Evening Post

Evening Post, Volume CXXXV, Issue 21, 26 January 1943, Page 4

Evening Post

TUESDAY. JANUARY 20, 1943,

"AIR POWER THE KEY"

Four formidable factors in modern war are the aeroplane, the tank, lie submarine, and artillery. Artillery, the oldest, his reacted^ to the tank and the aeroplane, but does not appear to have made, on its own initiative, any astonishing advances. The tank has been and is being improved, but is not altogether living up to the saying attributed to Stalin—"this is a tank war." Rommel, facing a superior air j power, was not saved by his tanks.! But, if someone were to say, "this ;s an aeroplane war" or "this is a submarine war" such a statement would have to be listened to at least with respect. To a certain extent, the formidable character of the submarine may be measured by the comparative silence on the subject of the shipping war; but the meaning of the aeroplane is proclaimed by a thousand tongues and pens. The war could be won or lost either by the influence of the submarine or through that of the aeroplane; and each of these possibly decisive weapons, is undergoing improvement—rapid and spectacular in the case of the, aeroplane, grim and secret and more gradual in the case of the submarine. Of course, it could be said that.the war will be won not hy the submarine, nor by the aeroplane, nor by the tank, but by the most perfect balance of, and cooperation among, these arms, plus artillery and the human factor. But in this quest for co-operation the aeroplane plays at least as big a part as any other arm, The long-sought air and army co-operation seems to have been attained in North Africa better than in any, other theatre of Allied warfare.

Montgomery's and Coningham's remarkable co-operative success "in Africa—a vigorous footnote to many House of Commons debates—is now followed by a new appreciation of air power by General Mac Arthur. Mac Arthur is generally interesting, which implies that he is sometimes controversial. He is given to occasional clear-cut expressions of view. On the eve of a pending broadcast by the Commonwealth Prime Minister (Mr. Curtin) General Mac Arthur has informed the world that the "key to victory" in the Pacific has been found; it is air power, with its "swift, massive strokes." Of course, he assumes the co-operation of other arms and of all Services. Given that co-operation, lie declares that Japan's island outposts and bastions need not be reduced one by one; they can be by-passed, and the by-passing blows, aimed at vital centres, can reduce those centres and (automatically) the by-passed bastions. The essence of this principle is the bypassing. Hitherto, those people who— to avoid the heavy cost in blood and time of detailed "island hopping"— searched for a by-pass principle, have been inclined to find it in an offensive strategy which would use the mainland of Asia (Burma and China) in a' land-air-and-sea blow at the heart of Japan, cutting across the communications of Japan's far-flung Pacific enterprises. Tnat this continental strategy must come into play is necessary not only as a means of hitting Japan but of helping China.

Mac Arthur, however, evidently means something else or something additional. When he says that "by the fullest use" of air power "many enemy 'strongpoints' could be bypassed, and decisive blows could be dealt to vital centres," he seems to mean a decisive penetration of the Pacific archipelagos held or partly held by Japan. For instance, he states that these "swift and massive offensive strokes," the spear-point of which is air power, are to be applied "in a theatre where the enemy's strongholds are dispersed throughout a vast expanse of archipelagos." The idea seems to be that when a' vital centre is smitten the by-passed archipelagos fall. The argument could be made specific if General Mac Arthur wouid say that Rabaul could be by-passed in a decisive attack on Truk, or that the East Indies could be attacked decisively from Australia without regard to Timor and New Guinea. Naturally he cannot be specific, but he has said enough to attract a great deal of comment, some of which implies that the. American naval authorities agree with the General that "Japan's key bases" can be attacked directly "by outflanking, or literally over-flying, the intermediate and, less important bases." If this is so, much of Japan's insular activity may be found to have been wasted. Island suicide garrisons whose job is merely to draw as much Allied blood as possible would "hedgehog" harmlessly in summer seas if Mac Arthur's principle could be made good. But the General stipulates that his principle requires "the fullest use" of air power—that is to say, a great air force of superior quantity as well as quality.

There remains a good deal to be said on the danger of land-based enemy aeroplanes operating from the bypassed islands. As the Eighth Army advances in North Africa, it seizes airfields and turns them against the enemy; this is a root-principle of land warfare, not applicable to oceanic bypassing on Mac Arthur's plan: Naval comment in America, while stressing aircraft-carriers, seems to have bypassed this question of the conflict between air power sea-borne and air power land-based. The idea of "air forces and ground forces welded together with proper naval support" has reached a high expression in North Africa, where, by intense. organisation and co-operation, the captured. airfields were converted into striking bases in a matter of hours, and where the Navy is not only clearing the ports (Benghazi, Tripoli) with all possible speed, but meanwhile is landing supplies on beaches, so that the Eighth Army in its rush forward shall have all the help that sea transport can give by replacing land transport, as far as possible, in supply services. 4ir mastery and sea power thus can give immense military and transport advantages, and ultimately the air mastery enjoyed in Libya must materialise in the Pacific. But no armamental advantage can be sufficient without the intense co-operation noticeable in Montgomery's campaign —the campaign in which, after several years of travail, the British Army has found itself.