Tanks and Thanks to Russia

The slim little lady from Omsk reached up and pulled a string. Her tug released a flag (hammer-&-sickle rampant on field gules) which covered part of a tank. Written boldly on the tank's bare flank was the word STALIN.

The workers standing all around cheered. The roundheaded official, also a native of Omsk, made a short speech: "These good machines will not rust in idleness. They will go into the battle line. ..."

Directly, the unveiled tank, which was mounted on a truck, rolled off on the first leg of its journey to the battle line. Behind it others rolled, named VOROSHILOV, KARL MARX, LENIN, TIMOSHENKO, BUDENNY.

As the tanks went off the workers sang:

. . .No more tradition's chains shall bind us.

Arise, ye slaves, no more in thrall. . . .

'Tis the final conflict; let each stand in his place;

The International Soviet shall be the human race.

This incident did not take place in Russia. It happened at a tank factory in the British Midlands. The man and woman from Omsk were Soviet Ambassador to the Court of St. James's Ivan Maisky & wife. The workers were good beef-eating, royalty-loving British munitions laborers. Last week was Tanks-for-Russia Week, and the British were so eager to help the Russians that they acted like Russians themselves.

Britain's speed-up was typically Russian. During the week tank factories all over the country increased production 20% above previous weeks. BBC sounded like the Moscow radio: "A South Wales factory has already turned out more guns for tanks than was believed possible in the time. A factory in the northwest reported: we are flat out in production and the women are leading the way. From a Midlands factory, the workers and management gave the pledge: all possible support to Russia until the job is finished."

The case of Evelyn Duncan was a distinctly British variation of a distinctly Russian folk tune. In one week 21-year-old Evelyn made the amazing number of 6,150 shell components. She was given a bonus for her speedup. With it she bought 25 of Winston Churchill's favorite cigars, marked their box with the inscription: "From Evelyn Duncan, holder of the world's munition record." As the Prime Minister toured Birmingham's bombed areas, she ran through a police cordon, handed Winnie the cigars, kissed his hand. Said Winnie, gruffly: "Thank you very much, my dear, and thank you for what you are doing."

All this was merely a symptom. Underneath lay a new, realistic conviction that Britain's fate was closely tied to Russia's. Tanks-for-Russia Week was only a beginning. Tanks happened to be Russia's most immediate need, but other needs would develop far faster than the British could satisfy them.

The decision to send all-out aid to Russia was as courageous in its way as the decision last year to defend the Mediterranean at a time (just after Dunkirk) when the British had nothing with which to defend themselves "but a few rifles and a few good boys in good planes. Since that time the British have brought their home strength somewhere near to the point of adequacy, but the sacrifice of major quantities of materiel from Britain and Egypt will be more than a noble gesture. It will be a real military risk.

The members of the U.S.-British-Rus-sian arms conference, which finally convened in Moscow this week, must have been conscious of this British risk. The U.S. delegates must have felt a little bit in the cold. They could look at Britain's Chief Delegate Lord Beaverbrook, perfectly comfortable in Moscow with his devoted valet nicknamed Secret Weapon, and figure that the Beaver would not make much sacrifice. They could figure that Russia was not aiding the U.S. in the same direct military way as it was aiding Britain. They could recall Munich, chide British tardiness in arming in the first "phony" months of the war, criticize British failure to invade the continent this summer. They could complain about Russian secretiveness and suspicion.

But all such rationalizing could not change the fact that by aiding Russia, Britain was incurring immediate military risk, the U.S. was seeking to avoid it.

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