VICTORY IN 1941

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 155, 28 December 1940, Page 8

VICTORY IN 1941

CHINA CONFIDENT

CHIANG'S GROWING ARMY

SOURCES OF HELP

LONDON, December 27,

The Chinese people expect to be able to take the offensive against Japan during the coming year. In a review of the military situation today, a Chinese military spokesman at Chungking said that 1941 will be the year in which the Chinese will take the offensive and achieve victory. General Chiang Kai-shek's army now numbers over 3,000,000 regular troops. One million of these are mobile units, and large numbers of recruits are constantly in training. Armaments in the defence of the interior of China have been progressively developed, andj China's army is now obtaining better j equipment than ever before. It is. stated in Chungking that the people of Japan are at last beginning to realise the true situation in which the Japanese army finds itself after three years of bloody, costly, and indecisive fighting in the vast territories of China. Another reason for increased optimism in Chungking is that the international situation is now more favourable to China. Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union are all increasing their aid to China. In Chungking there are welcome signs of increasing co-operation between Great Britain and the United States in the Far East. CRUELTY IN MONGOLIA. The Moscow radio last, night broadcast a long account of Japanese oppression and cruelty in the interior of Mongolia. This account, taken from a Chinese paper, states that in one province the Japanese have seized control of all trade and are exploiting the province ruthlessly. Only those Chinese who support them are able to obtain flour. The Chinese are forced to plant poppies for opium which the Japanese buy at a cheap rate and use for undermining the Chinese nation. Taxation is crushing and penalties for any signs of discontent are severe. Nevertheless, the Chinese are resisting and bands of irregulars constantly attack Japanese garrisons and railway guards. The Moscow radio also quoted a Shanghai report of the rapid spreading of anti-war feeling among the Japanese troops in China. The latest accounts of the fighting received from Moscow report that the Japanese have been driven back on the central front. On the northern front the Chinese forces carried out successful assaults on Japanese garrisons, and in southern China irregulars are giving the Japanese considerable trouble.

According to a message from Shanghai more than 3,000,000 dollars (£750,000) worth of war materials has reached China this week along the Burma Road.