Posted on 06/02/2013 5:11:28 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
http://www.onwar.com/chrono/1943/jun1943/f02jun43.htm
Air Raids on Eastern Front
Wednesday, June 2, 1943 www.onwar.com
Soviet bombers on a sortie [photo at link].
On the Eastern Front... The Soviets conduct air raids on Kiev and Roslavl. The Luftwaffe bombs Kursk.
From the Vatican... The Pope appeals for “laws of humanity” in aerial bombing.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/andrew.etherington/frame.htm
June 2nd, 1943 (WEDNESDAY)
FRANCE: Paris: Jean Paul Sartre’s first play, Les Mouches is staged by Charles Dullin at the Théâtre de la Cité (once the Sarah Bernhardt). Sartres has refurbished the classical story of the house of Atreus, to represent Orestes as that very Sartrean character, the justified murderer, conscienceless about killing the mother and stepfather who stood in the way of his cause. Liberty proved to be defined as the power of his will over everyone else’s. Naturally the Propaganda Abteilung had not objection to this totalitarian concept, and it passed the censorship. Alfred Buesche, the German critic in the Pariser Zeitung, warmly recommended the play as “a theatrical event of the first order.”
ITALY: Rome: In a message aimed at Allied bombing strategists, Pope Pius XII appeals to the warring nations to observe the “laws of humanity” in air warfare.
U.S.S.R.: Luftwaffe raiders bombard Soviet positions at Kursk; the Russians claim 162 “kills” for the loss of 30 planes.
MEDITERRANEAN SEA: The British destroyer HMS JERVIS and the Greek ship VASILISSA OLGA attack an Italian convoy, sinking the torpedo boat CASTORE and two merchant ships.
TERRITORY OF ALASKA: In the Aleutians, the Japanese submarine HIJMS I-9 lands 17 tons of weapons and ammunition and 11 tons of food on Kiska Island. The sub then evacuates 55 sailors, ten soldiers and 14 civilians. (Jack McKillop)
CANADA: HMCS Frontenac launched Kingston, Ontario.
U.S.A.: Actor Tyrone Power is commissioned a second lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps. (Jack McKillop)
Famed American football player Nile Kinnick, winner of the 1939 Heisman Trophy, dies when a training flight from the USS Lexington over the Caribbean. He experienced engine problems during the flight and ditched into the Caribbean, while a rescue boat arrived soon after he ditched, his body was never found. (C J Martin)
ATLANTIC OCEAN:
U-105 (Type IXB) Sunk near Dakar, in position 14.15N, 17.35W, by depth charges from a one-of-a-kind French Potez-CAMS 141 flying boat named “Antarés” of Flotille d’exploration 4E, French Naval Air Force. 53 dead (all crew lost).
The 4-engine flying boat that sank U-105 was the only one of that design built. The aircraft, named after a star as tradition in the French Navy, was based at Dakar and she sank the boat after a 2 hour chase. (Alex Gordon)
U-521 (Type IXC) Sunk in the North Atlantic southeast of Baltimore, in position 37.43N, 73.16W, by depth charges from the US submarine chaser PC 565. 51 dead, 1 survivor (Alex Gordon)
The only one I have is the one I excerpt from now and then - “Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911-45,” by Barbara W. Tuchman. I am sure there are others that are more on point. Maybe henkster or CougarGA7 have some suggestions. I got henkster’s reading list once upon a time but I don’t see anything from the war in China on it. CougarGA7 has a reading list on his profile you can check for yourself.
I have heard credible rumors that the German offensive may be delayed until useable quantities of some new type of armored vehicles can be rushed directly from factory to battlefield.
Tuchman’s “Stilwell and the American Experience in China” is the only book I have on the Sino-Japanese War from 1931-1945. Even then, the book does not really center on that war; instead it focuses on the relationship between the United States and China. Tuchman most definitely did not like Chaing and his Nationalist regime, and had a soft spot for Mao and Chou. She insinuates that we would have done better to have backed Mao, but I don’t think it would have made any difference. Mao was going to play his own game.
There is really a dearth of western literature about this war. There are several reasons for this.
1. The Chinese Nationalists did not keep very good unit records. A number of nominal military units were really under the direction of traditional warlords, who had no interest in maintaining military historical branches of their armed forces.
2. After the Communists ejected the Nationalists in 1949, I would imagine in their “Purge” of all things associated with Chaing’s regime, the Nationalist military records were destroyed. You will probably never get an accurate record of the war from the Chinese side.
3. The Japanese committed a lot of atrocities in China, and during the time they had between the Emperor’s announcement of surrender and the occupation, they destroyed as much incriminating information as they could. They knew there would be war crimes trials, and they knew the Allies were going through the German archives for that purpose.
4. Despite this, the American military was interested in a historical review of the war, and went through existing Japanese records to reconstruct the war in the Pacific. One example was the JANAC committee which reviewed American and Japanese records to come up with an accurate post-war assessment of our campaign on Japanese merchant shipping. There was no American interest in doing the same for China, and no Chinese presence in Japan with the same interest.
5. Despite the purge of records, I would guess that there are some decent Japanese histories of their war in China, but there is no interest in translating them into English.
As a side note, I have exactly the same problem with finding good histories on the Eastern Front for World War 1. The Tsarist records were poorly kept, and the Soviets didn’t want to record any history of the evil, imperialist/capitalist Tsarist regime. The Austrian records were fragmentary as their Empire disintegrated during the war, and a lot of the German archives were destroyed during the bombing during the sequel. There really aren’t any good in-depth histories of that titanic conflict either.
http://www.taxhistory.com/1943.html
1943: The Current Tax Payment Act
The Revenue Act of 1943, H.R. 3687, is said to be the first Revenue Act to be vetoed by the President, subsequently passed by the House and Senate, thereby overruling the President, and then superceded by the following years Revenue Act. [See 1944 Congressional Record and Congressman Carlsons speech on May 4, 1944, Vol. 90, Part 4, page 4021].
However, in addition to the Revenue Bill of 1943 Congress enacted a separate piece of legislation requiring the payment of taxes in the year the income is earned, instead of the following year in which the taxes were normally paid. Basically the “Current Tax Payment Act of 1943 (H.R. 2570), deals with the “pay-as-you-go” concept of tax collection. In order to accomplish the transition, without collecting two years taxes in the same year, Congress had to come up with a workable plan. Part of that “plan” was the “withholding” provisions similar to that used by the Social Security Act. This is the beginning of our current “Collection of Income Tax at Source on Wages” (26USC3401) requirement. In addition, this is where the “estimated tax payment” requirement comes from. The Committee Reports provide a detailed explanation.
Some, no doubt, have heard of the “Ruml” plan and the proposal to forgive one years taxes in order to facilitate the move to a “pay-as-you-go” collection system. It did not happen. Instead Congress lowered the taxes due from 1942 income, based upon the 1941 schedules, and implemented the “withholding at the source on wages and salaries” provisions for the collection of taxes on current income (based upon gross receipts, or income under the new terminology). In addition, the provision for filing and paying estimated taxes was developed to facilitate the collection of current taxes from those acquiring their income through the operation of business and financial transactions (based upon net-income, or income under the old terminology). In other words, the tax would be taken from the paycheck of the employee on a scheduled basis as it was earned, whereas the sole-proprietor would file a quarterly statement and pay an estimated tax amount.
It is interesting to note that the “withholding” provision applicable to “wages”, in relation to the Victory Tax, was based upon the “personal exemption” of $624 single, $1,248 married, and $312 in the case of a dependent. Whereas, for the net-income tax provisions the exemptions were $500, $1200, and $350, respectively. The reasoning used was that the “Victory” tax was based upon the gross income of wages and salaries, and temporary in nature. Therefore, the personal exemption allowance was based upon the statistical cost of “food and a little more”, whereas under the net-income tax provisions the personal exemption was based upon an arbitrary amount. In other words, the Victory tax is where the value of the “personal exemption” changed from an amount adequate to cover the “personal living and family expenses” of the majority of the population, to an amount that barely covered the yearly cost of food. It remains that way today.
Accordingly, by a comparison of statistics from 1937 to 1943 taken from the Social Security records, average “wages” increased from $996 in 1937 to $1,462 in 1943, whereas the “personal exemption” decreased from $1,000 single, $2,500 married, and dependent $400 to $500 single, $1,200 married, and $350 for dependents. At the same time the Statistical Abstract of the United States shows that “personal consumption expenses” (actual average per capita cost of living) increase from $516 in 1937 to $726 in 1943. The difference between 1943 and 1954 is even more staggering, because the “personal exemption” was not increased, yet “wages” doubled along with the “per-capita” cost of living.
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