UNPLEASANT PROSPECT

Marlborough Express, Volume LXXVI, Issue 246, 19 October 1942, Page 5

UNPLEASANT PROSPECT

IMPLICATIONS 0F THE BATTLE JAPANESE AIMS. MAY RESUME ORIGINAL PROGRAMME. P.A. Special. SYDNEY, Oct. 18. "If the Japanese succeed in retaking the Solomons without crippling losses to their own sea power they might be in a position to accomplish their original Pacific strategy of driving on to New Caledonia and taking that," declares a war commentator in the Sydney Sunday Sun. He adds: "If New Caledonia fell to the Japanese and the Allies were so weakened in this area that they could not take it back, the outlook for Australia and New Zealand would be dark. "The enemy would have a base beside our main Pacific supply lines from America, and would be only 1000 miles from Sydney and Auckland. New Caledonia would afford him harbours, airfields, and mineral riches, including vital nickel to plate his bullets and chrome and manganese to harden his steel. It is a natural base from which to strike at eastern Australia." Japanese conquest of New Caledonia would almost certainly involve the preliminary occupation of the Allied bases in the New Hebrides, and also the New Guinea stronghold of Port Moresby.

The American news magazine Time to-day declares: "General MacArthur has enough men to retake all of New Guinea, but offensives risk ships and the price may not be worth the cost." Time places the number of Japanese in all of New Guinea at not more than 20,000, and, pointing out the audacity of the enemy in stretching his fingers over thousands of miles of the Pacific, says that there were not more , than 3000 Japanese in the south-east Solomons when the American marines launched their offensive early in August. Japan's total expansion in the Pacific engaged probably not more than 200,000 troops. STRATEGIC ISLAND CHAIN. The military correspondent of the Sydney Morning Herald says that the extension of the Japanese* attack to the shelling of a point in the New Hebrides shows the importance attributed by the enemy to the recent developments south of the Solomons. The Allied occupation of the New Hebrides and Fiji, as well as New Caledonia, means that the Allies have completed the links in a great strategical chain designed to protect the sea communications between America and Australia and New Zealand, and to form a strong position on the flank of the Japanese.

"This chain, with its oUter link in the southern Solomons, is the strategical answer to the similar Japanese chain stretching from the mandated islands through Rabaul to Bougainville and New Georgia," declares the correspondent. "Its various links fit compactly into the general defence system. It is about 500 miles from Guadalcanar to the New Hebrides, from which New Caledonia is 300 miles distant and Fiji about 600 miles. Each link is a stepping-stone to the next, and troops and supplies may be moved very quickly from their bases to various pressure points.

"By striking in the New Hebrides the Japanese probably hoped to break a link in the chain and prevent free movement of reinforcements from one group to another." LONG-HOPED-FOR CHANCE? "The Japanese know that if they resigned the southern Solomons to us the rest of their shaky new empire would go, but if they can eject us they would get a new hold on their dream of world conquest," declares the New York Herald-Tribune, summarising the issues at stake in the present battle. "They have not flinched from risking a decisive battle on the issue." Observers say that in Washington there is no attempt to minimise the seriousnbss of the situation. The only prediction made is that "the Japanese are in for the toughest fight of their lives in their attempt to take Guadalcanar from the marines. Observers point out that the United States military leaders expected the all-out Japanese attempt to recapture the island and that they were no doubt prepared for it. "This may be America 's long-hoped-for chance to crush the Japanese fleet," says Glen Perry, the New York Sun's Washington correspondent. "It is not impossible that the Japanese are walking into a deadly trap."