WAR GAMES

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLV, Issue 126, 1 May 1925, Page 10

WAR GAMES

OF AMERICAN FLEET. INVADERS’ SUCCESS. WASHINGTON, April 08. Information received frorp the battleship Pennsylvania, off Honolulu, states that the Hawaiian war games ended to-day, when the umpires decided that the invading fleet was in a clear position to achieve its mission and capture Oahu, ivhich from the point of actual strategy of American defence must be amply defended against capture by a real enemy. It is regarded that a properly organised superior force, under good weather conditions such as favoured the present invaders, can land on the north coast pf Oahu and take the island by assault. The marine force is considered to hpve accomplished this, although they suffered so-cnlled casualties estimated at 50 per cent. The invaders, however, mechanically did not lose a single battleship.—A. and N.Z. cable. “BRUTALLY FRANK.” COMMENT qn naval MANOEUVRES. HAWAIIAN “BATTLE.” CHICAGO, April 17. The Chicago Tribune's special writer with the American armada in the Pacific is brutally frank in directing atten? tion to the significance of the '••battle” for Hawaii. . “Inasmuch as the ‘blue’ (attacking) fleet is composed of the greater payt of the United States l\avy,” he pays, “and the ‘black’ (defending) forces are comparatively negligible, the attach will be such as Japan might deliver at a moipent when the entffe AhlCfiekfl navy is in the Atlantic and bo unable to reach the scene because of the crippling of the Panama Canal. TRAINED FOR WAR. “These manoeuvres,” the Tribujie writer adds, “are the culmination of a three-year programme of exercises, devised primarily to train the U.S. army and navy for effective co-operation in war. “In other respects the results Wih be far-reaching. ~ The condition and readiness of our sea and land defence equipment will be tested in graphic manner, though without firing a, single actual shot. To-day eleven battleships are steaming in colhinn formation, with 54 destroyers only dimly discernible on the horizon. The strangest craft of all is the ship with a roof, the airplane-car-rier Langley, on which 30 airplanes are roostipg like so many birds. “Admiral S. S. Robison’s orders are to steam without lights and tp seal the radio of every ship in the ‘blue’ armada, and thus prevent Admiral J■ D. (‘Big John’) McDonald and General Lewis, commanding the ‘black’ navy and army, respectively, from Ideating us. A CONTENTIOUS QUESTION.

“The umpires, Admiral Coontz and Major-General Hines, aboard the Beattie, will decide whether .the ‘black’ airplanes were able to sink or cripple the ‘blue’ batijeships or cruisers. Altogether those manoeuvres are expected to shed a flood of light on the controversy, airplanes versus battleships.”