SPY MENACE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 April 1942, Page 4

SPY MENACE

HAWAIIAN ISLANDS LARGE ENEMY POPULATION. LESSONS OF PEARL HARBOUR ATTACK. For years alarmists have predicted that an American-Japanese war would bring an explosion of the Japanese problem in the Hawaiian Islands, says a Honolulu correspondent of the “Christian Science Monitor.” That war has come, the article continues. What about the Japanese? There can be no doubt that the Japanese Government received extremely valuable and accurate information from agents in these islands—as Mr Frank Knox, Secretary of the Navy, indicated in his formal report on the Battle of Pearl Harbour. The selective shrewdness of the Japanese attack proved conclusively that the Japanese forces knew almost everything" there was to know about the islands, down to the aeroplane hangars which contained planes and those 1 which were empty. Empty hangars were not bombed; full hangars were. AGENTS OPERATED FREELY. This means almost perfect espionage. And it is a presumption which can scarcely be challenged that this information was available to the Japanese because of Japanese agents able to operate freely within the large Japanese population of Honolulu, aided presumably by Japanese fishing vessels operating out of Honolulu bour. On the other hand, although Mr Knox used the phrase “fifth column activities,” nothing has so far happened which comes within the strictest ifieaning of that phrase. He undoubtedly used it to cover espionage. “Fifth column” activity means sabotage, armed uprisings, and mass treason behind a fighting front. So far there has been no evidence of such hostile mass action among the bulk of the Japanese inhabitants of the islands. Now that the acid test of a Japanese attack has been applied the general tendency of most authorities on the islands is to feel that the great bulk of the Japanese population is “loyal.” Everyone has his own percentage. Some say 98 per cent and others place it more conservatively at 80 per cent. A few of the die-hayd alarmists insist that none can be trusted and are all waiting for a real Japanese invasion attempt to prove themselves Japanese at heart. But such extreme views are not common among military or civilian authorities. “TAKE NO CHANCES.” In responsible circles the tendency is to feel that most of the dangerous Japanese have been rounded up in the dragnet which has put aliens into protective custody since the outbreak of war. Precautions are not neglected anywhere. Even highly trusted Japanese of American citizenship have been excluded from defence work in Pearl Harbour proper and shifted to < work outside the Navy Yard just “to take no chances.” The size of the Japanese population compared to the total population inevitably constitutes the major problem in the Hawaiian Islands. Out of 465,000 residents, only 139,000 are whites, while there are 35,000 Japanese aliens and 124,000 citizens of Japanese ancestry, or a total of 159,000 persons classed by the local white population as being Japanese.