VALUABLE ASSET

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 December 1943, Page 3

VALUABLE ASSET

AIRFIELD ON BOUGAINVILLE

IN USE BY AMERICAN AIRCRAFT.

BOMBERS GIVEN FIGHTER PROTECTION.

(Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, December 12.

American light bombers and fighters are now using Torokina airfield, on the north-western side of Empress Augusta Bay, the United States beachhead on Bougainville Island in the northern Solomons. The use of the new field enables the Allied bombers to receive fighter protection on their raids against the Japanese positions to the north. This is reported by war correspondents in the southern Pacific. In the six weeks of fighting since the American landing at Empress Auusta Bay, the Japanese have lost a minimum of 2000 killed. The American casualties have been about 1300, with fewer than 300 killed. The Japanese airfields on Bouainville have been kept inoperative by the constant hail of bombs and shells, and the Japanese naval forces face a tremendous problem in supplying their garrisons on the island with food and war materials. Allied light naval craft constantly patrol the enemy’s lines of escape, while our aircraft hammer his installations. War commentators suggest that Bougainville has now ceased to be a threat to the Allied plans in the Pacific.