To the Editor of the Crimson:

Now that the Crimson has joined the long list of newspapers that have so recently swung themselves over in favor of "short of war" politics, it seems appropriate to harken back to the days when this country took a realistic and far-sighted view of the European turmoil. The Crimson is by no means the only newspaper to lose its balance in regard to the foreign situation although others have effected such a change rather more gradually.

They have pumped the public full to the gills with the very propaganda against which they at first warned and have influenced themselves as well as their readers away from the humane and logical viewpoint with which every sane man sympathized a year and a half ago.

As an example of this somersault of public opinion after eighteen months of a war-mongering diet, it should be a steadying influence to quote some statements from editorials printed in various newspapers during September, 1939. This is actually what we all believed before we became subjected to a flood of falsehood impregnated with the seeds of hate.

Memphis Commercial Appeal-What part shall we play?... keep our feet on the ground, our minds clear, determined to the utmost to keep this struggle localized and to remain aloof from it.

Boston Post-It is up to all of us to make a firm determination not to give way again to wild notions that we can save Europe from its own acts, or that we have to.

New Haven Journal-Courier-We in the United States will be under terrific propaganda pressure...we...must...clarify our opinions...

Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser-This Nation can stay out of Europe's wars if it has the will to do so. They are not our wars.

Chicago Tribune-The duty of the United States government is to the people of the United States. Europe has had crises before and will have them again. This is not our war...We should keep out of it.

New York Daily News-We cannot see how we or anybody else can benefit by American participation in this war...If we can't learn from the proverbial school kept by experience, what kind of fools are we, anyway?

The Louisville Courier-Journal-We are an emotional people; that is why it will be difficult for us to maintain aloofness from the European tragedy... But now with... the flood of propaganda and falsehood sure to afflict us as it did prior to our entry into the World War, our aroused emotions and sympathies may sweep us off our moorings... We must keep our heads cool and preserve a strict and real neutrality. We are not likely to be able to do that by following a policy which many of us favor of professing neutrality, yet doing everything "short of war" we can do to help France and Britain.

Of course, it is true that unexpected events of the past year have played a decided part in our change of policy. But it must be admitted that propaganda, which the newspapers have been so happy to fling at their public, has not been absent either. We must look back to the days of September, 1939, when this inevitable war broke out. Then we looked at it through clear eyes, eyes not blinded by war-mongers and fanatic speechmakers. We know then that the United States should do everything in her power to stay out of this war, that entering it would aid us in no conceivable manner.

We know the same thing now, if we will but realize that the issues at stake in this war are not the slightest bit changed since its beginning.

Let us once again be far-sighted. Let us once again "keep our heads clear." Let us once again "profit by the proverbial school kept by experience." Let us stop our acts "short of war" before we are again involved in a useless, fantastic turmoil of hate and bloodshed. Howard W. Young '42.