Refugio Timely Remarks (Refugio, Tex.), Vol. 13, No. 25, Ed. 1 Thursday, April 17, 1941 Page: 7 of 8
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“It’s a pretty safe rule that
the fellow who agrees with every-
thing you say, is not worth talk-
ino* n_A "A/T cx crcx
By General ARED WHITE
© A. WHITI WHO SERVICE
(Continued from Last Week)
and they are doing it.
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THURSDAY, APRIL %7, 1941
REFUGIO TIMELY REMARKS
Page Seven,
m
INSTALLMENT FIVE
THE STORY SO FAR: Col-
onel Flagwill, acting chief of
G-2, U. S. militapr intelligence
department, estimatel there
were 200,000 European troops in
Mexico preparing for an attack
on the United States. Posing
as Bromlitz, an American trait-
or captured in Paris, Intelli-
gence Officer Benning went to
Mexico City, where he was un-
suspectingly accepted as an of-
ficer by Van Hassek, leader of
the foreign armed forces in
Mexico. Firxcke, another ene-
my officer, soon took him into
his confidence. Benning was
joined in Mexico City by Lu-
nette Ducos, a French spy, who
told him that Bromlitz had es-
caped. He returned to Wash-
ington after learning Van Has-
sek’s plans for an invasion of
the United States. Acting on
the basis of this information
the President sent an ultima-
tum to Mexico demanding an
immediate explantion of the for-
eign troops on her soil.
Uow continue with the story.
CHAPTER VI—Continued
“I read a news flash on the
President’s ultimatume in the San
Antonio papers last night before
I took off for Washington, sir,”
Benning said. “If my opinion is
worth anything, Coloney Ruiz will
merely stall around in a play for
time. He’s controlled wholly by
Van Hassek.”
“We’re getting ready to mobil-
ize the army and National Guard,
Benning.” Flagwill rubbed a tor-
mented hand across his brow.
“Gad, what a headache if- it final-
ly comes to that!”
“We’ll be lucky if we get any-
thing mobilized before Van Has-
sek hits us,” Benning predicted.
“I mean if we wait much longer.”
“Wait? Wait? What else can
we do but wait? The people just
simply refuse to believe we’re vul-
nerable, Benning. Late yesterday
a prominent senator dressed down
the President for sending an ulti-
matum to Ruiz. Said the present
troubled time is not one to rock
the boat—intimated the President
was playing politics. The press
gave that statesman almost as
much space as it gave the ulti-
matum. But now you get busy
and type out your report in detail,
Benning. General Hague has
called a General Staff conference
for 8 o’clock. Hague has been at
his desk constantly since your re-
port came in yesterday—no one
around here has had any sleep.
I’ll b back as soon as possible.”
Benning dictated to a confiden-
tial clerk his report covering his
movements and observations from
the day of his arrival in Paris.
This done, he reproduced from
memory the Van Hassek opera-
tions may with its numerous sin-
ister red arrows indicating points
of possible invasion of the United
States by a major land force sup-
ported by warships and aircraft.
Colonel Flagwill came in from
staff conference, his face gravely
tense.
“What’s fretting the President
is his next move. G-2 has can-
vassed public opinion throughout
our nine corps areas and finds the
public isn’t very much excited
over the Mexican situation. The
President’s ultimatum stirred up
more curiosity than alarm in the
country. Too many newspapers
treat the matter apathetically, or
question the vigor and finality
which the President went after
Rpiz.”
' A stenographer brought in Ben-
ning’s complete report and Flag-
will seized it avidly. His brows
met as he came to the scene in
Van Hassek’s quarters at the Pa-
lacio Nacional.
“You say, Benning., you saw a
black flag with crossed sabers
with your own eyes—and all the
officers saluted it?” he asked
sharply.
“Yes, sir.”
“You didn’t tell me that in your
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been showing up in Europe among
the armies of the Coalition Pow-
ers. It’s also been reported in
Tokio and China. Reports have
leaked out that the militarists are
rallying behind that flag, hell-bent
on taking matters in their own
hands if necessary. Of course,
that’s a subterfuge for Coalition
governments to maneuver behind
while they keep up a pretense of
peace negotiations. But the pres-
ence of that flag in Van Hassek’s
headquarters is highly significant.
I’ll take your report at once to
General Hague.”
Benning spent the morning and
afternoon checking over the G-2
reports on complications and de-
velopments the world over. Notes
of ambassadors, consuls, army and
navy ataches in foreign capitals,'
and summaries of press clippings
all reflected the unrest and tension
that gripped the world.
Europe continued a maelstrom
of rumor, Germany, Italy, Spain,
and their allied Balkan states were
shut off by rigid censorship. On
the plea of internal necessity they
had closed their frontiers to for-
eigners, denied aliens all use of
mails and wire communications.
Similar action had been taken by
Japan. Unverified reports came
from China of heavy troop con-
centrations north of Shanghai to-
gether with concentration of
transport fleets. Russia had
drawn off to herself behind an
unbreakable curtain of censorship.
Diplomacy admitedly had broken
down the world over, fretted cap-
itals waited in the grip of fear
for the next moves in a world gone
mad.
Only in the United States was
there tranquillity left, a lack of
fear and tension. G-2 reports gave
the same story from over the
country. There was lively inter-
est but little tension. War was
something on remote horizans, iso-
lated by broad seas. America
wanted nothing to do with it,
wished only to be left alone with
her peaceful intentions. Therefore
no harm could come. The war
scare was jingoistic poppycock
promoted by militarists in their
quest of heavier appropriations
for armaments. Just as though
recent millions pledged to them
were insufficient. As for those
mercenary troops in the Mexican
army, our own army could gobble
them up in a jiffy if they were
senseless enough to start any-
thing.
During the day Benning saw
little of Flagwill. Endless staff
conferences were being held, the
whole War and Navy Departments
a beehive of strained activity. A
new plan was hot in the making,
a tortured, impossible plan, out
of which the best must be drawn.
It was a plan to meet the one
emergency for which the United
States was wholly and utterly un-
prepared, the emergency of sud-
den invasion.
At Fort Sam Houston, on the
outskirts of San Antonio, Lieuten-
ant Colonel Bart, Corps Area G-2
Chief, received a disturbing bit of
information late in the day. Short-
ly after sunset a formation, iden-
tified as bombers, had passed over
the Rio Grande at a point west of
Brownsville, headed north.
Bart had telephones the villages
of Kingsville, Gregory, Skidmore,,
Beevill and Kenedy to the north
of the border, in Texas, without
picking up any further report of
the flight, from which he con-
cluded that the bombers must have
taken out across the Gulf of Mex-
ico.
He had alerted Galveson :
New Orleans, but as the evening
passed no reports came from these
cities. Neither Kelly Field nor
Randolph Field had any planes
out. A query to Washington
brought the response that no
American bombers were known to
be in the lower Texas region 1
along the Gulf of Mexico.
The reported bomber expedition
had followed a series of reports
during the afternoon that had put
General Brill and the whole corps
area on the jagged edge. A Mex-
ican had brought into Laredo the
report that heavy motorized divi-
sions were spending the day in
screened bivouacs in Coahuila and
Nueva Leon.
Half an hour later came news
from Colonel Denn that was not
to be ignored.
“Four flights have passed over
Laredo within the past 15 min-
utes,” Denn said. “If my ears
know an American plane these
were not American. They were
headed about due north, and trav-
eling high and fast.”
General Brill calmly made his
own estimate of the situation.
Parked in the grounds of Fort
Houston were the 1,600 shining
new truck of the Second Division,
together with the division’s mate-
rial and supplies. The Second,
alerted and, with ail leaves sus-
pended, was in barracks and camp
ready for emergency. At Kelly
and Randolph Fields, nearby, were
the planes and supplies used in
training a small new army of pi-
lots for the expanded air service.
“Have the Second Division get
their trucks out of here as soon as
possible,” he directed his chief of
staff. “They’ll also disperse their
artillery. Notify the mayor of
San Antonio and suggest that he
have all lights cut off. Notify the
flying fields of our information.
Notify Eagle Pass and Fort Bliss.”
He paused to receive another
report from Bart.
“Six',, Third Army Headquarters
just called in from Atlanta.
They’ve a report from Charleston
of bombers flying high over that
city at 10:17 o’clock, heading
north by east.”
Outside there was orderly com-
motion. Troops were pouring out
of barracks and bivouac camps ____
already, the first drivers were j t0 the°sky from the "69th’s search-
whine of higher-powered engines
far overhead.
The 9th Anti-Aircraft Artillery
had got its guns in position, but
was withholding its searchlights
pending development. Suddenly a
small plane zoomed down over the
garrison and dropped a flare that
turned night into day.
Brill stood calmly observing. He
knew that flare was the first vio-
lence of an invasion of the United
States. He knew that in a few
minutes the bombers would circle
over their target of Fort Sam
Houston and let drive. He knew,
too, that there was nothing he
could do to prevent what was to
follow.
A hissing shriek caught his ears.
Invountarily he raised himself on
his toes and placed his finger-tips
at his ears. A savage flash of
yellow flame leaped from the
earth into the heavens. The ground
under him shook with volcanic in-
tensity from the savage wrath of
a heavy bomb.
Long fingers of light leaped in-
moving their trucks out of the
fort.
Another report from Colonel
Derm. The colonel’s voice now
crackled with intensity. One of
his intelligence scouts , disguised
as a Mexican peon, had the word
from friendly Mexicans that a
heavy motor column was moving
north from the vicinity of Palo
Blanco. Another column was re-
ported moving by night through
Tamaulipas toward Brownsville,
and a third was said to have
passed Mesquite, in Coahuila,
headed in the direction of Eagle
Pass.
An hour later the Second Divi-
sion’s trucks, filled with men, were
whirring out of the fort; rubber-
tired artillery was shifting its
light and medium cannon out of
the zone of possible danger.
An aide, whom General Brill had
sent out into the garrison to ob-
serve, burst into headquarters,
breathless, his face stripped of
color.
“Sir, airplanes!” he panted.
Flying high—but you can hear
them coming!”
General Brill left his staff at
their allotted jobs and went out-
side with his aide. The garrison
was dark, headquartex-s worked be-
hind drawn shades.
The roar of motors filled the air
as trucks and artillery continued
to roll out of the garrison. But
above that he caught the sharp
lights. A heavy demolition bomb
detonated in the field from which
the trucks were whirring. Brill
caught, in the momentary flash of
light, the grim tragedy of shat
tered men and material. Above
the din he heard the cries of
wounded men. Another bomb
crashed and another. His anti-
aircraft regiment began crack-
ling, but his handful of gxins were
almost lost in the din of titanic
thunder that crashed from the
sky.
Incendiary bombs rained down,
bringing an irresistible heat that
ate its way into all combustible
parts of barracks. General Brill
turned back into his headquarters,
sat down at his desk stricken by
his utter helplessness, but main-
taining his self-control.
His staff, their bloodless faces
drawn and lined, worked coolly,
outwardly oblivious to the danger.
Information kept coming in, re-
ports that had to be appraised
until the whole picture of attack
and disaster had been assembled
and appraised as the basis for
whatever later action was to be
taken.
The wooden hangars at Kelly
Field were in flames. Randolph
Field was being hammered. San
AntoAio was in a mad panic which
had got out of all police <
People were f
rushing about
their efforts
Roads were choked with passen-
ger vehicles.
But the Van Hassek bombers
were confining their major fury to
Fort Sam Houston and the flying
fields,, which told General Brill
that the attack presaged a cross-
ing of the Rio Grande by mobile
troops during the night or at day-
break.
From New Orleans and Galves-
ton came reports of raids that
were still in progress. Hundreds
were killed in the streets. No
other details.
Shortly after midnight the vio-
lence suddenly ceased, the bomb-
ers and their accompanying at-
tack ships sailed off to the south.
Colonel Denn called in again from
Laredo. The head of a motorized
column had halted at Nuevo La-
redo just south of the Rio Grande.
His intelligence patrols had veri-
fied this with their own eyes.
“All right, gentlemen,” Brill
told his taff. “Get the Second
Division together as quickly as
possible and start them moving
south toward the Nueces River!
Tell General Mole of the Second
I’ll meet him at Kirk in three
hours with his orders for the de-
fense of San Antonio. Get Gen-
eral Hague on the long-distance
again while I report. We’re going
to do our best in a desperate sit-
uation, and I needn’t tell you what
we’re up against- I’ll be ready for
your recommendations in an hour,
gentlemen.”
(To Be Continued)
-*1*--
BOMBS DESTROY
CHURCH OF PILGRIMS
London,—The 17th Century Con-
gregationalist Pilgrim Fathers,
Memorial Church has been de-
stroyed by incendiary bombs, it
was disclosed.
The Church, in Southwark,
South London, was built in 1616,
and some of the Pilgrim Fathers
worshiped there before they went
to America. Burned with it was a
pulpit Bible containing the signa-
tures of prominent English and
American preachers who had de-
livered Pilgrim Fathers memorial
sermons there.
-*-
Household Hint: “Ink can be
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tablecloths before it is spilled
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* rule that
80-YEAR-OLD GOES
TO HEAR FORTURE;
RESULT: HE LOSES IT
Durant, Okla.,—Persuaded to leave
home to have his fortune told, 80-
year-old Harxy R. White, Bryan
County pensioner charged Friday
that his life savings of $934.49„ in-
cluding $425 in gold coirxs, were
missing from his locked trunk on
his return. Two men have been
charged with theft in connection
with the disappearance of the
money.
Sheriff W. O. (Bud) White re-
covered the money buried on a
farm near Frederick. No action
has been taken against White for
hoarding gold coins.
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Jones, J. L. Refugio Timely Remarks (Refugio, Tex.), Vol. 13, No. 25, Ed. 1 Thursday, April 17, 1941, newspaper, April 17, 1941; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth875060/m1/7/: accessed August 15, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Dennis M. O’Connor Public Library.