Weather
Fair and Warmer.
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3attop
Editorial
Ayres Unjustly
Treated By Press . . .
VOL. LII. No. 134 ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN, THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 1942 Z-323
PRICE FIVE CENTS
I
Sikhs Reject
Brit1sh Offer
Of Post-War
Independence
Majority All-India Group
To Make Final Decision;
Chances For Passage
Are Considered Slight,
India Wants Khan
For Defense Head
BULLETIN
LONDON, April 1-(IP)-Pandit
Jawaharlal Nehru and Gen. Sir
Archibald Wavell, British com-
mander for India, have arranged
to meet for a talk on control of
Indian defense, said a dispatch
late tonight from New Delhi to the
Daily Herald.
NEW DELHI, India, April 1.-(iP)-
The Sikhs, warriors of the Punjab,
and the extremist Mahasabha group
of Hindus tonight rejected the Brit-
ish plan for Indian post-war inde-
pendence, and all India awaited
tensely the decision of the Majority
All-India Congress.
In the light of expectations that
the working committee of the Con-
gress would turn down the plan be-
cause of British insistence on con-
trolling India's war-time defense,
there was an increasing awareness of
the consequences of failure of Sir
Stafford Cripps' mission to this sub-
continent.
The deepest impression was made
by strong comment of the British
and United States Press, pointing out
that if Indian leaders, by bargain-
ing, cause the plan to collapse, In-
dians will forfeit the good opinion
of the United Nations.
Congress Adamant
Yet it was doubtful whether such
warnings would be enough to change
the Congress Committee's attitude.
The average Indian nationalist
seems bewildered by what he regards
as failure of Britain and the United
States to understand his point of
view on the need for an Indian de-
fense councillor.
He argues that only an Indian can
rally the country and he asks what
objection there can be to placing the
defense portfolio in the hands of an
Indian like Capt. Sir Sikander Hyat
Khan, premier of the Punjab, which
provides the present bulk of Indian
troops.
The prevalent attitude in both the
Congress and the Moslem League is
that Hyat Khan is intelligent enough
to take advice and guidance from
Gen. Sir Archibald P. Wavell, Bri-
tain's Commander in Chief for India.
Even the moderates led by Sir Te
Bahadur Sapru, one of Britain's best
friends in India, feel this way,
Britons Glum
Today's first definite minority re-
fusals, auguring ill.for the success
of Cripps' effort to align India firm-
ly behind the Allied war effort, were
received glumly by Britons, and the
press sounded solemn warnings that
if the plan were scrapped, nothing
could be done until the war ends.
The Sikhs, numbering 4,500,000,
turned down the program through
their all-parties committee for fear
they would be placed at the mercy
of the Moslemn majority of 13,500,000
in the Punjab.
Ideal America
Is Nec essary,
Declaring that a clash with en-
trenched capital and its philosophers
is inevitable, Prof. Mentor Williams
of the English department told mem-
bers of the Student League of Amer-
ica last night that only a functional
democracy will achieve a decent post-
war world.
He stressed that an ideal America
would be founded on bases of com-
plete social, economic, and political
democracy, and constantly reminded
his audience that the winning of the
war would not insure or even imply
internal improvement.
Most dangerous enemies of this
ideal America, Williams emphasized,
were not mere tools like Father
Coughlin and Rev. Gerald L. K.
Smith, but the selfish capitalists who
inspire their activity. He laid at the
hands of these same men, the pres-
ent campaign against labor and in-
dustrial uncooperativeness in the vic-
tory effort.
In the decent post-wa'r world which
Williams honorl we mirrIt finally
Jap Siege Of Toungoo
Broken In BloodyBattle
Stilwell's
Enables
Masterful Direction
City's 'Lost' Garrison
Of
To
Chinese Armies
Slash Way Out
By DANIEL DE LUCE
WITH THE CHINESE ARMY ON THE TOUNGOO FRONT, Burma,
April 1.-(A)--Under the incessant week-long blasting of Japanese dive-
bombers and artillery, a Chinese garrison has slashed its way out of encir-
cled Toungoo, forded the Sittang River and rejoined the main Chinese
armies in a bloody withdrawal action personally directed by Lieut.-Gen.
Joseph W. Stilwell with all the shrewd serenity of a chess-master.
This is the story of the fiercest battle yet fought in Burma:
The Japanese aiming north toward Mandalay encircled Toungoo a week
ago. The Chinese garrison (reported by Chungking to have numbered 8,000
men, against 40,000 or more Japanese) was cut off from all aid but stuck to
shallow trenches and pits with ma- ---
chine guns and rifles, staving off re-
peated assaults.
General Stilwell, the lean, gray
American commander of all Chinese
forces in Burma, brought his armies
from the north in an attempt to
raise the siege.
Convoy Breaks Through
For five days the counter-attack
continued, but only a single convoy
of ammunition got through to the
Toungoo garrison. Heartened by this
help, the men fought on.
By Sunday, however, it became evi-
dent that Toungoo could not be re-
lieved. Lack of air support was a
vital factor.
In short-sleeves, calmly smoking a
cigarette in a black holder, General
Stilwell went into a huddle with his
Chinese aides, his fluent Chinese
audible above the clatter of nearby
machine guns.
He then flashed orders by radio to
the Toungoo garrison to be ready to
crash through the Japanese lines at
a specified point on the northeast.
Feints To Southwest
He moved his relief forces in a
southwesterly direction, drawing off
considerable Japanese strength to
meet his feint. The British Imperials
in the Irrawaddy Valley farther west
also began an attack to divert as
much Japanese pressure as possible.
Yesterday, the scene was set and
the Chinese in Toungoo dashed from
their tree-screened positions out into
the open.
The Japanese artillery laid down
a blanketing fire, but the Chinese
scattered and pressed on, splashed
and swam across the Sittang under
point-blank shelling, and reached
the sanctuary of the farther hills
through fields littered with Japanese
dead.
Chinese Are At Nangyun
Now the Chinese lines stand 12
miles north of Toungoo, around the
smouldering ruins of the Nangyun
railway station, which is a half-mile
west of the Burma Road and five
miles south of Yedashe.
(In a somewhat similar situation
on the Irrawaddy front, the British
announced they had accomplished a
withdrawal, mauling the Japanese
at Shwedaung, 10 miles south of
Prome, and rejoining their main de-
fense line to the north. As in the
Chinese case, a British communique
said Japanese air superiority was a
telling factor.)
Fall Speaks For Itself
As the first big-scale test of the
Japanese and Chinese armies in
Burma, the final fall of Toungo
speaks for itself, but the issue might
have been different if the Chinese
forces now available had been able
to reach the scene at the start of the
Japanese encirclement maneuver.
General Stilwell, who brought up
every man he could as quickly as
possible, came to the front in an
American armored scout car with
First Lieut. Carl Arnold, one-time
los Angeles music instructor, and
Sergeant Francis Astolfi, of Wilkes-
barre, Pa.
Both carried sub-machine guns,
but they had no occasion to use
them, because the Chinese sur-
rounded Stilwell with a strong escort
of their own.
Grad Awards
Are Presented
Dean Yoakim Announces
Scholarship Winners
Dean Clarence Yoakum of the
Graduate School yesterday an-
nounded the following recipients of
annual graduate school scholarship
awards:
Special Awards: Betty Margaret
Robertson, Brooklyn, N.Y., $600 from
the Emma J. Cole Fellowship; Ruth
Eyles, Atlanta, Ga., $350 from the
Albert Euclid Hinsdale Memorial Fel-
lowship.
Three persons were anounced win-
ners of the F. C. and Susan Eastman
Newcombe Fellowship: Solon A. Gor-
June Induction
Will Draw On
Feb.16 Group
Draft Heads Indicate Some
May Be In Army Camps
As EarlyAs Next Month
WASHINGTON, April I.-(U)-
Draft headquarters served notice to-
day that some of the men who regis-
tered on Feb. 16 may be summoned to
the training camps in May, and that
June most probably would see a por-
tion of them in the service.
Those who registered on that date
were men between 35 and 44 inclu-
sive and those who had become 20
and 21 in the recently preceding
months.
The intent of the Army regarding
this group was made plain in a Selec-
tive Service order to all local draft
boards. They were told to start class-
ifying the new registrants immedi-
ately and prepare to fill the June call,
and possibly the May call, in part
from them.
This clarified an uncertainty as to
whether these men would be lumped
with the earlier registrants and be-
come subject to early call or whe-
ther the Army would exhaust the
first group before tapping the second.
The method of coordinating the
two groups is to be explained in de-
tail in a later announcement. As re-
cently outlined, the plan is as fol-
lows: after the men have been class-
ified, a local board determines how
many from each group are 1-A. If it
has, for example, sixty 1-A men from
the first group and 40 from the
second, all calls form the Army for
new men are filled 60 per cent from
the first and forty per cent from the
second.
"Local boards," the Selective Serv-
ice Headquarters announcement said,
"were instructed to start classifica-
tion at once of the several million
men who enrolled on Feb. 16, and
to prepare to fill the Army's June
call for men, and possibly the May
call with these registrants and regis-
trants from the first age group."
Dance At Union
Will Represent
ForeiganLands
University students are invited to
join their fellow students who are
natives of foreign lands and dance
to the music of Bill Sawyer and his
orchestra at the annual International
Ball which will be held Friday, April
17, in the Union Ballroom.
One of the most colorful events
during the university year, the Inter-
national Ball will donate all of its
proceeds to the Emergency Fund for
Foreign Students. Many of the for-
eign students attending the all-cam-
pus dance dress in their native cos-
tumes.
The ball is being sponsored by the
newly formed Interclub Board of the
International Center. This board in-
cludes representatives from all the
clubs and cultural interest groups
meeting in the International Center.
Decorations for the dance are being
designed by Eduardo Salgado, Spec.A,
one of the most eminent of Filipino
artists. He has had exhibitions of
his paintings in many of the leading
art centers of the United States.
Daly's XMeloramua
Will (Tiiin in e 1 un
"Under the Gaslight," Augustin
Daly's old-fashioned melodrama of
the '60's, will be presented for the
second time at 8:30 p.m. today in
the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre un-
der the auspices of Play Prodiu ction
Great Clash
Is Foreseen
For Russia
Offensive Will Determine
Result Of Spring Battle
Along Soviet-Nazi Front
Entire Line Locked
In MovingConflict
LONDON, April 1. -()- Bitter
fighting now under way in the Don-
ets Basin on Russia's southern front
was reported tonight to be gradually
developing into a titanic clash which
ultimately may determine the out-
come of 1942's warm weather opera-
tions on the entire Russian-German
battlefront.
Dispatches from both Moscow and
Berlin indicated that the entire front
from Leningrad to the Black Sea now
is locked in a see-saw struggle, with
both the Russian and German High
Commands moving masses of reserves
into the central and southern zones.
In view of this, London observers
find it difficult to'predict that either
side could develop any lightning
spring offensive.
Rather, they preferred to view the
current action in the Donets Basin,
where the roads are now drying
steadily, as pivotal fighting holding
the key to the entire warm weather
situation for the remainder of the
year.
The side winning the advantage
here is expected to prevail.
Germans Counter-Attack
Incessant German counter-attacks
to recover lost ground and relieve the
encircled Nazi sixteenth army in the
Staraya Russa sector on the north-
western front are stressed in reports
from Stockholm.
These reports state that the be-
leaguered German force, which orig-
inally numbered 100,000 men, has
been cut in half by methodical Rus-
sian bombing and artillery fire.
Tonight's Moscow communique told
of a number of successful operations
on the Leningrad front in which
about 3,000 German officers and sol-
diers were annihilated during the past
two days.
A Russian drive to close a pincers
movement on the strategic town of
Vyazma from the north is believed
to have advanced further with a
Soviet announcement that 12 vil-
lages on this northwestern front had
been recaptured within 24 hours.
Meanwhile the Moscow radio broad-
cast to the people of Vitebsk, only 75
miles from the Polish border, that
their hour of liberation is "not far
off."
Russians Widen Advance
London observers interpreted the
northwestern front advance and the
radio announcement as an indication
that the Russian High Command was
strengthening and widening the arm
of their westernmost advance on the
north of Vyazma.
This line extends back to Rzhev,
which the Germans still are holding
doggedly. Any extension of it with-
out a substantially guaranteed chal-
lenge to the Germans north and
south of this spearhead will place the
Russians in a precarious position,
London observers believe.
These observers watched the south-
ern front action, however, as a more
trustworthy forecaster of what warm
weather, dry land fighting is to bring
everywhere in Russia this summer.
The fronts farther north still are
presenting what amounts to a con-
tinuation of the Russians' winter
successes
Feminine Designer Drafte
Who Planned Uniform
(By The Associated Press)
WASHINGTON, April 1-Army of-
ficers shy off discussing it, but a
woman clothing consultant has been
called in to help military designers
with a problem in er-er-feminine
unmentionables that they overlooked
in thinking up snappy uniforms for
the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps.
The Army, which prides itself on
Aviation Board
Checks Students
For Air Corpsa
Examinations To Continue
In Health Service Today
For Prospective Fliers
Twenty-five students were exam-
ined for enlistment in the U.S. Air
Corps yesterday in the opening day]
of a three-day examining period nowa
being conducted in the Health Serv-
ice Building by the Sixth Corps Area
Traveling Aviation Cadet Examining
Board.
Further examinations will be given"
at 9:30 a.m. and at 12:30 p.m. today
and tomorrow, and all students in-
terested in Air Corps enlistment, es-
pecially those who intend to enlist at
the end of the semester, are urged
to report at one of these times.
A former requirement of two years
of college work has been waived,
Lieut. George R. Comte, public rela-
tions officer, has revealed, and stu-
dents may be accepted for flight
training upon successfully passing
the examination.
Ground officer candidates will still
be required to present the educational
requirements, however, and are asked
to bring their academic grade tran-
scripts with them when they apply.
By applying for enlistment at the
present time, students may avoid the
rush which will mark the end of the
semester and still get deferment until
that time, Lieutenant Comte said.
April Fool Pranksters
Don't Fool City Police
"Crack-pots" ,.that's the label
police tagged onto April Fool prank-
sters yesterday who called in the
morning's small hours to report a
broken water main which didn't exist.
Too smart for the pranksters, pol-
ice checked the phone calls and
closed the case when they found the
complaints came from University
rooming houses.
One gas station attendant called
the police for an explanation when
someone gave him a five dollar bill
with George Washington's picture on
it.
d To Save Faces Of Men1
, 'Forgot' Other Items
being prepared for any emergency,
was naturally considering designs for
the girls uniforms, so the latteri
couldn't claim "they hadn't a thing
to wear," if and when the bill setting
up the Auxiliary Corps is finally
passed by Congress.
But, it has leaked out, the design-
ers overlooked the fact that women
wear such items as girdles, panties
and bras. Nor did they remember
night gowns or pajamas.
The rumor is that the subject
came up when some woman inquired
if the soldierettes would b issued
girdles. It's said that this resulted
in some hasty red-faced conferences
in high ranking Army officialdom.
When the generals got to discuss-
ing it, it was realized that it would
be difficult for the dough girls to
buy their underthings out of their $21
a month.
This prompted other worries. Army1
designers really have been trying to
fashion a uniform that women would
"just love to wear." They probably
had visions of women, used to wear-
ing tea-rose satin nighties and pink
sheer panties, declining to volunteer
because they didn't like the under-
wear.
It was enough to make strong men
shudder! It was no time at all until
some strong male remarked it was
past time to call in feminine help.
What is being decided in the way
of underthings is something of a
military secret. The best that can
be learned is that they likely will be
of cotton. Whether the soldierettes
will get girdles or have to get curve-
control by exercise is also in the dark.
Farish Admits
Hiding Rubber
Process Details
Standard Official Keeps
Manufacturing Methods
From 'Full Disclosure'
WASHINGTON, April 1. -UP)-
The president of Standard Oil Com-
pany (New Jersey) acknowledged to-
day that the company failed to give
all information about its synthetic
rubber processes to a Navy represen-
tative in 1939 but contended that
the company did furnish "everything
the government could make practical
use of."
W. S. Farish, Standard president,
made his statement after Senator
O'Mahoney (Dem.-Wyo.) had chal-
lenged his testimony that Standard
gave "full information" to the Army
and Navy "covering Standard's syn-
thetic rubber activities."
"When you testified that you were
making full disclosure," O'Mahoney
asserted, "as a matter of fact you
were not."
Farish protested O'Mahoney's con-
clusion, asserting that the company
had given the Navy's representative
"everything that he was interested
in."
Assails Navy Plans
"The Navy was not, as I under-
stand it," Parish told the commit-
tee, "interested in the manufacture
of the product but in its possible use.
"The idea was to see if this rub-
ber had such properties that the
Navy would be interested in using it."
"It was your judgment and not the
government's judgment that governed
the disclosure," O'Mahoney asserted
during the exchange.
O'Mahoney raised the point in con-
nection with a letter, taken from
Standard's files and read into the
record last week by Thurman Ar-
nold, anti-trust chief, indicating that
a Navy Department civilian employe,
identified only as Mr. Werkenthin,
had visited Standard's plant in 1939
in search of information.
No 'Complete Picture'
Farish said that Werkenthin visit-
ed the plant "at the request of our
people who were working with the
Army Generals Embarrassed;
Girls' Uniforms Lack Dainties
U.S. Resistance Stiffens
In Philippines As Japan
Gains Ground In Burma
Enemy Attack On Bataan
Defeated As Americans
Wipe Out Supply Bse
Australia Mobilizes
Full Armed Might
(By The Associated Press) f
American resistance was rising last
night in the Philippines, Australia's
mobilization was reaching the peak
of urgency, and only in the Burma
theatre was the Japanese eneny mak-
ing progress of consequence.
Successive War Department com-
muniques told of the defeat of a
major enemy attack on General
Wainwright's main line on Bataan
Peninsula, Luzon, and reported two
audacious and highly successful
American-Filipino raids on the Phil-
ippine Island of Mindanao far to the
south.
There one body of troops struck a
Japanese supply base near Digos
and burned 22 enemy military ware-
houses to the ground, while native
Sulus thrust to the very center of
the Japanese-occupied city of Zam-
boanga, destroying machine gun nests
and other enemy positions, killing
many Japanese and withdrawing
without losses to themselves.
Hand-To-Hand Fighting
On Bataan, some American out-
posts had to withdraw a short dis-
tance under heavy enemy assaults
which were subsquently checked in
violent hand-to-hand fighting with
the loss of no material American
position.
Moreover, as the accent remained
on American military action, the
Navy announced that U.S. Naval and
Army forces had now destroyed or
are presumed to have destroyed a
total of 28 Axis submarines, the bulk
of them in the Atlantic. Three of
these sinkings were announced dur-
ing yesterday.
(Donald Francis Mason, the Naval
enlisted pilot who recently "sighted
sub, sank same," has done it again,
it was anno'unced Wednesday, and for
his unprecedented double success has
been awarded the equivalent of a
second Distinguished Flying Cross
and given an officer's commission).
New Australian Draft
All single Australian men from 18
to 45, and the married as well be-
tween 18 and 35, were called up for
immediate military service and the
toughest kind of war training was put
into effect under the general super-
vision of Generalissimo Douglas Mac-
Arthur and the personal direction of
his right hand for all the Allied
ground forces, Gen. Sir Thomas
Blamey.
While these determined prepara-
tions went forward, Allied bombers
rode the southern skies again in a
continuation of their strong and
thus far successful counter-offensive
against the enemy's invasion bases
on Timor to the northwest of the
mainland and New Guinea to the
north, and their successes against
enemy aircraft within the last three
days were thus tabulated:
Four planes shot down for certain,
18 destroyed in all probability, 11
known to have been damaged, for a
total of 33.
Bomber Sets Record
In Atlantic Crossing
LONDON, Thursday, April 2.-(1)
-An American-built four-engined
Liberator (Consolidated) bomber has
flown 2,200 mile's fromNewfoundland
to Britain in the record time of six
hours and 40 minutes, the ferry com-
mand announced today.
The new time of 400 minute
eclipsed by exactly one hour the
trans-Atlantic flight record set three
months ago by a young English pilot.
The Liberator pilot averaged 330
miles per hour,
The bomber command said that
the record was due "to a combination
of the qualities of the airplane, an
exceptional tail wind, and magnifi-
cent navigation."
Norwegian Ships
Flee Swedish Port
STOCKHOLM, April 1.-(P)-Ten
Norwegian ships berthed in Sweden
since the German invasion of Nor-
Yours Almost For The Asking:-
Civil Service Jobs For Students
Easier To Get, O'Rourke Says
By GEORGE SALLADE
Chances for the appointment of
any college grade students to a fed-
eral civil service position are im-
measurably greater today thaii at any
time in the past, Dr. L. J. O'Rourke,
director of research for the United
States Civil Service Commission, told
a guidance and occupational infor-
mation conference yesterday in the
Rackham Lecture Hall,
The war has increased the demands
for more personnel, he said. Any
senior graduating from the Univer-
sity ought to be able to secure a job
in either government or industry
easily. Particularly scarce are econ-
hours after their names come up in
the placement lists.
Dr. O'Rourke stressed the fact that
students should attempt to fill jobs
that are essential to the war effort.
He explained also that government
employment does not guarantee de-
ferment from the draft. The Presi-
dent has ruled that government serv-
ants will not be deferred for more
than six months unless their service
is indispensable. Persons who have
not been employed at least six months
will not be granted any deferment,
In other sessions of the conference
openings for men and women in de-
fense industries were discussed by
John Haien, of the Chrysler Corpora-
tion, and Thomas P. Garrity, assist-
ant director of vocational training