ON GUADALCANAR.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 63, Issue 41, 27 November 1942, Page 6

ON GUADALCANAR.

ENEMY POSITIONS BOMBED. > _ WASHINGTON, November 24. A Navy! communique states that during Sunday night United States aircraft attacked enemy positions on Guadalcanal’. During Monday, United States forces continued their limited advances west of the Matanikau river. Japanese troops were active in the Mambulo and upper Matanikau' river regions. Reviewing the Pacific situation, Mr Joseph C. Harsch, writing in the “Christian Science Monitor,” says: “If the Navy had not gone to the Solomons it would have had to employ the same or a greater force round New Guinea in order to convoy General MacArthur’s troops round the north-eastern coast undeij the immediate threat of Japanese air and sea forces based on Rabaul. Perhaps concentrating everything on the New Guinea campaign might have been better, but it would have raised the problem of a unified command sooner.

“The Navy’s desire to 'avoid a unified command in General MacArthur’s area may have been a contributory reason for the decision to attack Rabaul simultaneously from two directions, instead of from New Guinea only. “General MacArthur’s task in New Guinea has certainly? been eased by the Solomons advance,' but the fact remains that Rabaul is 'the obvious objective of a co-ordinated campaign, and the Navy is not yet as near Rabaul was was presumably hoped. The campaign remains controversial, ~as also does the fact that it is still an operation under two separated commands, instead of a unified operation under a unified command.”