BADLY DEMORALISED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 31 December 1943, Page 4

BADLY DEMORALISED

JAPANESE IN THE HUON PENINSULA ARMS AND EQUIPMENT THROWN AWAY. IN HEADLONG FLIGHT BEFORE AUSTRALIANS. (Special Australian Correspondent.) (Received This Day, 12.10 p.m.) SYDNEY, This Day. 'The Japanese rearguard in (light northwards along the coast of the Huon Peninsula, in New Guinea, has become a disorganised rabble. The enemy soldiers are flinging away their arms and equipment in their flight to escape from ■ the pursuing Australians. More stragglers, weak from starvation and dysentery, have been captured, while the bodies of many who died along the track have been found. War correspondents accompanying the Australian drive say there is no doubt that the rearguard of the strong Japanese force which for so long menaced the Allied base at Finschhafen has been defeated and dispersed. All organised resistance has been broken. It is probable that the Japanese, realising that their forces on the Huon Peninsula have been outflanked by the American landings at Cape Gloucester and Long Island, are withdrawing to Sio, their main supply and barge base between Madang and the Huon Peninsula. The Australian forces are now within 30 miles of Sio. With their capture of Blucher Point, announced yesterday, they have advanced 28 miles from Finschhafen.