SUPPOSED ENEMY AIM

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 January 1942, Page 3

SUPPOSED ENEMY AIM

SEIZURE OF ISLAND BASES IN ORDER TO DESTROY COMMUNICATIONS. BETWEEN COMMONWEALTH & SINGAPORE. LONDON, January 22. This morning’s messages from the Far East indicate the development of an ambitious Japanese scheme to seize island bases in the south-west Pacific and cut off communications between Australia and Singapore. The Australian Air Minister, Mr Drakeford, revealed in Melbourne today that the enemy had more than one aircraft-carrier as well as a covering force operating off the Bismarck (New Britain) Archipelago, and that an enemy landing in New Guinea today was to be expected. A full-scale assault was probable with the object of securing bases from which to attack the Australian mainland. Australia must be prepared for any eventualities. There was, he said, reason to believe that the Japanese might have put out of action temporarily the wireless stations in New Guinea. Rabaul was raided again this morning. Women and children have already been evacuated. It is thought in London that the Japanese are prepared to risk the danger of attacks from fighter aircraft operating from north Australian bases in order' to gain possession of the/

Torres Straits, which would enable them to cut one of the supply routes between Australia and Singapore. MENACE TO AUSTRALIA DECLARED BY FEDERAL PREMIER MELBOURNE, January 21. The Prime Minister, Mr Curtin, said tonight: “Anybody in Australia who fails to perceive the immediate menace to Australia which the attack on Rabaul constitutes must be lost to all reality. The peril is nearer, clearer,, and deadlier than before.”