C. L. Sulzberger

thumb|C. L. Sulzberger in 1968 Cyrus Leo Sulzberger II (October 27, 1912 – September 20, 1993) was an American journalist, diarist, and non-fiction writer. He was a member of the family that owned The New York Times and he was that newspaper's lead foreign correspondent during the 1940s and 1950s. Quotes And now, like some delighted old Turk with his hubble-bubble pipe, reclining on a divan with sweet memories, I shall relax and reminisce about the Balkans. . . . A gay peninsula filled with sprightly people who ate peppered food, drank strong liquors, wore flamboyant clothes, loved and murdered easily and had a splendid talent for starting wars. A Long Row of Candles: Memoirs and Diaries, 1934–1954 (New York: Macmillan Co., 1969), ch. 3, p. 35 The American Heritage Picture History of World War II (1966) New York: American Heritage Publishing Co. In command of the whole Nazi U-boat offensive was tough, brilliant Admiral Karl Doenitz, who would one day succeed Hitler as head of the Third Reich. p. 190 Yamamoto was an aggressive and inspiring officer, but he made the error of dividing his huge force five ways and of thinking that his foe would behave in a predictable way. After his crushing defeat on Midway, he ordered a general retreat and took ill in his cabin. U.S. naval intelligence again was his undoing. When he took off on an inspection tour from Rabaul, American fighter planes were up and waiting for him. p. 212 "Rommel, Rommel, Rommel!" Churchill had cried, as he paced up and down his room in the Cairo Embassy. "What else matters but beating him!" The Rommel magic had become legend even among British troops. A shake-up might help break the spell, Churchill reasoned. General Sir Claude Auchinleck was a much admired soldier, but his command seemed poorly coordinated and his troops lacking in confidence in their leaders. "To take or destroy" Rommel was now the assigned task of [two men], the very able General Sir Harold Alexander and the then little known General Bernard Montgomery. p. 234 Rommel was bitter afterward about Hitler's "victory or death" order, which, he said, kept him fighting at El Alamein twenty-four hours longer than he should have. As a result, a large part of Rommel's infantry and motorized troops were lost. After Axis forces began withdrawing on November 2, Montgomery sent armor sweeping around behind them, and two days later Rommel's escape road was blocked; yet somehow he slipped his forces around the barrier. Sudden, heavy rains that bogged down vehicles in mud were all, according to Montgomery, that saved his foe from annihilation. The R.A.F. constantly bombed Rommel; Montgomery's armor slashed at his columns. Rommel abandoned every non-essential, including his Italian infantry. His route was littered with burned-out vehicles and other debris of war. The Nazi leader had no choice but to try to continue his retreat some one thousand miles until he could link up with German forces in Tunisia and with them turn on Montgomery—and on the American forces newly landed in North Africa. p. 241 There had been little in his background to prepare him [F.D.R.] for running a war. He had never worn a uniform or received any military education. True, he had served with much enthusiasm in the Navy Department during the first war; but his profession had always been strictly politics. It was a line of work few men were better at, and perhaps because of that, he recognized from the first that victory would depend on unity among the Allies. "The United Nations" was his phrase, and he used it often with great effect. But he also knew that real unity would take some tall doing. Stalin wanted a second front right away; Churchill did not, and there was strong feeling at home for punishing the Japanese first. Roosevelt decided that Stalin would get something close to what he wanted in 1942. It was a second front in Africa instead of Europe, but American soldiers were fighting Germans in less than a year after Pearl Harbor, and there was going to be no American straying from the beat-Germany-first strategy. Furthermore, Franklin Roosevelt seemed to know how to judge men. Whatever he may have lacked for the job of Commander in Chief was more than made up for by the group of men he called on to help him. p. 311 General George C. Marshall, Army Chief of Staff, was F.D.R.'s ablest strategist. p. 312 Present at Casablanca but excluded from every talk that mattered was Charles de Gaulle. No one seemed to know quite what to do with him. But before the conference was over, his differences with the Allies had been patched up somewhat, and his future role had been much clarified. p. 317 External links Category:1912 births Category:1993 deaths Category:Journalists from the United States Category:Non-fiction authors from the United States Category:Diarists Category:Pulitzer Prize winners Category:Harvard University alumni Category:People from New York City