NOTICE SERVED
ON LAVAL GOVERNMENT SIGNIFICANCE OF AMERICAN ACTION. IN NEW CALEDONIA & SOUTH PACIFIC. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) NEW YORK, April 26. The “New York Tinies” in a leading article, says: “The announcement of the arrival of American troops in New Caledonia, may be accepted as a notice to the Laval Government that the United States has assumed military control of the French possessions in the south Pacific for the duration of the war. New Caledonia and its surrounding archipelagos, the New Hebrides and Loyalty groups, are essential bastions protecting our supply route to Australia.
“Noumea (capital of' New Caledonia), is an equal distance from Australia and the nearest Japanese extension in the Solomons. Further enemy expansion southward is now blocked by our forces. The flank of our Pacific defence is effectively guarded, while the waterway into Torres Strait and the whole north coast of Australia will be commanded by our flyers. “But the time to regard the southwest Pacific as an area of defence is rapidly passing. The strength of the United Nations on the Australian continent has enormously increased in the last six weeks. Rising air power has halted the Japanese at New Guinea and hampered them in their stronghold at Rabaul. The announcement of the arrival of American troops in New Caledonia is no doubt a euphemism for the consolidation of our forces there. These certainly include warplanes, which we may soon expect to see exerting pressure against the precarious enemy holdings to the north.
“When General MacArthur decides that the moment has come for an ailcut offensive, New Caledonia as well as Australia will be a base from which to strike.”
The Vichy news agency says that the Government has instructed the Ambassador in Washington, M. Henry Haye, to protest to the United States Government against the landing of Americans in New Caledonia. The official Note states, “If French rebels in September, 1940, seized New. Caledonia, that fact does not justify the landing of American troops there. Neither General de Gaulle nor his fives are in any way qualified to speak on behalf of France.” The French National Committee in London has issued the following statement: “American troops have landed in New Caledonia in accordance with the declaration issued by the State Department on February 28, which recognised the French National Committee in London as the only French authority in all the French island possessions in the Pacific.”
AMERICAN COMMANDER (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 10.40 a.m.) RUGBY, April 27. The United States War Department has announced that the American troops in New Caledonia are under the command of Major-General Alexander M. Patch, Junr.
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Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 April 1942, Page 3
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438NOTICE SERVED Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 April 1942, Page 3
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