NORTHERN SOLOMONS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 November 1943, Page 3

NORTHERN SOLOMONS

JAPANESE LOSSES NOT BEING REPLACED shortland group outflanked ALLIES’ NEXT MOVE DISCUSSED. (By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) LONDON, November 1. It is evident that the Japanese have made no effort to replace their heavy plane losses in the Northern Solomons area or to make good the deficiencies resulting from the probable transference of strength from the Solomons to the Rabaul area. Now outflanked by the Allied landings on' Treasury and Choiseul Islands, the strategic Shortland group just south of Bougainville is likely to fall to Admiral Halsey, according to an Australian war correspondent in the South Pacific. With its excellent harbour at Faisi and the airfield at Ballale, this group has now become useless to the Japanese. Admiral Halsey can either assault the Shortlands as he did Vella Lavella or blockade it as he did Kolombangara. The Japanese garrison has the alternatives of running the gauntlet of Admiral Halsey’s surface forces by trying to evacuate to Bougainville or staying to Allied aircraft have neutralised the southern Bougainville airfields while Allied naval forces are completely in control of the “Slot” (the famous stretch of water between the parallel chains of the Solomon Islands) and also exercise a large measure of wider control over all the waters south of Rabaul. LONE LIBERATOR’S FEAT SHADOWS JAPANESE WARSHIPS. BOMBED IN SMALL HARBOUR. (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, November 1. A lone Liberator bomber probably sank a large Japanese destroyer and damaged another early on Saturday morning The attack followed one of the finest aerial “shadowing”, feats that has ever been carried out in the Solomons Sea. Two destoyers, together, with a cruiser, were close together in the harbour in a tiny island oil the north coast of New Britain, and they provided an excellent target for the Liberator s 10001 b. bombs, which crashed among them. Though damage is claimed officially only io the destroyers, the Liberator pilot said that the blast front direct hits on one destroyer would certainly have done heavy damage to the other destroyer and to the cruiser. The Liberator first sighted the ships on Friday night, but they offered such furious anti-aircraft opposition that the pilot postponed his attack till the ships had reached what they apparently believed to be a secure haven. While the Liberator was shadowing the warships it encountered Japanese night fighteis, but they did not attack. ■