BEHAVIOUR OF TROOPS

Chronicle (Levin), 25 March 1946, Page 3

BEHAVIOUR OF TROOPS

AMERICANS IN FRANCE Fven the sketchiest picture of Freneb conditions would be incomplete without I mentioning the Americans, writes ' George Boloveytcliik in the Contempor- ! ary Keview, of London. I regret to say ! that thcir coutinued presence in France raises a series of ugly problems — which I are as bad for the Americans them- | selves as they are for the Freneh. i Broadly speaking, these annies have | beconie the strongest factor of corruption, not merely in Paris, but also throughout the country, and they are both corruptors and corruptees. There is not au iuformed American » observer in or out of uuiform who is not profoundly aware of it, and David Anderson, Brussels correspondent of the New York Times, liit the nail on the liead when he had the moral courage to report that "The very meu who earned the right to be called their country 's best ambassadors are developing into their own worst enemies iu France, Belgium and the Netherlands. In Paris a Q in Brussels, some of our troops on leave are showing no discretiou in their a-uproach to women. There is no sign 0f "uis.cj'imi nation. ' J I am li'1 puritan and fully appreciate the problemrf the American Army in Europe, but I niust say that, compared with the way these young— aud ofter not so young — men have disported themselves throughout France, their conduct in Piccadilly after dark has been a model of good behaviour. Of course, there are lots of honest, sober, decen't, well-mannered and immensely generous men among them whose record is unassailable. But the bulk behave lilce a buneh of drunken louts-let loose in the zoo, and are eertainly no credit to the Western eivilisation they fought to save.