JAPAN’S HOPES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 16 January 1942, Page 3

JAPAN’S HOPES

FUTURE COURSE OF WAR

AXIS DELUSION.

PLANS FOR WORLD CONQUEST.

(British Official ’Wireless.) RUGBY, January 14.

The sophistry with which Axis writers delude, or attempt to delude, their public is amusingly illustrated by an article in the Rome newspaper “Popolo D’ltalia,” by Admiral Suetzuga, former Commander-in-Chief and senior commander of the Japanese fleet, dealing in part with the outbreak of war between Japan and the United States.

“If Roosevelt,” writes Admiral Suetzuga, “were a great statesman, he would have immediately accepted Japan’s proposals. In this case Japan would have missed a chance which would not have been offered it again at least for a century. Thanks to providence and the short-sightedness of Roosevelt, this did not happen, and Japan was able to gain almost unlimited sway over the Pacific and Indian Oceans.”

The sincerity of the Japanese proposals can thus be assessed at its true worth. The writer goes on to indulge in the unusually -vivid expression of wishful thinking. After stating that Japan is now faced with gigantic problems, he outlined the future course of the war as follows:-— “As Burma and the Dutch East Indies will come under Japanese care, Japan will be freed from all care about raw materials. The China incident will also be settled. Australia and New Zealand will be in isolation and compelled to break with the Anglo-Saxons. The German and Italian armies will advance as far as the Suez Canal and will join the Japanese in the Indian Ocean.

“The three nations thus will form one solid bloc. India will be in isolation and England will lose its richest possession. Anglo-Saxon assistance to Russia will cease and the Russians’ capitulation will then only be a question of time. Russia, too, will be compelled to come under the flag of the Tripartite Powers.

“The Mediterranean will become the inland ocean of the Axis Powers. North and South Africa will come under the supremacy of the Axis Powers and France will eventually become a loyal collaborator with the Axis countries. This huge bloc will be formed by the Axis countries extending over Asia, Africa and Europe.”