CLOSING IN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 November 1942, Page 3

CLOSING IN

THE ALLIES IN EASTERN NEW GUINEA JAPANESE DEFENDING BUNA. WITH THEIH BACKS TO THE SEA. (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, November .16, The Japanese, will) llieir backs to I lie sea, arc now making their final stand in Papua. The Australian and American forces have joined and are moving against Buna in a combined attack. They are stated to be approaching from the west and the south. The Allied air force, using principally Marauders and Beaufighters, is attacking without respite. At Buna barges have been set on fire and transport smashed. At Soputa, eight miles inland, ground installations were pounded. The enemy troops who are falling back on Buna are revealed to be under the command of Lieutenant-General Tomatore Horii, who is an expert in landing operations, and has been directing the enemy’s operations in Papua for some time. The Japanese strength is now concentrated in the coastal region, but no indication has been given of the size of his remaining forces. Both the Australian and American contingents are known to be powerful.

Failure to hold the Allied advance will leave Horii with just two possible ways of escape: his forces must be evacuated by sea or attempt to flee through the heavy jungle. The Allied air supremacy would be likely to make an attempted sea evacuation expensive to the Japanese, while the jungle would certainly exact its own toll from an enemy cut off from his supplies. Australian forces, an earlier message stated, were expected to set out at dawn today for the Buna-Gona area, the last Japanese foothold in northern Papua. They built a new bridge across the Kumusi River at Wairopi on Sunday, and are now on a good motor road leading to Buna, 35 miles away. After their withdrawal across the Kumusi River, the Japanese destroyed the pontoon bridge which they had built to replace the Wairopi bridge. Recent rains had swollen the river, which in some places was almost 100 yards wide.

Anticipating a speedy ending to the Papuan fighting, war correspondents point out that the Japanese have now lost a considerable amount of heavy equipment, particularly field guns. The campaign has been a costly one for the enemy. Nearly 2000 Japanese graves are dotted along the trail between loribaiwi, the starting point for the Japanese retreat oh the Owen Stanley Ranges and Wairopi. It is revealed that a highly efficient air transport organisation enabled the Australians to reconquer the Owen Stanley Ranges. American planes carried hundreds of tons of food, ammunition, weapons and medical supplies to the troops fighting in the mountains. Sometimes the planes landed on specialy cleared landing strips in the jungle, but most of the supplies were dropped by parachute in selected areas. GREEN UNIFORMS USE IN JUNGLE FIGHTING. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright l SYDNEY, November 16. Australian jungle troops will wear green uniforms. However, khaki has been found to be the best all-round colour for the fighting forces. “Even in New Guinea there are places where the green uniform would be conspicuous and defeat its purpose,” declares the Minister of the Army, Mr Forde. “In these places our troops wiF keep their khaki attire.”