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l3!I33?KlaW j 3 =0*1 riniE United Nation* are fighting a global war. On 1 $ix fronts million* of soldier* and their machine* must be fed and clothed, fuelled and repaired, supplied with ammunition, *pare part*, medicine*, gun* and tools. United Nation* factories producing war goods must be stoked with an endless flow of raw materials. ^ To carry these supplies around the world, the United Nations have mobilized the biggest merchant fleet ever feen?a huge cooperative fleet in which ships from r.r*at Britain, Canada, the U. S., Russia, the Nether lands, Greece, Norway, Belgium, France, Australia, Poland and Jugoslavia serve together and sail together in giant convoys. Just how hig this fleet is no one know?, ? but it is somewhere in the neighborhood of 8,000 ships ?40,000,000 deadweight tons. ' This Freedom Fleet makes a chain of supply lines across the seven seas. Wallowing along in huge convoys it carries men and food and planes to Britain across the North Atlantic, tanks and trucks and guns to Russia, mail and machine-gun bullets to U. S. soldiers in Africa and the Solomons. EgSff3gtjH*8iMEca^wM? , Under (he ready guns of battleships a convoy puts out to sea. Few big warships are used for convoy work, but fast destroyers and corvettes are death to submarines. Toughest convoy route of all is from Britain around the North Cape to the Soviet arctic port of Murmansk. Here the convoys must contend with not only submarines and torpedo boats from the fjords of occupied Norway, but also land-based bombing planes and continuous icy cold. Not all the ships get there, but with today's safeguards less than one ship in 200 is lost in convoy. Catapulted from the deck of this merchant ship, this Hurricane ficrhter will ward off the attacks of dive bombers. Beneath the watchful wing of a patrol bftltibcr a convoy stretches away to the horizon. Near land convoys ure protected by a constant uir patrol. Seamen of the Netherlands Merchant Navy man an anti-aircraft gun. most United Nations merchant ships have guns of their own with trained crews. 1 ~ ?unini ??maa mm i i iiinli? - - THE tnen of the Upited Nations merchant fleet have a vital job and a dangerous one. They are fighting the war in unarmored ships, ships that were never built for battle. In convoy the merchantmen rely on the protection of planes and warships; even so hundreds of merchant ships have been bombed or torpedoed and sunk. But the spirit of the men is such that those who have been torpedoed two or three times cheerfully sign on again on another ship. In spite of sinkings the United Nations merchant navy is growing. By the end of 1942, the United States alone will have built more than lO million new tons of cargo ships since Pearl Harbor. The 1943 quota will be larger still. More than ever as the United Nations move to take the offensive, we need this enormous fleet. It takes 17 tons of shipping to move a soldier and his equipment overseas and nearly three-and-a-half tons to maintain him and keep him fighting. This means that nearly 3 million tons of merchant ships are needed just to supply the U. S. forces that are at present abroad. Larger armies will need still more ships. This great merchant navy is one of ihe most striking examples of wn$i United Nations cooperation can accomplish, not only in the war but in times of future peace. A convoy with merchant ships, battleships, sailors and merchant seamen working together for the United Nations is a powerful promise of a peaceful democratc world. assas8&SBU&mmmmKnmKammmBm*^?mm ? Somewhere in Great Britain a fleet of tanks Is swung aboard a merchantman. After their sea journey they will see action J fighting the Axis on the Russian or African front. j T' AottriMrvrate bmiMW at Lwt?. Gnt< qaaniitlc*, tfiW* *w?*r ' *j-y. i ft&ht and day ai ml? toher te Britain, AnsUalla and the UfHad States to Tr?w- mora ships far tha Freed am Fleet *marahaptPtt<M^a^|Wsfl as & 2?&f * 1- J^rkTMdraoas^r-r' . Two Norwegian seamen in (he middle of a deckload of warplanes. Big long-distance bombers can be ferried to the fighting fronts but fighter-planes must be carried by convoy, \ crammed into the holds of merchant ships or lashed on deck, f 1 , Men like these make convoys pottible. The Russian pallor above and the British seamen bel&v have jobs as dangerous |v as soldiers'. But they bring the goods through. I#" - *