WW2 | Soldiers of Uncle Sam are on their way to Dutch Guiana!
Monday, November 24, 1941

By R. J. Sunseo
DUTCH GUIANA – When they get there, it will be only the second time since the war began that we have sent American troops to foreign soil — Iceland being the first.
The reason is a solid one: Dutch Guiana has large deposits of bauxite, a mineral vital to the defense and Lend-Lease program.
At the White House, Secretary Steve Early estimated that the Surinam bauxite mines provide more than sixty percent of the aluminum required by the entire U.S. aluminum industry.
Until today, there had been nothing to indicate that those bauxite deposits were threatened by any hostile power.
But perhaps the questionable attitude of the Pétain Government in France lies behind Uncle Sam’s move.
Dutch Guiana lies next door to French Guiana, and that colony still adheres to the Vichy Government. Thus, if recent developments in France mean that Marshal Pétain is going all out for collaboration with Hitler, those rich bauxite mines near French Guiana might indeed be in danger.
There have been numerous rumors that French Guiana and Martinique have become hotbeds for Nazi and Fascist agents.
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The Sunday Star (Washington, D.C.), December 7, 1941
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, December 1941
The New York Times, in articles about U.S. forces occupying Dutch Guiana by arrangement with the Netherlands government-in-exile.
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