ALMOST HOSTILE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 November 1941, Page 5

ALMOST HOSTILE

ACTIVITIES OF JAPANESE SHIPS IN AMERICAN WATERS. SUBMARINE THAT WAS KEPT UNDER OBSERVATION. —• i (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) NEW YORK, November 2. Writing to the “New York Times” from Honolulu, Mr Hallett Abend says the Japanese Navy has lately been guilty of activities in American waters that are said to verge closely on the beginning of hostilities. American naval authorities have patiently withheld retaliative action, but much has been learned of Japanese tactics and aims through simulated ignorance of what their ships are doing. It is now possible to reveal that a Japanese submarine has lately been in Hawaiian territorial waters, remaining submerged in daylight and coming up after dark. Its daylight observations were conducted with only the periscope. American naval authorities are chuckling over this abortive Japanese naval reconnaissance since they observed every move of the submarine from the time it was about 400 miles from Hawaiian waters. Other semi-hostile Japanese naval actions are openly conducted without the slightest attempt at secrecy. Their fast ships have provocatively cruised at high speed all around Midway. Wake, Johnson, Palmyra and other Pacific islands, always keeping 2000 yards beyond the utmost range of the American coastal'defence batteries. The only disturbing feature of this phase of Japanese naval activity is how the Japanese espionage agents have so accurately learnt the extreme shooting range of the shore batteries of the individual islands. DEFENCE CHIEFS CONFERENCE AT SINGAPORE. LONDON,. November 2. General Sir Archibald Wavell, Com-mander-in-Chief in India, arrived in Singapore today from Rangoon by air. He is to confer with Air Chief Marshal Sir Robert Brooke-Popham, Com-mander-in-Chief in the Far East, and Admiral Sir Geoffrey Leighton, commanding on the China station.