RAID ALARMS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 December 1941, Page 5

RAID ALARMS

SOUNDED IN SAN FRANCISCO IDENTITY OF AIRCRAFT UNCERTAIN. GREAT CONFUSION CAUSED. (Received This Day, 9.50 a.m.) SAN FRANCISCO, December 9. The “all clear,” after a further alaFm, was sounded at 3.27 a.m. local time. Officials are not in agreement as to whether.the planes that swarmed over the city were friends or enemies. Washington authorities stated that the alarms were only tests, but BrigadierGeneral Ryan, of the Fourth Interceptor Command, insisted that the unidentified planes were not United States craft and that they had approached the Golden Gate and had been driven back to sea. The alarm was broadcast by the police at Brigadier-General Ryan’s orders and it produced tremendous confusion. Twice the police advised that the air raid alarm should be called off and twice Brigadier-General Ryan insisted upon its continuance. There was no immediate indication as to whether the raiders again flew over a strategic area er had been intercepted by United States planes. . Brigadier-General Ryan refused to disclose what may have occurred during the alarm, which lasted for nearly an hour. The interception and repulse of the raiders was a general source of gratification, but this was tempered by the fact that the planes were identified as on a reconnaissance mission and by the realisation of the extremely audacious strategy the Japanese would risk in an all or nothing bid for supremacy. The California area, with its vast aircraft plants and shipyards, offers a tempting cluster of targets. Informed quarters agreed on this, but the shrewdest guess was that the Japanese hoped to strike a surprise blow at one of the major Navy bases, with the idea of inflicting further damage on fleets operating and on facilities ashore. An earlier message reads: “The interceptor command of the West Coast of the American Army Air Force last night reported that two squadrons of unidentified planes had approached to within 21 miles of San Francisco.