Current Events November 26, 1943; Gen. Patton's Reprieve:

THIS WAS REPORTED TODAY NOVEMBER 26, 1943:
 The case of Lt. Gen. George S. Patton, Jr., versus a shell-shocked Army private is now being tried before the court of American public opinion;•
The case already has-been tried in private chambers, so to speak; and,a decision made by Gen. D wight D. Eisenhower and the war department. That decision was that both men  should remain on their Jobs because good generals, temperamental or not, are too scarce,.to be spared. so are good privates.

 Premier Marshal Josef Stalin announced in an order of,t;he day broadcast by Radio Moscow today that the Red army had captured Gomel, smashing the entire southern end of German defense . line in Russia. ,
Confirming an 'acknowledgment broadcast -'hours earlier by tha German DNB news agency that thair.
Nazi stronghold had fallen,  Staliin announced that Soviet troops occupied Gomel today.

 American troops smashed , a Japanese, counterattack on the Bougainville beachhead in an all-clay artillery
and infantry battle Monday,gaining new ground over the bodies of 104 enemy soldiers, it was disclosed
today.

      The Tucon Daily Citizen
                TUCSON, ARIZONA, FRIDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 26, i 943

  REDS WREST GOMEL FROM NAZIS

Whole End Of
German Main
Line Crushed
Soviets Penetrate
 German Line Up
   To 27 Miles
By ROBERT MUSEL
LONDON, Nov. 26. (U,P)—'.
Premier Marshal Josef Stalin announced in an order of,t;he day broadcast by Radio Moscow today that the Red army had captured Gomel, smashing the entire southern end of German defense . line in Russia. ,
Confirming an 'acknowledgment broadcast -'hours earlier by tha German DNB news agency that thair.
Nazi stronghold had fallen,  Staliin announced that Soviet troops occupied Gomel today.
The fall of Gomel came as Russian armies, smashing westward irt a new offensive north of the city, broke through the German lines to reach the. Upper Dnieper river on a broad front.
Stalin's order of the day said the Nazis«were driven from Gomel by a bold outflanking thrust executed)
by Gen. Rokossovsky's armies by their continuing offensive toward
the Polish frontier.
The collapse of Nazi resistance in Gomel, main southern anchor of. their line in White Russia, had
been foreshadowed for days as Red! army tanks and infantry closed in on the city from all sides— cutting
off all but one narrow escape gap to the northwest.

 American 45th
Division Joins
Italian Battle
Famed Southwest Force
  Operating Now With
          Fifth Army

 LULL IN ACTIVITY

Planes Knockout Road
    Network Behind
        Nazi Lines
 By NOLAND NORGAARD
ALLIED HEADQUARTERS,
Algiers, Nov. 26. (UP)—
The American 45th division, once part of the seventh army of'-Lt. Gen. George S. Patton, jr., in Sicily /has been in action with, the fifth army in Italy, it was as Allied units counterattacks
along a generally" unchanged front.
The impact of the "fighting 45th," one of the most colorful divisions in the American Army, helped roll back.the German tide when, the Salerno bridgehead appeared likely to be overrun in the early critical period after the first. landing, it was disclosed.
The division, made up largely of troops from Colorado, Oklahoma and New Mexico with a' sprinkling
from a • number of Eastern and more than 1,000 Southwest Indians is rated in army circles.as one of
the toughest and hardest. hitting outfits under the flag. It made its battle debut in an amphibious assaults
against Sicily after only a brief-pause in North Africa.
                                              Nazi, Airforce Strikes
The German air force joined ground forces in determined attacks yesterday against 'British gound forces in determined attacksyesterday against 'British is securely bridgehead carved' 0ut  British Eighth Army forces: now securely entrenched in the bridgehead carved out from  the bitter defense line across the flooded Sangro.near Italy's Adriatic  shore.

Bouganville
Yank^s Break
Up Jap Drive
  And Then Gain-New
Smash Counterattacks
          Ground
By BY.DON C. TAWES
ALLIED ' 'HEADQUARTER?,
: Southwest,;'.' Pacific,
Nov. 26 (U.P) —.
American troops smashed , a Japanese, counterattack on the Bougainville beachhead in an all-clay artillery
and infantry battle Monday,gaining new ground over the bodies of 104 enemy soldiers, it was disclosed
today.  The .enemy dead abandoned on the .field, brought Japanese losses in ground fighting at Empress Augusta bay since Nov. 1 to at least 104 Gen. Douglas MacArthur's spokesman said, while another 4,000 have been killed in sea and air .warfare, including 'a battle Thanksgiving day off the north end of Bougainville in which four enemy destroyers were sunk and a fifth damaged.
                                                   Yankees First Bombarded
Japanese troops'trying to reduce the beachhead on the western coast of the island attacked after long
aerial and artillery preparation. The enemy used field pieces up to 75 millimeters but met replies from
heavier U. S. guns.

 Army Mishandled Publicity
On Patton, General Belief
Public Worries Now If Policy To Continue;
Ask 'Is Such Secrecy Justified'?
BY JAMES MARLOW AND GEORGE ZIELKE
WASHINGTON—(&)—
The faltering way in -which the story of Major General George S. Patton's head-slapping episode became public has brought into focus two sharp questions on the War "Department's policy of giving news to the American public:
1, To what extent—and for how long—Is the department justified In hushing up an unpleasant episode on grounds that publication might give aid and comfort to the enemy?
2. Are there other instances—or will there be—of the same kind of news strangulation Involved in the Patton story?
A central point at Issue is what is "security" and what isn't. Nobody has contended that the army or navy should make public any Information when its publication would threaten the. security^ of the nation or the lives of protect the Interests of the country, feel obligated to make known as much Information as it's possible to tell.
Here is the background of the Patton incident:
On Aug. 10. during the Sicilian campaign In which he commanded- the hard-hitting Seventh army,
Patton strode Into a military hospital, consoled wounded troops, and saw a shell-shocked soldier
sobbing on the side of a bed, when the soldier told Patton the front-line shelling had cracked his nerves, Patton slapped the man on the back of the head, called him "yellow," and ordcrctl him back to the front. Hospital attaches Intervened, General Dwlgbt D. Eisenhower heard of the occurrence, rebuked
Patton. The latter apologized to the soldier, the hospital staff and his troops--- in the hospital.
                                                      Held.Value To Enemy?
Newspaper correspondents covering the Sicilian Invasion got the story. They were told by Elsenhower
that army censorship would not stop their sending It back to----

Firiday November 26, 193                                     TUCSON DAILY CITIZEN Page 7
 War Chiefs Feel Patton Is
Punished Enough- For Error
 By HAL BOYLE
ALLIED HEADQUARTERS, ALGIERS, Nov. 22. (Delayed)—(AP)—
The case of Lt. Gen. George S. Patton, jr., versus a shell-shocked Army private is now being tried before the court of American public opinion;•
The case already has-been tried in private chambers, so to speak; and,a decision made by Gen. D wight D. Eisenhower and the war department. That decision was that both men  should remain on their Jobs because good generals, temperamental or not, are too scarce,.to be spared. so are good privates.