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Has my father's way of thinking changed? You did well in telling me what he thought, but I cannot tell you how the news distressed me. I cannot understand how my father, being what he has always been, could be in such a state of mind. The German propaganda must be extremely well done! I hope in any case that he sees clearly and judges soundly.
You may tell him what I am doing and what I have chosen. Tell him that I am going to Brazzaville, that there I am making up a platoon of officers, that toward the end of April I shall almost surely see some fighting. . . . Tell him, if you think it might comfort him, that the life that I am leading is certainly harder than that which I would have led if I had done my military service in France. . . . Tell him also that I am doing my best to follow the course that he always drew for me when I was in France. Tell him that I would believe I was betraying all the education that he gave me and being false to what he has become by his work and his upright life, if I had obeyed the orders of the Vichy Government. . . .
Perhaps he has been told in France that the De Gaulle Legion is nothing more than a collection of pirates, of adventurers. It is not. Of course there are always and everywhere some scabby sheep, but it must be said emphatically that the De Gaulle Legion is above all a young movement and that is what gives it its strength. We have one mysticism, one ideal, and one ambition, and that is to see France once more raise her flag, so full of honor. . . .
I am here because once and for all it must be established what we are fighting for, and the catechism of the Legionnaire of France of the Future must be drawn up. For one must not fight without remembering that some could profit from the labor, the sacrifice and the suffering of those who fight. Their labor must not be wasted. And because of that it is necessary that those who see with enough depth and enough faith work to maintain the enthusiasm that has brought so many young Frenchmen under the command of General de Gaulle.
Tell him that I am well; obviously the fatigue is great, but so are my hopes. . . .
—*
Leopoldville,
Belgian Congo
Wrong Odds
Sirs:
If a $1 premium per thousand dollars seems to TIME [Aug. 18] like "odds of 1,000-to-1 that U.S. cities will not be bombed within a year," then I suppose an even chance (1-to-1) of Nazi bombers over the U.S. would call for a $1,000 premium to protect a $1,000 investment? Obviously, your interpretation is misleading. The "odds" are offered that the particular property insured will not be hit, which is quite another matter. In fact, considering that war-risk insurance on cargo in U.S. vessels bound through the Caribbean is only around ⅛ of 1%, Lloyd's rate of $2 per thousand (⅓ of 1%) to protect industrial property in the U.S. from bomb hits seems quite exorbitant. . . .
Far from reassuring, this item indicates that Lloyd's consider suicide-bombing of strategic industrial properties in our East a decided possibility, a far better one, in fact, than the torpedoing of one of our ships in the Caribbean. . . .
PRIVATE MARTIN F. HERZ
Wilmington, Del.
> To falsely reassured readers, TIME, blushing for its arithmetic, apologizes.—ED.
* Name omitted by request.