NEW ENEMY THRUST

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 May 1942, Page 3

NEW ENEMY THRUST

EXPECTED IN EASTERN CHINA PREPARATIONS FOR ATTACK ON FUKIEN. GREAT FORCES BEING MASSED IN FORMOSA. LONDON, May 26. In Chungking today, a new Japanese offensive against Eastern China was declared to be imminent. The Japanese, checked in the Indian Ocean and the Coral Sea, are expected to launch a heavy attack in the coming week. Troops, transports and warships, including aircraft carriers, are being massed at Formosa and an attack on the Chinese province of Fukien, immediately opposite Formosa, is expected. The Chinese defenders of Kinhwa, the capital of Chekiang, have flung back repeated assaults by the enemy. Soon after a report that one of the three Japanese columns was only two miles away, a communique from Chungking stated that the Chinese in a bayonet charge repelled an assault near the gates of the city and inflicted 3,000 casualties on the enemy. In Western China, General Chiang Kai-shek’s forces are hitting back strongly at the Japanese column driving up the Burma Road. A Chungking communique states that Chinese forces have seized a strategic point on the Burma Road 60 miles inside China. In Burma, Japanese activities are being constantly harassed from the air. British Blenheims and Hudsons yesterday attacked enemy, targets and traffic on the rivers. All the planes returned safely. MENACE TO CHINA REGARDED IN LONDON AS VERY SERIOUS. FULL-SCALE OFFENSIVE IN PROSPECT. (Special P.A. Correspondent.) (Received This Day, 10.50 a.m.) LONDON, May 26. An opinion Is expressed in London that the Japanese may launch a full-scale offensive against China, which at present is being attacked from Chekiang and also on the Yunnan front, via the Burma Road. If the Japanese cc •‘.centrate against the Chinese during tne coming weeks, the supply position assumes first-class importance, for the Chinese will need first line fighters and bombers. It is felt that the only completely satisfactory solution lies in the recapture of Lashio and Mandalay. The position for the Chinese is regarded as desperately serious, for the whole future strategy of the Far Eastern war depends on the maintenance of contact between the Allied Nations and China, a fact which the Japanese undoubtedly appreciate. China may play the same role in Allied strategy in the Far East as Russia is playing in the West. Lieutenant-General Sir Douglas Brownrigg, commenting in the “Evening News,” says that an all-out attack against China would be a most difficult operation for the United Nations to counter. He continues: “Now is the time to strike at China, which Tojo will do if he is wise. General Brownrigg believes that China will resist to the end and also thinks Japan will now go all out in other directions—from the west to Chungking and from the east by westerly advances from forward positions and from ports in Japanese hands, of which the recent landing at Foochow is a feeler. FIGHTERS & BOMBERS NEEDED SORELY IN CHINA. TO ROLL BACK JAPANESE AGGRESSION. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, May 26. The main effort of the Japanese at present appears to be directed against China which they are attacking in two widely distant theatres. Forces in Burma are trying to fight their way through very difficult mountainous country, broken up by steep gorges' and swift rivers along the Burma Road and parallel courses. “The Times” observes, however, that the Japanese do not appear to be able to employ large forces here, and their formidable mechanised columns can do little or nothing in the mountains. They cannot live on the country, as in Burma, and pockets of Chinese troops raid communications in their rear. “The Times” regards the offensive in Chekiang as the more formidable. In this hitherto fairly quiet sector the Japanese, covered by powerful air forces, are pressing toward Kinhwa witjr over 100,000 men. The Japanese state that their object is to seize air bases built by the Chinese for raiding Japan. Though the Chinese are making obstinate resistance, this offensive, as “The Times” says, “emphasises China’s sore need of aircraft —fighters for the defence of her cities, which are being continually and mercilessly bombed, and bombers which can attack the Japanese in China and in their own islands. The sooner such help can reach China the more rapidly will the tides of Japanese aggression recede.”