Three Weeks Will Elapse Before Main Drive at Shanghai

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 199, 8 September 1937, Page 5

Three Weeks Will Elapse Before Main Drive at Shanghai

-Press Pfess Association-

CHINESE SOCCESSES IN NORTH

(By Telegraph-

-Uopyright);

(Received 8, 1.25 p.m.) SHANGHAI, Sept. 7. There are 15(5,000 Chinese ti-bops ediicenirdted between tlie Y&ngtsedriang and Shangliai, wliere the Japanese have secured aii iihple riverside landing-groimd, hut iieai'ly three weeks riiust felapse before the lauiidhiilg of a inajor operation to drive the Chinese back towards tlie Interiiational City. Meanwhile, the blockade prevents the defenders frdni reiiewing their munitions and motor fiiel. Despite the intfeiise inteffcst iri Shangliai, the conflict in &orth Chihtt femaihs the pfiixdipdi frohtj The total troops engaged nuraber 400^000* Coxint Terauchi is beiieved to be ddmhiaridirig the hfew JapaiiCse efforts, Whifch mxiSt be directed at doneentrating sufficient forces to deal with the slieer tiuinbers of Cliiiiese, who report Ibarked sucCesses in a fiefce battle in tbe Liangsiang mountains, where they pushed back tbe Japahese fofbes for a iiiile. This borthernmost friiige bf tlie battlefront exteiids for 200 miles from Machang to Yangkao, on the Kalgaii-Tatungfu railway, running parallel td ihe GrSat Wall. Tbe Loilddh Daily Telegfaph's Woosung correspondent says tbat the Japanese are poxiririg trdops and supplies into the Wod* iting ared hut that still thefe is no Coiithmity between the three Japanese laiidiiig-places. Mbredvef, the correspondent says, the Chinese attadks still prefclude the establxshment of an ixnbrdkeil Japanesie line. A Peiping message says: Having siibjugated Cliahar, the Japanese have Chtered the provlhCe of Shansi.

Desultory firing before daybreak developed into & steady cannonade ae5 companied by Japanese air bombing oi ihe Cixinese in tbe Kiangwan and Tangtse-poo areas, but tbey did not ■ucceed in spotting tbe Chinese batteries. In tbe PoOtung atea the intensity of the bombardment was renewed, suggesting that tbe Cbincse linfis liad not yielded oxcept in tbe vicinity of Yaagtse-poo, A Chinese battalion befoieally resistfid for four days at Lotien, surrounded and foodless. lrinaily it Was wiped Out, there being fto stirvivoi'a. Japanese planes off Ningpo bocnbed and macbine-gunned tbe Chinese Customs launclies Haisni and Haitsing} re■pectively eommanded by Britons, Messrs. Jago and Pittendrigh. One ChineBe was killed and six wounded.

Chinese officials ffoxh Prata Slioals allege that tbe japaiiCse ranged them before machine-guns and tbreatened to drive poised knives into their skulis if they did not reveal the wliereabouts of a ndn-existent arms cache. The Japanese are converting the islands into a seaplane base. They wrecked the fadlo station and imprisoned the lighthouse staff. It is fcported that the Japanese have seized Linting Island, West of Hong* kong. China rejected the Powers' pro« posals for a mutual withdrawal of conl'' batants froin Bhanghai, but is ready to reeonsider the idea if the Japanese warships are withdrawn from the WhangpoO river*