Turning

How The Pacific War Is

Allies' Growing Air-power is the Factor That Mr. Tojo of Tokio Forgot

THERE have been important and significant developments in the Pacific war during the past month.

They may be summarised thus: — Late in January, Australian and American forces wiped out the last of the Japanese in the Gona-Buna area, and thus cleared Papua of the enemy.

Early in February, the Americans attacked and destroyed the Japanese remnants on Guadalcanal, thus clearing the enemy out of the southern half of the British Solomon Islands.

The Japanese, after leaving the north coast of New Guinea alone for a year, have established naval stations and airfields there—especially at Wewak and Madang.

Japanese from the Salamaua-Mubo district infiltrated through the moun tains and made a sudden attack, in considerable strength, upon Wau. in the Upper Bulolo Valley. They were discovered in time, broken up and driven back into the mountainous jungle east and south-east of Wau.

A few days later, on February 6, the

Japs sent over very large air forces to attack the Wau aerodrome. They were caught by Allied air forces, which destroyed or severely damaged 41 Jap planes, without losing one machine.

While the Japs appear to have made landings at one or two points on the south-western shores of Dutch New Guinea, Allied air forces have almost wiped out Japanese establishments in the Aroe and Tenimber Islands, be tween Dutch New Guinea and the North Australian coast.

There have been persistent reports, originating in Tokio, of a naval and air engagement in the Solomons, in which the Americans sutfered heavy losses. The Americans report much sporadic fighting, but deny there has been a major battle, and they describe the Jap reports as much exaggerated.

On February 9, Tokio announced that, having achieved their object and accomplished their mission, Japanese forces have been withdrawn from North-east Papua and Guadalcanal.

Changing Character of Pacific War

OUT of a consideration of the foregoing facts, it is possible to make the following generalisations regarding the progress and prospects of the Pacific war.

The Americans and Australians most definitely have pricked the bubble repu tation of the prowess and “invincibility” of the Japanese. Less than a year ago, hysterical writers were telling us about these “trained and dangerous jungle fighters,” and about the skilled Zero fighters, and the bombers who preferred immolation by hurling themselves and their machines upon their targets, rather than let their enemy escape.

To-day, we know that trained Austra lians and Americans are much better jungle-fighters than the Japs; they have thrashed them soundly wherever they have met them —on Guadalcanal, on Tulagi, on the Owen Stanley Range, in Milne Bay, at Kokoda and Buna.

As we learn more of the fighting in the Papuan jungles, from the Owen Stanley track back to Buna, we realise that the Allied soldiers have surmounted what were probably the worst fighting conditions ever known in the world; that they beat the Japs at their own game of camouflage, infiltration, jungle sneaking and sniping, and that they almost certainly will now beat the Jap wherever they meet him.

IN the air, the change that has taken place in twelve months is of tremen dous significance. Between January and March last, the Japanese fliers were apparently supreme—they were doing almost what they liked with our bases, from Timor to Northern Australia and from Papua through New Guinea to the Solomons.

But, month by month, as the battle wise Australian pilots came back from the Middle East and Europe, and the young Americans arrived with their superb machines, the situation altered; until now the Allies are supreme in the air over North Australia. a,nd as far northwards as their great bombers will fly.

The result of the air battle over Wau

on February 6 was no accident —and it was a revelation of what the Allied air men can now do to the Japs.

The mounting air-power and growing aggressiveness of the*Allies suggest that some significant move by the Japanese will soon be made. They must either strike at the Allies in the South-west Pacific with all the force they can muster; or they must fall back towards the north west, and shorten their present all-too vulnerable lines of communication. As a third alternative, they can stand and fight; but, if they do, they will suffer grievous losses.

Japan cannot hope to hold all these Islands Territories against the increasing strength of the Allies unless she has ade quate communications. That means that she must have shipping. Even in the beginning, a year ago, her available shipping was barely sufficient for her pur poses. Since then, her losses in mer chant shipping have been enormous.

ALMOST every day, in the New Guinea-Solomons area, a Japanese ship or two is destroyed by our air men. In this area, she is extremely vulnerable to attacks on shipping. As our air power grows, she will lose more ships—until she will find her communi cations crippled.

Therefore, dare she remain in this area? Shipping is her Achilles heel. It would seem that she must cripple our power to attack her southern shipping from the air, or she must fall back and seek safer waters.

Day after day, week by week, Allied aircraft are ranging over all the Japanese bases within striking distance — bases in Timor, in the Aroe and other Arafura Sea islands, in northern New Guinea, in Lae, Salamaua, and Gasmata, in Rabaul, in New Ireland ports, in Kessa (Buka), in Buin (Bougainville), and in half a dozen places in the British Solomons —and the enemy cannot in definitely suffer the hammering they are giving him, and the losses they are inflicting. Now and again, Jap planes

attempt Interception; but the Allies, with little loss to themselves, shoot them down in such numbers that the Jap attacks are dwindling in numbers and in power.

We can hope that the Japs will try to hang on in New Guinea and the Solo mons; because, as long as they do so under these conditions, their sea-borne communications, which are vital to them, are bleeding to death. It is idle to guess at what they will do. The Jan mind does not work like the minds o"f other reasoning beings.

THE Tokio announcement about the Japanese retirement from Papua and the Solomons cannot be taken at its face value. We know, as well as Tokio knows, that the Japs on Guadalcanal and in Papua were practically exterminated— only remnants escaped.

Therefore, the announcement clearly was compiled for home consumption. It may mean one of two things—either that the people of Japan are being prepared for news of a further and bigger with drawal, or that the Japanese are pre paring for another and bigger thrust at Allied Territories in the south-west, and are trying to lull the Allies into a false sense of security.

We soon shall know. The present situation in New Guinea and the Solo mons may not continue.

OF course, now that the Japanese are going back, we cannot expect the Allied forces in the South-west Pacific to stay quiet. The Japanese may be expecting the Americans and Aus tralians to attack them in New Guinea and the Solomons; and these recent moves of theirs, at Wewak, at Wau, and elsewhere, could be consistent with a plan to stand on a defensive line in New Guinea and the Northern Solomons, and inflict the heaviest possible losses upon the attackers.

Again and again, in this journal, we have expressed the view that the defence strategy of Japan is to fight on to the death, in an endless series of fortified posts, extending back over countless islands, in the belief that the Allies will not be prepared to pay the heavy cost of smashing all the way northwards, through all the archipelagoes.

Significant Words

It was a good plan; but it left out of account one thing that will prove to be the deciding factor —air-power. The air power that already is cripping Japan’s South Pacific communications will alter the complexion of this Pacific war, ultimately, and in such a way that we shall not be called upon to attack that cunningly-calculated series of fortified islands. Here is how the South-west Pacific Commander-in-Chief himself (General MacArthur) summed it up, on January 25: “The offensive and defensive power of the air force, and the adaptability, range and capacity of its transport, in an effective combination with ground forces, represent elements of a broadened con ception of ivarfare. They permit the application of offensive power in swift, massive strokes, rather than the dilatory and costly island-to-island advance that some have assumed to be necessary to a theatre where the enemy’s far-flung strongholds arc dispersed throughout a vast expanse or archipelagoes.”

On February 11, Mr. Churchill made a most important statement, in which, he said, President Roosevelt concurred. Here it is:— “British and American strategists are unanimous that the breaking of the German power must have priority over a decisive blow against Japan.

. While Hitler is being destroyed every effort will be made to keep Japan thoroughly occupied.”

If we study the Pacific war outlook against the background of the highly significant words of General MacArthur and Mr. Churchill, much that may now seem puzzling becomes clear.

The task before the Allies in the Pacific is enormous, almost appalling; but we may see it now, as we could not perhaps see it a year ago, as a task capable of fulfilment, within a reasonable time. It is true that Japan is a nation of nearly 100.000. people, and can oppose us with 6.000. armed and resolute men. But this is a war which will be decided by machine-power rather than manpower; and in that respect we have two great and growing advantages:— 1. —We can not only out-fight Japan in the air—we can, so greatly out-build her that, even if her airmen were super airmen (which they certainly are not) we can overwhelm her with the numbers and speed of our squadrons. 2. —As our air-power grows, we shall to a corresponding degree harass and cripple the sea-borne communications of Japan, which are vital to the effective operations of the vast defensive plan she has pre pared.