INSULAR BATTLES

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 64, 12 September 1942, Page 6

INSULAR BATTLES

The application of modern methods of war to tropical islands provides experiences new to history. These experiences are likely to be full of surprises so long as the belligerents in the Pacific both possess the power to make fresh landings on the islands in which war is waging: and there is a possibility that territorial battles on islands may be inconclusive until such time as mastery of the sea and the air passes definitely to one belligerent or to the other. In Papua the Allies are on one side of a peninsula; the Japanese are on the other; and between them is a forested mountain range, one of Nature's military obstacles. Judging by cabled comments, Australian opinion is agitated as to whether this natural obstacle has been wrongly regarded as a Maginot Line. The fact is that military possibilities in tropic islands whose terrain rises from malarial swamps to snowy heights have never been tested in the way of modern war. The crossing of the Alps or other great obstacles in temperate zones throws little light on similar equatorial adventures. The little, lithe man who worms his way through the jungle like one of its native snakes is not to be despised.

Papua and the rest of New Guinea make up an island big enough to be fought over for years without a decision, unless the decision be arrived at on the sea and in the air. The greater part of the island can

never become a battlefield in the European sense, but success in manoeuvring on land may be a factor in a decision of the Pacific war if land-based aircraft continue to be a formidable menace to navies and shipping. Guadalcanar is an example of the value of wresting an island from the enemy, seizing his airfield, and turning it against him. So keen are the Japanese in contesting the ownership of islands and airfields that they are still landing small portions of troops on Americanoccupied islands in the Solomons. Mr. Churchill, alert tactician, points out that the convoying of supplies to Malta provided a contest between Axis land-based aircraft and British sea-carried aircraft assisted by the guns of the Fleet. The enemy failed, he says, "to inflict appreciable damage on the warships or supply ships" of the last convoy to Malta. But damage that might not be appreciable in relieving a vital strategic strong-point like Malta might be more appreciable than appreciated if it were inflicted on a South Seas convoy. So the problem of the landbased aeroplane—as well as that of tropical jungle fighting—remains something to be tested by trial and error. To the list of insular battles, mostly in the Pacific and East Indies,* must be added one in the Indian Ocean, where Britain, with American approval, has occupied further territory that is claimed to be under the control of Vichy France. The long arm of the Japanese navy is able to shield enemy landings on various Pacific islands. Could it also reach to Madagascar? Whatever the answer to that question may be, it is better to forestall the Japanese than to evict them later. But the war cannot be won merely by occupying islands or parts of islands. Insular occupations must be made to fit into a war plan that will give mastery of sea and air, with its direct implica-

tions—cutting of enemy communications and a final assault on the enemy homeland.