HAWAII’S DEFENCE

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 180, 1 May 1925, Page 9

HAWAII’S DEFENCE

NEED FOR STRENGTHENING SHOWN BY FLEET’S CAPTURE OF OAHU CONGRESS ASKED FOR APPROPRIATION Br Telegraph—Press Association. •JoPYBIGHT Washington, April 29. The Administration will ask Congress for increased appropriations, to strengthen the defences of Hawaii as the result of the capture of Oahu by the attacking naval and air fleets. . The Secretary of War, Mr. Weeks, made a recommendation in his last an. nual report for better preparedness at the “crossroads of the Pacific,” and they will be put in the form of an urgent demand in the next report. Officials have outlined the most needed reform, as the result of the capture of Oahu, as an immediate increase in the permanent air force at the islands, coupled with increased artillery and infantry forces. ■ Military experts and flying officers are agreed that the disparity in the air force largely accounts for the capture, and recommend an increase from forty airplanes to a hundred. It it stated that the Hawaiian defences cannot be made adequate until there are as many aeroplanes permanently stationed at the island as could be put into the air by a hostile fleet—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.