WAKE ISLAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 October 1943, Page 4

WAKE ISLAND

ALMOST INDISPENSABLE AS BASE IN ATTACK ON JAPANESE COMMUNICATIONS AUSTRALIAN WRITER'S VIEW (Special Australian Correspondent.) (Received This Day. Noon.) SYDNEY. This Day. “If the wide Allied aim in the Pacific is to sever Japanese outpost communications from the mainland, Wake Island would be an almost indispensable advanced base.”—This comment is made today by the “Sydney Morning Herald’s” military correspondent in discussing last Tuesday's sea and air raid on the three separate islands of this strategically important atoll in the North Central Pacific. The correspondent points out that' the trend of Allied strategy since the defensive phasf of the Pacific war ended has been in the direction of greater naval and aerial activitly, in order to cut in upon Japanese lines of communication with outlying strongholds. Suggesting the possibility of an Allied reduction of Wake Island, the writer says: “In any attempt to bring down the outer part of the hastily-occupied Japanese empire. Wake Island could play a part comparable with that of Rabaul, 2.100 miles to the south-west. The Allied possession of these two bases would change the face of the war in the Southern Pacific, firstly by isolating and nullifying enemy holdings to the east, and secondly by threatening Japan's position in Micronesia, to the west and north. An airfield on the main island at Wake would bring the Americans 2,300 miles west of Honolulu. Since Wake has been raided from Honolulu five times in the past 16 months, then Tokio could be attacked from Wake Island, since the distance is 400 miles shorter. The great Japanese base of Truk is only 1,200 miles from Wake Island and many intervening hideouts would also be open to attack by air. Wake Island is also important as a forward naval base. If the Americans were able to reconquer the island, its main importance would be as an advanced supply base, from which the now greatly augmented Pacific Fleet could be used for aggressive purposes. Wake Island would also be particularly useful as a base for submarine supplies.” EFFECTIVE BLOWS STRUCK BY AMERICAN AIRCRAFT. SIXTY-ONE JAPANESE PLANES DESTROYED. (By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright) LONDON, October 10. In raids during two days on Wake Island, 61 enemy planes were destroyed. The raids took place last Tuesday and Wednesday, when a joint mission was carried out by an American aircraft task force and land-based Liberators. Thirteen American planes were lost.