HITTING JAPAN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 April 1943, Page 3

HITTING JAPAN

PREDICTIONS OF ALLIED OFFENSIVE MADE BY CORRESPONDENTS. •> POSSIBILITY OF GREAT NAVAL BATTLE. (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, April 27. An Allied offensive plan in the Pacific may be closely synchronised with the preparations for a second front in Europe. This suggestion is being made by British and American war correspondents at advanced bases in the Southern Pacific.

One correspondent says that the basis of the plan was agreed on by Mr Churchill and Mr Roosevelt at Casablanca and that details were developed at a recent conference in Washington of all the Commanders of the Allied fighting forces in the advanced Pacific war zones. The plan is said to be now in the hands of General MacArthur and Admiral Halsey. “Whatever the nature of the operations under consideration, they are expected to involve British as well as American units,” writes the London “Daily Mail” correspondent in this theatre, Walter Farr. “If New Britain or some other Japanese stronghold was threatened the Japanese could bring down a battle fleet in a camparatively few hours. If that happened—and the possibility is very marked —there could ensure a naval battle which might reduce the length of the Pacific war by at least a year.” NO TIME BEING WASTED. A further prediction that the next offensive move will be made by the United Nations comes from Joseph Driscoll, correspondent of the New York “Herald-Tribune” in this area. “In spite of the present lull, the American forces in the South Pacific are wasting no time,” he writes. “We now have sufficient men and tools to hold our present gains and take something more from time to time. The Americans are aggressive, and acquisitive, and will not be content merely to hold on indefinitely. The character and extent of our future operations will fit closely into the pattern of global warfare.”

OPINION IN AUSTRALIA. Though preoccupied by the task of holding the growing Japanese forces

to their near north. Australians regard these buoyant prophecies with some hopefulness. Moves against limited objectives in this area would not be incompatible with, and might, indeed, be highly consistent with, the “Beat Hitler first” strategy.

“We in Australia would not wish to see the Tokio outrage exploited for the purpose of modifying the Casablanca decisions,” says the “Sydney Morning Herald" in an editorial today. “It would suit Hitler, and in the longer view it might suit Japan, if there were a sufficient diversion of Allied strength to the Pacific to affect the course of events in Europe. “The Japanese know very well what is in store for them when Germany goes down, so they are busy consolidating their conquests against the eventual Allied challenge. The dangers of allowing her to do this without serious interruption must now be as plain to Britain and America as they are to us. The main danger is that Japan might seek less to extend than to secure her gains by striking at new objectives—perhaps Australia. Japan must be hit as well as held during the uneasy interim period in the Pacific, and Washington is now steadily increasing the flow of implements with which Japan can be harried.”