TASK FORCE 58

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 229, 24 June 1944, Page 7

TASK FORCE 58

Big Achievements And Prospects (Received June 23, 9:30 p.m.) WASHINGTON, June 22. It was Task Force 58, the most powerful and most destructive naval unit in the history of sea warfare, commanded by Vice-Admiral Mitscher, which defeated the Japanese fleet on Monday in what is officially designated the “Battle of the Eastern Philippines,” says the Navy Department. This task force is composed of the latest and swiftest carriers, battleships, cruisers and destroyers. It was formed six months ago and was given the entire Pacific to the gates of Japan as its theatre of operations. It has reversed the direction of traffic in the Pacific. A captured Japanese pilot, who saw the task force scattered over the sea as far as his eyes could peer, stated that the sight convinced him that Japan had lost the war. The Navy Department disclosed that the task force furnished the tactical Support for the amphibious landings in the Gilbert and Marshall campaigns and at Eniwotok, supported General MacArthur’s invasion ot" Hollandia, twice hammered Truk atoll, destructively raided Palau, Yap and Woleai. carried out the assault against the Mariannes in February, hit Marcus and Wake Islands, conducted the recent attack on Volcano Islam! and the Bonin Islands, and is the spearhead of the invasion of the Mariannes.

“Where this floating strategic air force will strike next is a. constant source of conjecture and worry for the enemy,” the statement says.

The task force has 1.250,000 square feet of runways, from which it is capable of launching well over 1000 planes. Its gun power is equal to 70 standard army field artillery units. The task force is supplied by a vast fleet train with its own carrier protection, enabling it to operate thousands of miles from the home bases. The Navy Department pointed out: “With Super-Fortresses striking from the west and Task Force 58 from the east, the onee-impregnable Japanese homeland has at last come within range of a strategic bombing force." It added that a sudden growth of baby flat-tops has brought the total Pacific Fleet carrier strength, to nearly 100. Rear-Admiral Arthur Radford, acting Deputy Chief of Naval Air Operations, said that presumably most of the 22 big carrier which had been commissioned since Pearl Harbour had been operating as part of Task Force 58. He added that by the end of this year the navy would have more than 100 carriers in the Pacific, for which reason it was obvious that the Japanese home shores would not be long safe from carrier-plane bombings.

DEATH OF JAPANESE ADMIRAL (Received June 23. 11 p.m.) NEW YORK. June 22. Tokio radio announced that Rear-Ad-miral Yoshimnsa Nakahara died heroically in the Great East Asia area.