JAPAN'S PLANS

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXX, Issue 13670, 18 June 1942, Page 3

JAPAN'S PLANS

INVASION OF SIBERIA? Report Probably Another Nazi Trick T lU . e To Prevent Russian Reinforcements out of Stockholm comes a typical tr ial balloon in the shape of in Field-Marshal Her--8 Goering’s “Essen National I!1 ‘. ■’ of Japanese plans for an invasion of Siberia. Interesting is ,i IP follow-up from Chunking, corporation by a “military spokesman the effect that 33 Japanese divi- . s ome 500.000 men, are massed ■' Manchukuo, for the jump-off, writes Major James Ross in the .■Christian Science Monitor.” Fact or fiction? A lure to prevent Russian reinforcements west of the pi-als to detract United Nations’ attention from other fronts? Has Japan in effect sufficient troops to engage in a third major campaign? Again, and this is worthy of some consideration, there is always the possibility that Hitler is actually tryinJ t 0 trick bis Axis partner, capitalising on Nippon’s fear of Vladivostok as an air base menace, to produce a Japanese move 'in that direction. Are Things What They Seem? The conventional plan for a Japanese attack on Siberia, as discussed frequently, considers the long overland stroke through Manchukuo into the Amur Valley near Blagoveschensk, accompanied by a still longer thrust through Mongolia, via Chita, in the Baikal area. Such a plan might well have been put into effect were Japan unencumbered by ether major operations in far distant fields. That the Chinese report indicates massing of troops for these longrange operations is quite probably the result of intentional feints. Much more probable, under present conditions —if the Japanese general staff has decided that the Vladivostok menace must be removed —• would be an entirely different, shortrange operation, stemming from Harbin down the Old Chinese Eastern Railway Line, via Mulin, on Nikolsk-

Ussuri, the vital railway junction 5 0 miles north, of Vladivostok. Might Base on Korea At the same time another drive from Korea, based on the coastal railway terminus of Kashin, to seize Possiet Bay, then pressing up the post road skirting Peter the Great and Amur Bays, would be in order. Cutting the Ussuri railroad lino at Nikolsk-Ussuri would close the gate to reinforcements, and supply munitions and foodstuffs must How from Khaborovsk, from whence all munitions and foodstuffs must flow into the fortress, either from the west via the Trans-Siberian line, or from Komsomolsk on the Amur, Soviet Russia’s new industrial centre. That such attack would bring almost instant Soviet retaliation by long-range bombing operations against Japan itself, cannot be denied, unless the Japanese initial blow by air so crippled Soviet air forces as to remove the menace. Again one wonders why, if such plans were really about to be launched, the Nipponese would toss away the advantage of surprise. Recalls Episode of lf)18 Speculation on the probabilities of a campaign in this area, where American soldiers campaigned from 1918 to 192 0, brings to mind a little-known World War I, sideshow, obscured by the larger picture of the American Expeditionry Force. Few Americans to-day realise that two regiments of United States Infantry, the 27th and 31st, were scattered in what turned out to be guerrilla warfare from Vladivostok to Lake Baikal, along the TransSiberian line; to Harbin on the Chinese eastern line, and up to Khabarovsk along the Ussuri line. The late Major-General William S. Graves handled a delicate situation at that time, in which Japanese attemps to sieze the Maritime Provinces were thwarted by the presence of our troops. Another objective of our forces there was the evacuation, successfully accomplished, of the A New Nazi War of Nerves Sober consideration of all the factors involved in this Germanadvertised potential move of Japan to invade Siberia leads one to conclude that it is but a part of the Axis psychological warfare.