AUSTRALIA AS BASE

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23536, 14 January 1942, Page 5

AUSTRALIA AS BASE

Offensive Against Japan POSSIBILITY SEEN IN U.S. (Received January 14, 1.45 a.m.) (U.P.A.) WASHINGTON, January 13. The Associated Press of America says that Japan's expanding conquests have aroused the capital to the grim possibility that the united nations may be forced back to Australia—the last bastion from which a major counteroffensive in the Pacific can be launched. The agency adds that informed quarters in Washington point out that Australia's big strategic advantages cannot be duplicated in Oceania. Her enormous land mass provides space for all necessary air fields, while so far the comparative dearth of air fields in the Far East and the Pacific has considerably hampered the Allies. The agency says that the main bases in southern Australia would be out of range of Japanese aircraft, while bombers from there could be ferried to the north to start attacks against the Japanese. The retention of present bases in Burma, plus Australian air fields, would enable the Allies to strike against Japan throughout the Pacific war zone. Also, three (5f the four Australian naval bases could be used by the British and Americans advantageously against Japan, while Darwin would probably be partly neutralised if the Japanese won a complete victory against the Netherlands East Indies. The agency adds that it is realised in Washington that Australia has built up a most impressive war industry, but "as a front-line fortress of the united nations” Britain and America must send her tremendous additional supplies of munitions, aircraft, and also manpower.