DELIBERATE OUTRAGE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 30 November 1942, Page 4

DELIBERATE OUTRAGE

AIR' ATTACK BY JAPANESE ON ALLIED FIELD HOSPITALS IN NEW GUINEA. TWENTY-FIVE MEN KILLED. (By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright) (Received This Day, 12.25 p.m.) SYDNEY, This Day. Twenty-five men were killed and many wounded when ten Japanese Zero fighters on Friday afternoon strafed and bombed Allied front line casualty clearing stations near the Scputa and Sanandra track, in Eastern New Guinea. Both hospitals flew Red Cross flags and were marked on the ground by eighteenfoot Red Crosses against a white background. Twenty were killed at an Australian station and five at an American station. The men killed were medical orderlies, and wounded just brought in, as well as two Australian medical officers. Many of the wounded were lying helpless on stretchers, with no chance of escaping. The clearing stations were blown to pieces, and much valuable medical equipment was destroyed. There was no warning of the attack. The Zeros shut off their motors and dived silently on the buildings. While the attack was in progress, native bearers continued to come back from the front, carrying wounded men. With superb courage the natives took the helpless men to places of comparative safety before themselves' seeking cover.

Three war correspondents were also injured in the attack. Tom Fairhall, of the “Sydney Telegraph,” is 'now in- a base hospital; lan Morrison, of the “London Times,” and Geoffrey Reading, of the Sydney “Daily Mirror,” received superficial injuries, but are remaining with the advanced troops. It seems certain that the Japanese were aware that their targets were hospitals. Three days earlier their planes had made a close reconnaissance of the area.