JAPANESE SHIP LEFT BURNING

Press, Volume LXXIX, Issue 23975, 16 June 1943, Page 3

JAPANESE SHIP LEFT BURNING

TWELVE ENEMY SHIPS SUNK

ATTACK BY BOMBER OFF NEW GUINEA ENEMY SUPPLY BARGES DESTROYED (Special Australian Corresp., N.Z.P.A.) (Rec. 11 p.m.) SYDNEY, June 15. A 4000-ton Japanese freighter, a transport, was left in flames in Humboldt Bay, near Hollandia, on the north coast of Dutch New Guinea, after being attacked by a Liberator on Sunday morning. The Allied bomber, which was on armed reconnaissance over the area, made several attacks before finally crippling the enemy vessel. , . , In the first attack, made at a high level, the Liberator dropped six 5001b bombs, scoring a hit as well as a near miss. Fire broke out on the ship’s decks, but after 20 minutes the crew were apparently able to get_ it under control. Determined the ship should not escape, the Liberator’s pilot came down to 200 feet and then delivered a skip-bombing broadside which scored a further direct hit and started the fire burning again. After the decks had been strafed with 1500 rounds of ammunition, the vessel was blazing fiercely. Our attack was pressed home in face of anti-aircraft fire from the vessel as well as from an accompanying patrol boat and two small unidentified ships. Enemy barges on the regular Japanese coastal supply route along the northern New Guinea coast between Madang and Lae were heavily attacked both on Saturday and Sunday nights. Our heavy bombers destroyed or damaged 11 of them, all being either set on fire or forced to beach. To-day’s communique from General MacArthur’s headquarters also reports that two Japanese aeroplanes raided Gcodenough Island, just north of the eastern tin of New Guinea. They dropped incendiary bombs, which caused neither damage nor casualties. A Flying Fortress attacked enemy ground installations on Tuam Island, in Vitiaz Strait, between New Guinea and New Britain, on Monday afternoon. „ . • , A Catalina attacked Kaimana and Babo, in Dutch New Guinea, on Saturday night. Delayed reports indicate two heavy bombers are missing from Sundays heavy raid on the Japanese air concentrations at Rabaul, in New Britain. Aerial photographs revealing the presence of 261 aeroplanes on three Rabaul airfields should dispel any notion that the Japanese are recoiling from the lower Pacific fronts. The previous highest total recorded was on March 19, when 237 aeroplanes were counted on these aerodromes. However. some of the aeroplanes photographed on Sunday are staled to be unserviceable. AIR BATTLE IN SOLOMONS AMAZING ESCAPES OF U.S. PILOTS (Special Australian Corresp., N.Z.P.A.) (Bee. 11 p.m.) SYDNEY, June 15. An Australian war correspondent with the United States Pacific Fleet reports three amazing escapes by American fighter pilots in Saturdays big air battle over the Russell Islands, in the Solomons, when 25 Japanese aeroplanes were destroyed and eight others damaged. One parachuting American airman was attacked by a. Zero pilot, and the propeller of the Zero cut off his right foot and part of his left heel. Another American pilot dived 2000 feet into the sea when his parachute failed to open—and he is alive to tell about it. He has a fractured pelvis and is badly bruised. A third American pilot rammed a Zero. In the resulting explosion, which destroyed both aeroplanes, he was blown clear and parachuted to safety.. . A United States Navy communique says: “During the night of June 12 Fortresses and Liberators attacked Japanese positions in the Kahili and Buin area of the Solomons. The results were not observed. No aeroplanes were lost.”

U.S. SUBMARINES IN PACIFIC (Rec. 7 p.m.) WASHINGTON, June 14. A United States Navy communique says: “United States submarines have reported the following results in the Pacific and the Far East;— One destroyer, one large transport, five medium-sized cargo vessels, one large trawler, one patrol vessel, one small supply vessel, and two small cargo vessels, all sunk; one large tanker damaged; one destroyer damaged; one medium-sized transport damaged and probably sunk; one medium-sized transport badly damaged. “These actions • have not been announced previously.” AKYAB ATTACKED BY R.A.F. AMERICAN BOMBERS RAID MANDALAY (Rec. 11 p.m.) LONDON, June 15. Royal Air Force bombers and fighters yesterda'- attacked Akyab, the main Japanese base for the Arakan front in Burma. Bombs fell on the jetty and the wireless station. Enemy troop positions on the Arakan front were machine-gunned, and positions in the Chin Hills were bombed. One British aircraft is missing. A communique issued in New Delhi says; “American bombers yesterday attacked a railway bridge in the vicinity .of Katha, on the Irrawaddy, in Upper Burma. Hits were scored on buildings in Mandalay, and the area was also strafed. All the aeroplanes returned.” GERMAN ESPIONAGE AT HONOLULU AGENT SENT TO PRISON FOR FIFTY YEARS WASHINGTON. June 14. German espionage helped the Japanese to prepare for the attack on Pearl Harbour. This is revealed in an announcement by the United States Office of War Information that on December 21, 1942, a military commission at Honolulu sentenced to death Bernard Julius Otto Kuehn, a Nazi agent, on a charge of having betrayed the United States Fleet. The sentence was later commuted to 50 years’ imprisonment with hard labour. No reason for this has been published. Kuehn went to Honolulu in 1935, ostensibly to study Japanese, but in three years he banked more than 70,000 dollars. On October 25, 1942, the Japanese Consulate delivered 14,000 dollars in cash to him. Kuehn admitted having prepared for the Japanese Consul a general system of signals for reporting United States Fleet movements at Pearl Harbour, also a system of signals by which information was conveyed to the Japanese fleet. One signal was a light in a window in Kalama on Oahu Island. Other lights flashed to sea from Kuehn’s beach house at Lanikai.

British Consulate In Tunis.—The British Consulate-General in Tunis has been reopened. There are many British subjects in Tunis, in addition to 5000 Maltese.—London, June 14.