Evening Post SATURDAY, OCTOBER 24, 1942. JAPAN AND THE TIME FACTOR

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 100, 24 October 1942, Page 6

Evening Post SATURDAY, OCTOBER 24, 1942. JAPAN AND THE TIME FACTOR

Which is the more dangerous adversary —Germany or Japan? Which is the more important theatre of war —Europe or the Pacific? These are the questions posed in the news today by the comments of Mr. Hanson Baldwin, of the "New York Times," one of the most-quoted commentators on the war. Some months ago, when Japan was still sweeping southward in the Western Pacific and, partly in response, no doubt, to the representations of Mr. Curtin and the other Australian authorities, American troops had been dispatched to the scene,* Mr. Baldwin was quoted in the cable news as a strong critic of this dispersal of Allied force to a theatre of war remote from the United States, which inevitably by its remoteness created serious problems of supply. He doubted whether the effort was worth the cost and whether Australia could really be regarded as a strategic base bearing on the ultimate course of the war. He was then of opinion, as were many others on . both sides of the Atlantic, that Hitler was the real enemy, that the main effort.of the United Nations should be directed against him in his stronghold in Europe. The same view has wide support. Mr. Baldwin has now returned from a tour of the Pacific war area with a changed outlook on the general situation. He is quoted at length today in a message from New York deserving careful study. He says:

The men fighting the Pacific war believe that the Japanese arie more dangerous than the Germans, and consider Japan our primary adversary. . . . The Pacific leaders are concerned over the dangerous fallacy in American opinion that once the Germans are defeated Japan will be a push-over. They express the opinion that if Japan is allowed to consolidate her gains while we undertake the laborious process of bringing Germany to her knees, the Japanese .will become so strong and secure that it will take years to defeat them.

Mr. Baldwin gives full reasons for this view, which is supported by Mr. Joseph Grew, former United States Ambassador to Japan, who knows the temperament of the Japanese well. There are many other grounds for this judgment on the situation in the Pacific as compared with the situation in Europe. In Europe the Axis is strategically in a strong position which is difficult to assail from the outside. But three years of hard warfare, including two costly campaigns in Russia, have immensely weakened the man-power resources of the Axis, while the Axis conquests have not furnished the enemy with many of the vital essential materials of war. The Axis Powers still lack oil and many other commodities, and their food situation is bad. They have, in addition, to maintain strong garrisons to keep down the ferment,of hate among the people of the occupied countries. No such difficulties face Japan. The swift and cheap conquests of the Japanese have given them a neat and rounded empire containing almost all the necessaries of war, including some, notably rubber, of which the Allies themselves are short. In the main, their subject populations are easy to control. Their strategic position is excellent inside a ring fence of islands, ideal for naval and air defence. The Solomons campaign and the fighting in New Guinea indicate the magnitude of the task for the Allies. Only from the Asiatic continent, in China and Siberia, is Japan vulnerable, and that only, for the moment, in the air. It is this aspect that makes the suggestion of an immediate major Asiatic continental counteroffensive against Japan, emphasised in the news today, so important. The Chinese themselves, according to Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, are ready, but they will need assistance in their efforts. While Japan is busy in the Solomons with substantial land, sea, and -air forces endeavouring to recover lost ground there, the opportunity does seem to present itself for strong Allied action in the Asiatic mainland. Neglect of such opportunities may greatly enhance the difficulties of the task before the Allies at a later stage. This is the problem presented to the leaders responsible for the grand strategic design of the war. How far can resources and transport be engaged in forcing a quick decision in the East, without delaying or weakening the great counter-blow to be struck at Hitler in the West?