PACIFIC WAY-PLACES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 124, 28 May 1938, Page 8

PACIFIC WAY-PLACES.

LAGOONS IN DEMAND. (By J.C.) No scrap of a ring-island in the Pacific can be despised nowaday*, at any rate not if it is anywhere on or near the aviators' routes, present or to come. Cable messages from America indicate that following on the contemplated agreement between Britain and the United States regarding the status of Canton and Enderbury, in the Phoenix group, the two countries will take up the question of joint jurisdiction over the various other small islands in the Pacific. The status of some uninhabited islands is uncertain because of conflicting views as to their discovery. A convenient lagoon island on the trans-ocean air routes is a highly valuable possession, for strategic and commercial reasons, and in view of the close co-operation between the British countries and the U.S.A. the proposed joint jurisdiction is the wisest method of settlement. The chart of the Pacific Oeean is evidently Tinder the keenest scrutiny just now, and no doubt scouting expeditions which are being kept quiet for the time are out in various directions. Most of the North Pacific, to the west of the ISO-degree meridian, with its thousand islands, is Japan's, and what goes on there is a closed book to other nations, but the routes of most importance to our countries are free for Anglo-American strategical planning. Not Many in Doubt. There are really not many islands wh>«e ownership by reason of discovery, annexation or occupation is in doubt. In the case of those mentioned in the Phoenix group, where British and American claims run jointly, there was an apparent conflict of views in the published reports; this seems to have been a bit of camouflage disguising a quiet and amicable agreement. The naval and aviation authorities of the two nations can work in partnership relations as harmonious as those which existed, between the two parties of astronomers at the Phoenix group in the solar eclipse expedition. (Coincidence of good omen and convenience for ceremonial purposes there, and elsewhere — "God Save the King" and "My Country, 'Tis of Thee" both go to the same tune.) It was stated recently that aviators did not find Tutuila Island's harbour, Pangopango, a suitable or easy landing place, because of its mountainous surroundings. In scanning the chart for other and better places of call on the trans-Pacific flight it may be that the possibilities of the Union, or Tokelau, group of atolls will be considered. These large lagoon islands are about four hundred miles north of Samoa; they are British, and are administered by New Zealand through the governing authority in Samoa. There are ports of calm there for fleets of flying-Clippers if need be. Some of the largest lagoons in the Pacific are in those mid-Pacific seas, but just off the present experimental routes. One is Christmas Island, a very large ring of reef and palms, a little to the north of the equator. It is British, and it once had commercial interest for Auckland. A good deal farther south is the great atoll Suwarrow, one of our own NewZealand possessions, away to the east of Samoa; it has a reef circuit of about fifty miles. Like Christmas Island, Suwarrow may seem to a scouting flying man exactly created, for aviators' rest, just as much as for its teeming flocks of tropic birds. Some day such off-the-track islands may come in mighty useful.