JAPANESE AIR FORCE

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 55, 2 September 1944, Page 5

JAPANESE AIR FORCE

AN IMPORTANT QUESTION

NEW YORK, August 31. Lieut-General Millard Harmon, who was today appointed to the newlycreated position of Commander of the Pacific Army Air Forces, told a Press conference that one result of the new command will be the intensification of the air war against Japan. Indeed, mass bombings of Japan on a scale as large as the 1000-plane raids on Germany are probable, if Japan-holds out long enough to make it necessary. General Harmon said that for this task large land bases within 500 to 6QO miles of Japan were needed. Mass bombings of the Japanese empire could be done from the northern end of Formosa, from China, or from some islands to the south of Japan, notably Okinawa and Izu. No other Islands in this region had sufficient land areas. Bonin Island was too restricted for bomber operations. .'■■■' Mass bombings on Japan may have to be carried out in the early stages without fighter escort, because, excepting the China coast, we cannot get bases close enough for land-based fighters. General Harmon admitted that the future Pacific air war is com« plicated by the lack of an answer to the vital question, "Where is the Japaanese air force?" The answer to that question coulld hardly be as optimistic as the answer to the question, "Where is the Luftwaffe?" because Japan's productive capacity has not yet felt tha power of the Allied air efforts. Indeed, Japan is now producing new and better types of planes, capable of putting up a real fight. "Moreover, I think Japan has more of an air force than she is showing," added General Harmon. "For that reason we must count on more than a year of hard fighting before the end of the Pacific war is sighted."