HOTLY ATTACKED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 July 1943, Page 3

HOTLY ATTACKED

AMERICAN ADMIRAL’S PREDICTION OF WAR AGAINST JAPAN TILL 1949. CHARGE OF DEFEATISM. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, July 21. After the first meeting of the Pacific War Council for several weeks, at which President Roosevelt reviewed Pacific operations, the Chinese Foreign Minister, Dr. Soong, who was acting as spokesman, was asked whether the council agreed with Vice-Admiral F. J Horne's view that the war would last to 1949. Dr. Soong replied: "That’s anybody's guess, but to us 1949 looks a long way off.” Vice-Admiral Horne was reported to have stated that the United States was planning for a war against Japan to last at least until 1949 The Director of War Mobilisation, Judge Byrnes, was also asked about Admiral Horne’s statement. He replied: “If anyone else is planning on that basis, I do not know of it.” The New York “Herald-Tribune’s” Washington correspondent, commenting on Admiral Horne’s statement, says that the number of American ships now afloat is not available, but that there were approximately 600 naval combat vessels in the navy on December 6, 1941. Navy officials assert that the fleet is now larger in spite of its war losses. They estimate that the goal for 1949 is more than 4200 combat vessels, which will be incomparably the largest fleet in the world. The New York “Herald-Tribune” in an editorial commenting on the statements by Admiral Horne says: “If the present naval high command does not know how Japan can be beaten in less than five years, it had better get out of the way and let those who do take over the Navy Department, Suggesting that the Pacific war may drag on for years, supplies Tokio with material for the most disheartening sort of propaganda for China and for the promotion of defeatism in every Oriental country as well as India. “The kind of war Admiral Horne suggests might indeed be the kind which' would have to be fought ifi China gave up hope and collapsed and, inflamed by Japanese agitation, were made worthless to the United Nations. If anything could achieve such disastrous results, it would be the consistent propagation of such nonsense as Admiral Horne's. The damage already done to the morale of Japan’s present and future Asiatic enemies will take a lively undoing. The quicker Colonel Knox gets to work on it the better.”

LOSS OF PRODUCTION .CRITICISED BY COLONEL KNOX. ’ MEANS NEEDLESS EXTENSION OF CONFLICT. WASHINGTON, July 21. Americans who think the war is won are guilty of manslaughter and are contributing to an unnecessary extension of the conflict, said the Secretary of the Navy, Colonel Knox, in a broadcast. He said that a steady loss of production was “now in its third month, ’ and was almost “criminally careless.” “The belief that the war is already won will result in cruel and unnecessary death for many thousands of uniformed Americans if it is not checked in time,” he declared. “The war will last till 1949 or longer if the home front fails to back up the services.” He described Sicily as a single outpost on the road to the real fighting in Europe, and added: “Unfortunately, the real fighting lies still ahead. Only a fool would pretend that we have dore more than make a good beginning.”