Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, December 15, 1993                   TAG: 9312150044
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Greg Edwards
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

WHEN WAR WAS IN THE HEADLINES . . .

In recognition of the sacrifice of the region's veterans, Roanoke Times & World-News staff writer Greg Edwards will take a periodic look at the stories that dominated the news 50 years ago - news from the South Pacific, Europe and the home front.

Following is a selection of news items and headlines published in the Roanoke Times, the Roanoke World-News and other sources in the week of Sunday, Dec. 12, through Saturday, Dec. 18, 1943:

American Flying Fortress and Liberator bombers, accompanied by Lightning and Thunderbolt fighters, attacked the German North Sea port of Emden by daylight, shooting down 138 German planes. Seventeen bombers and three fighters were lost in the attack, which left Emden in flames.

The American Fifth Army increased its threat to the Germans blocking the road to Rome. Sections of Lt. Gen. Mark W. Clark's Fifth Army were battering their way toward Cassino from the east and south. The British Eighth Army took the Italian village of San Leonardo on the north bank of the Moro River in bitter fighting.

In the South Pacific, U.S. planes resumed their bombing of the strategically located Marshall Islands. Elsewhere, Australian jungle fighters pushed their offensive to drive the Japanese from southern New Guinea.

Sen. Carter Glass, D-Lynchburg, opposed Sen. Harry Byrd, D-Va., and other Democratic Southern senators by supporting federal legislation that would give absent servicemen and women the right to vote in federal elections. Glass said he couldn't see how the legislation would jeopardize states' rights.

Congressional leaders said they hoped that President Franklin D. Roosevelt would report to Congress on his history-making trip to the Middle East for war conferences in Cairo and Teheran.

A major battle raged in Yugoslavia as the Germans hurled six divisions into one sector. Marshal Tito announced that his Yugoslav partisans had killed 1,300 Nazis as they threw back assaults in eastern Bosnia.

The appearance of Lt. Gen. George S. Patton Jr. in Cairo touched off speculation that he was slated for a new command, possibly in Allied action in the Balkans.

Railway unions set Dec. 30 as the date for a four-day strike, which the National Mediation Board sought immediately to avert. The strike to enforce demands for wage increases was endorsed by 97 percent of the union membership.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur's Sixth Army invaded the Arawe peninsula of New Britain Island, heart of the greatest Japanese defense zone in the southwest Pacific, securing a firm bridgehead at light cost.

The U.S. 15th Strategic Air Force attacked rail lines in Austria and the Brenner Pass to slow supplies to the German army in Italy. More than 300 bombers and fighters hit the railroad yards at Innsbruck in Austria only 24 hours after attacking targets 1,000 miles away in Athens, Greece.

The Army and Navy Register reported that Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower would get the job of commanding the cross-channel invasion of Europe, with Gen. George C. Marshall remaining home as U.S. Army Chief of Staff. President Roosevelt was mum on the issue.

President Roosevelt told reporters that the Russians had learned of a Nazi plot to kill him, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Marshal Josef Stalin during their meeting in Teheran.