OFF INDO-CHINA

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 44, 15 November 1941, Page 9

OFF INDO-CHINA

Japanese Ships Mass

The Chinese army spokesman at Chungking stated that military intelligence reports indicated that great numbers of Japanese warships and transports were being massed off the coast of northern ludo-China. About 100 transports and 140 Japanese warships were at Hoihow, in Hainan Island. .Scores of other warships were off Kwautung. A Columbia Broadcasting Company’s news broadcast from New York quoted a report from Batavia that naval sources believed the German battleship Von Tirpitz had been sent to the Pacific to aid the Japanese fleet in an emergency. The Tokio “Niclt Nichi Shimbun” quoted a broadcast by Mr. Yukawa, head of the Japanese Foodstuffs Bureau, in which he declared that Thailand, Burma, and Indo-China were really the Japanese Ukraine, since Japan had got an enormous supply of rice from those countries. Japan must defend her southern lifeline, he said, and eliminate all barriers. United States And Singapore. Mr. Victor Purcell. Director-General of the British Malaya Ministry of Information, informed the Press in Washington that Britain would offer the United States unrestricted use of the naval base and facilities at Singapore in the event of war with Japan.

He predicted that Britain, in concert with the defence forces of the other democratic Powers in the Far East, would be able to defend Singaport and all of Malaya against any possible Japanese aggression. The Australian .Minister in Tokio, Sir John. Latham, said there was a possibility that wiser counsels would prevail in Japan. There was a real amount of goodwill toward Australia.