AIR FORCES CLOSING IN ON JAP MAINLAND

Auckland Star, Volume LXXVI, Issue 164, 13 July 1945, Page 5

AIR FORCES CLOSING IN ON JAP MAINLAND

MOVE TO OKINAWA

Another Big Raid By 550 Super Fortresses

N.Z. Press Association—Copyright Rec. 12.30. WASHINGTON July 12 General Mac Arthur has announced that the headquarters of the Par East Air Forces have been moved to Okinawa. They will be under the command of General th e A° l^?r, i ?^ K l nney - T hey include l h V rK_ mted States Fifth, Seventh and Thirteenth Air Forces, and the move is part of the deployment of f J CeS saturation bombing

A force of 550 Super Fortresses dropped 3000 tons of incendiaries and explosive bombs on four Japanese cities before dawn to-day, reports the Associated Press Guam correspondent. The cities hit were Uwa•o£\ a ', on tho west central coast: v m , Utsunomiya, 60 miles north ot Tokyo; Ichinomiya, nine miles north-west of Nagoya; and Tsuruga, in the west of the central part of Honshu. ■•.;'-

. Super Fortresses also bombed the Kawasaki petroleum centre, on Tokyo Bay.

Tokyo radio reported that 180 bombers and fighters from a base on Okinawa fruitlessly attacked airfields in southern and eastern Kyushu today. Aerial Blockade of China Sea American naval aircraft frustrated Japanese attempts to run two troopladen convoys from Shanghai to Japan to bolster the homeland defences, said Rear-Admiral John Dale Price. Heavy anti-aircraft fire from the convoy prevented effective bombing, but one- ship was temporarily set on fire.

'Rear-Admiral Price said that Fleet Air Wing No. 1 was able to patrol over Korea and the Isushiwa Strait over 16 hours daily. The aerial blockade had virtually closed the three-da} Shanghai-Japan route, presumably compelling the Japanese to adept a three-week route by rail into Northern. Korea and thence by sea, using small 80-ton freighters. Air Wing planes had broken the railway line, he added. Privateers, strafing ships in the Korean inlets, had seen. Koreans applauding right in front of the Japanese, RearrAdmiral Price, who is the newlyrappointed commander of the Okinawa naval operating base, has been succeeded as commander of Fleet Air. Wing No. 1 by RearAdmiral John Perry.