OIL FOR JAPAN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 18 February 1943, Page 3

OIL FOR JAPAN

FROM CONQUERED TERRITORIES PRODUCTION RENEWED. COLONEL KNOX REVIEWS POSITION. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) NEW YORK, February 16. “The Japanese are undoubtedly obtaining oil from the conquered territories, particularly northern Borneo, where production from shallow wells has been renewed,” the Secretary of the Navy, Colonel Knox, told a Press conference here. He added that some installations in the Netherlands East Indies had not been destroyed, and the enemy were undoubtedly using them. Asked if sufficient Japanese ships had been sunk to impair the enemy’s supply line, Colonel Knox replied: “Our submarine campaign is being pressed very energetically. The navy records show that our submarines have sunk 123 Japanese ships in the Pacific and probably sunk 22 and damaged 32 others.” Colonel Knox added that nothing now was happening in the Solomons except a lot of air activity. Guadalcanal gave the Americans a firm base in an advantageous place for future operations. He surmised that the reason why the recent Japanese air losses were less favourable to the Americans than the earlier ratio of five to one was that the Japanese had introduced later model planes and better trained flyers. Asked what effect the 65 American bombing attacks had had on Munda airfield, in New Georgia, Colonel Knox answered that the Japanese were now able to make only limited use of this base.