PACIFIC COMMAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 November 1942, Page 3

PACIFIC COMMAND

CRITICISM IN UNITED STATES CHARGES BY CONGRESSMAN. RETURNED FROM ACTIVE , SERVICE. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) NEW YORK, November 15. Speaking in the House of Representatives. Melvin J. Maas, who is a colonel in the Marine Corps and has served in the Pacific, charged that the Navy had not told the truth about the Pacific war and that the situation was i more serious than had been admitted. : ' A first-class controversy is raging in the capital city over the charges by Representative Maas, says the New York “Herald-Tribune’s.” Washington correspondent. The highest military quarters, by implication but not dii> ectly, denied a charge of lack of unity in the Pacific, and asserted that com: plete integration of both command'and strategic planning has been achieved not only in the Pacific, but also in North Africa. The joint chiefs of staff, it is explained. delegate the supreme command to a single officei in every major operation. Admiral Halsey has complete charge of the Solomons campaign, under 1 Admiral Nimitz. General Eisenhower is in supreme command in North Africa. Both have land, sea and air forces under their authoritative direction. Their power is not divided with other officers nor is supreme power divided between the Army and the Navy. The British and American Combined Chiefs of Staff Committee conceives and co-ordinates grand strategy in America and Britain. These combined chiefs of staff are in session almost continuously. No plans or strategy are made independently by Army or Navy chiefs. Since the combined chiefs of staff consist of four Americans with their opposite number in the British Army, Navy and Air Force, Washington stands out as the real heart of planning the war against the Axis. As a matter of fact the joint chiefs of staff have set up the war operations against Japan with an efficiency that makes the most of the equipment and personnel allocated to that theatre. Mr Elmer Davis, director of the Office of War Information, has challenged charges that the American Navy is losing the Pacific war. Mr Davis said he did not know of any action in which the American losses exceeded the Japanese except in the Battle of Savo Island, in which three American cruisers and one Australian cruiser were sunk. _ Mr Davis refused to comment on Representative Maas’s charges, but Congressional sources hinted that the Military and Naval Affairs Committee of Congress might conduct inquiries into them.