conflagration in Tokyo would have a more severe effect th a n any raid on Rotterdam, Cologne, or Berlin. And if the bridges •ere blasted m•• whole communities ~ o u ld be trapped. A ccordin g llj says Jimmy Young, the B-29s ~ chan g ed the s trategy of our war in the Pacific • •••• ~ ~ that not enough of the big B-29s are " being turned out. 4JriHn.eLhis on the authority there is a definite lag in production. And the fact to blame for ta■ it all i• tkaixk as he puts it •disappearing employees•. Too aany aircraft plants ~•••4"• taking days ~ have been resigning • • workers in -.J- off •~ too many In the Philippines a Japanese convoy was on its way bringing reinforcements to the enemy garrison on Leyte. A formation of Uncle Sam's carrier-based bomber fighters c~ught thea northwest A .. .J of Leyte,Asanl two transports, and a destroyer with • all bands. They also set another tranbport on fire aad forced it to beach on abore:-tf"MacArtbur reports Wl~•PRAI that our plan;a¼ii'1at lea1t f'ou~thousaad- fi,re-bundred J a p ~ ~ ~ the nu■ber o f ~ ~ A ~ soldiers kill,d at sea 1since October twentieth, up to fifteen thousand. Our planes UiYe boabed the f••• Jap ships at one of our planes was mast-top height and 1•* not ~ 0 •• loat. 11 fftey destroyed forty-two Nipponese planes. CBIIJ. - In spite of the important Japanese victories in China a s okes m an of the Chinese aray today said tlllt be himself w as o p timistic. Although the lip p onese are consolidating the positions they«•*' captured near Liuchow, and they've China cut in two, this sanguine Chinese spokesman claims that the Jape will be unable to start another offensive for two or three months, because their lines are so extended they'll have to take time out to get ready for further aoves. Tokyo, however, reported today that the Mikado's armi• on the mainland have pushed aore than a hundred miles west of ~i• Liuchow, captur'1an important railway ,._ station, end will soon be in a position to isolate _ JliliJll_f.BQII From the Western Front tonig~t ~ the dramatic news that American infantry have -•gun the •watch on the Rhine•. They joined up today with the Seoond French Armored Division, under General Jacques LeClerc at Strasbourg. They have wiped out practically in ten per cent of the city. onight the tri-color -1£j- flies · from~ spire of the great cathedral of , Straab ourg. / - --- --- ------ One of the surprises in the capture of this hiatoric place is that the Nazis have ••••x■aiJxaal■xl■ not been able to destroy eit~er t\\~\~\\ge or the two railway bridges leading eaat across the Rhine, But the •till hold the west end of all those bridges, ana the French and Americans are attacking ferociously. The enemy ■till boids a circle of old forts around the city. So their mortars and machine guns are able to interfere considerabl' with the movement in the streets. Nazi guns froM the Siegfried Line across ta river are shellin g the center of Strasbourg • • The credit of capturing the city belongs to · the Sixth Army under General Jacob L. Dever. Just one hundr e d days have past since DeYer•a divisions left their boats in the Mediteranean and fought their way north through France along the aaae route that Bapolean traveled after his escape from Elba. One aonth ago, the lazi High Coa•and announced boasttull7 tbi'Dever and kai his Sixth Army was through for the winter. Be was through to the extent that in the last ten days be bas advanced sixty ailes, alich of the tiae through a blinding snow stora. 0 In the Saar District, Patton's men have advanced still further, capturing towns and villages as they go/ and approaching closer to Saarbrucken. / ~-_z-:-:-:o - fierc~t fighti along · he /' / is the no t:b where hine. be left ing capture fou1/ the J"'r PLANE -- / British and Americans alike are baffled by the m1stery created by one of our flying fortresses. on Tuesday afternoon it came down from the skies out of the West and made a perfect landing in a plo114td field near gun positions of the British Second Army. A coapany of Tommies promptly rushed to the plane and ••i* · waited for the crew to ctt ■ e out. They waited, and no crew came out. Then they went closer, investigated and found not a soul in that big airship. Neither were there any muddy tracks leading from the flying fortress to show that anybody h~d left. The gre a t bomber was badly battered by flak. The 11yatery is bow it couldhave aade such a perfect landing with no one at the controls. ROSSI,! -- Estoni a now is co ~ ple t ely freed of the German .s 7oke. Marshal Stalin announcet th a t the Baltic armies have driven the last remaining Nazis from the island of . • l Saare, someti ~es called Osel,in the Gulf T be \re II nan ts of the garrison~ driven J\ One advantage it releases seventy-Yi for use elsewhere. . ...::.:,...:::.:.11.:.a------ is that forces The battle is now on for Latvia. n the western the part of the country the Baltic armies have*•• remains · of A I thirty German di vis ions trapped on the Courland Peninsula. , The Red air force has sunk one German destroyer and three other vessels in the Baltic. · In addition, they have damaged a heavy cruiser ana several other warships. ~oscow also reports that the armies of . the Ukraine hav e captured several places in Hungary · and also in Czechoslovakia. P resident Roosevelt today put an end to the reports th a t he proposed to continue lend lease to our Allies after the war. In a message to Congress be told the lawmakers that not only lendlease but reverse lend lease should stop as soon as the war is over.But he added that the partner■ bip of the United lations should not only continue but should even grow stronger to make sure·that the peace endures. Be reported that reverse lend lease from Britain and the British Dominions bad contributed much to hastening the victory over Germany and Japan. Without it we should have bad to toatpon~ _the 1 in;asion of fort # t ~ u N ~ Franc~many months. ~ have needed to build a thousand~ . *~•••••• ships to send across th~Atlant1c the supplies #alldta--t ~ that the British provided. /'Great Britain and the British Dominio n s provid~d more than three billion, three hundred and twenty-eight million dollars worth of reverse lend lease. '!hat is about one-third of the I p(.-/-tt:w,~ lend lease fro'.11 us to the A British Empi r e. Th e re was an uproarious scene at Ottawa in the Canadian house of Commons today. A member of Prime Minister Mactenzie ting's own party bolted to the opposition with angry words. He is Wilfred LaCroix, member for a Quebec constituency. Be joined the two other Que~ec Liberals who bolted last night. Lacroix declared that the Prime Minister had been treacherous to the people of Quebec. Shortly · after he bolted, the Priae linister announced that his Air ■ inister, C. G. Power had resigned on that aame issue, the issue of conscripting Canadians for 0Yerseas service. BONDS -- From the Pacific comes an appeal to ua •• ~•• i.e ■e k~ft'lt. to buy mor e bonds and make the Six th-War- Loan--dri ve a complete suoces..13. Ad11i al Spruance, Command er of the Fifth Fleet, .,.ye iha+. if we ape, t., liaiab tbis •1r within a P c; aaoaaele time we 11u1t con\ ia,ue ~o receive t~e ge•al euppe1t ef the AmePiean peoplt. Vioe Admiral Lockwood, Comman!er of the Pacific Fleet Submarine force, -aaid t.be euoceaa of t.be ari••~a - N11a+..1a:.::;a11rant. .. e a ap1147 retu»a of oar l:a&a _ 4,._ t.heir IMiaN_. Vice Admiral Calhoun, Commander of the ,.._ IJR~ ~ -et[. • ~ - - ◄- Pacific Fllet Service force, ,r,•••• ha•e • r-e-t. . . : ; ( ~ ~ p • e ~ b t l - J help eu,- t.Jie weapoa■ •• .fay 'tie~u,, t bey pre•eat» iafl at ton, !:Dd--- ~he7 pile up :to~ N a " " " . o.i 8 a~•inge which wili ena:lie- •• to bu7 t.9' .. ailahle-.r The C .I.O. convention at Chicago today registered ~ resolution a protest a a inst the free~ of wages. The ~••tl , also said several t ings about the T/ar Labor Board.~ The delegates a--1.&e a dopted a resolution calling for the absolute ma••*••* destruction of Bitlerite Germany and the Japanese Militarists, no negoiated or soft A peace. Today it became clear that the strike of taxi drivers in Seattle is a revolt against David Beck, Vice President of the Teamsters Uaion. le have beard a lot about Beck in the last couple of years, of the charges that he is in some respects the Tirtual ruler of the Pacific Northwest, how he has \brewers,/ ~~•r prevente~•z••••z)\ from~Pacific States from ~~~ bringing thei~c•~ nto the state of Washington. rThe striking hackmen are independent drivers, •ostl7, and have kept the employees of the chain taxi companies off the street. Their grievance~ is that the union baa favored the drivers for the big taxi companies. David Beck who is in Bew Orleans at the Convention of the American Federation of Labor sent them a telegram, ■zai■I ordering them to go bacr,o work. The strikers retaliated•by asking the Se~ttle police ABIIY_ - A•• There are now eleven million, eight hundred and flft7-nine thousand men in the armed forces of the 0nited States. So we hear toda1 from Major General Ber1ae1, Director of Selec~ive Service. Of those, aore than eight million are in the army alene. Besid . e ■ the ■en there are one hundred and eightJ-nine thousand women in the services.