Word: balkans
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Battle of Boots. The guerrillas have few trucks and armored cars, have to make up the lack with bravery and footwork. In the ice and cold of the Balkan winter they need, first of all, good shoes. That is why, rear Lipovac in Western Bosnia, shoeless Partisans attacked a column of 400 lorries transporting German reinforcements, hit them fast and hard, then withdrew to the snowy mountains. Hundreds of Partisans at last had shoes, taken from Hitler's hated soldiers...
Mushanoff is a classic middle-of-the-roader. He admires German culture and efficiency, but hates Naziism. He is emotionally pro-Russian, but detests Communism. He advocates an entente with other Balkan peoples, but thinks Bulgaria should keep some of her neighbors' territories. From all except the most radical viewpoints, he is respectable...
...which comes only from watching him work in a small joint where his extraordinary gusto can not only bounce forth but also reach him on the rebound from a close and delighted audience. Then Jimmy reaches a comic violence that makes his audience feel like spectators at a small Balkan...
...Central Europe. The small states in this cordon, mutually not too friendly, would be tied to Moscow by agreements like the Soviet-Czech pact. Any overall federation in this area would form a large unit which might become a menace to Russia; that is why Moscow has opposed any Balkan, Danubian or Scandinavian federations...
...fighting in the mountains was aimed at railroad lines. These attacks were evidently keyed in with air raids by Allied Mitchell bombers from Italy. The U.S. Fifteenth Air Force, newly based in Italy, struck heavy blows at Pola, big supply center for Nazi forces in Yugoslavia (and at Sofia, Balkan communications hub.) Tito and Allied commanders were in communication; it was no longer a secret that some supply vessels and many liaison parties shuttled between Italy and Partisan-held points on the coast...