Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1943. GERMANY AND THEN JAPAN.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 February 1943, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1943. GERMANY AND THEN JAPAN.

QF commanding interest in all its details, and not least in the emphasis it laid on the imperative necessity for an unsparingconcentration and use of Allied resources in the campaign against the U-boats, Mr Churchill’s war review and report on Casablanca, reported yesterday, naturally will engage particular attention on this side of the world on account of its plain statement of Allied policy where the relative claims, in point of time and urgency, of the European and Pacific theatres are concerned. Mr Churchill said that British and American strategists and leaders were adhering unanimously to their de-> cision of a year ago that the breaking of German power must have priority for the time being over the war against Japan. No secret of course has ever been made of the fact that the Allies, are committed to this policy, but a measure of uncertainty has existed and even now remains as to the nature of the restrictions imposed meantime on Allied action in the Pacific. On the whole, however, the course of events that have taken actual shape in some parts of the Pacific, and what is known of preparations that are brewing in other areas, definitely encourage a belief that Japan will not derive any very great advantage from the measure of immunity from fullpowered attack she is meantime granted.

In actual fighting, Japan has been much more than held at bay for many months. Apart from the local effect of the crushing defeats she has suffered in Papua and at Guadalcanal, it is no doubt true, as the British Prime Minister observed, that the kind of effort in which she is now engaged is most injurious to Japan. The conduct of the war in the Pacific in existing conditions is costly, burdensome and arduous to both sides, but apparently good grounds appeal* for believing that the strain involved will tell in the end far more heavily against Japan than against the United Nations.

It has been asserted by the Federal Prime Minister (Mr Curtin) and others that Japan, as matters stand, is in a position to build up her strength by exploiting the resources of the territories she has occupied, but the London “Economist an authority of no mean standing on a question of the kind—takes the opposite view that: “The process of the development of these new resources is as much a drain on Japan’s war effort as support to it.” On the other hand the “Economist observed that Mr Curtin “was right to remind the Allies how entrenched Japan’s position is becoming and how undisturbed its military force is.” Whatever it may be worth at the moment, this advantage perhaps is by no means overwhelming when it is considered that it is only a matter of time, and perhaps of no very longtime, before Japan will be attacked by immensely more powerful forces than are now in action against her. The position of! course would be very much more satisfactory if these forces were immediately available, but since they are not there is no obviously good reason for finding fault with the policy indicated by Mr Churchill in the statement that: “Every endeavour would be made to keep Japan fully occupied so that she would exhaust and expend her material strength.”