BRITISH LEADERSHIP CRITICIZED

Southland Times, Issue 24888, 30 October 1942, Page 3

BRITISH LEADERSHIP CRITICIZED

NEW YORK, October 28.

The New York Herald Tribune, reviewing Cecil Brown’s book “Suez to Singapore,” in which the Australian politicians and British generals and almost everyone and everything with which Brown came into contact are freely criticized, says: “The author will lose credit as a result of his detailed record of disputes with the authorities. The reader must begin to wonder whether Brown suffered from a persecution complex. It seems that a brash young man who finds difficulty at this late stage in forgiving his injuries has used up a lot of good paper to take his revenge.” The New York Daily News describes the book as an “Odyssey of chipshouldering round the world” and adds; “Many mother war correspondent managed to see out a campaign without fighting a single-handed battle with our allies.”

The New York Daily News sympathises with the British leadership, saying: “It may have been contemptible, but it is easy to understand that generals did not want any radio correspondent telling them so in a temper.’*

Brown’s book devotes 25 largely critical pages to Australia. Brown was an American broadcaster in Singapore and fell under the authorities’ displeasure.