EAST INDIES OIL

Evening Post, Volume CXXXV, Issue 41, 18 February 1943, Page 5

EAST INDIES OIL

JAPS OBTAINING IT

NEW YORK, February 16. "The Japanese are undoubtedly obtaining oil from the conquered territories, particularly northern Borneo, where production from shallow wells has been renewed," the Secretary of the Navy, Colonel Frank Knox, told * Press conference here. He added that some installations in the Netherlands East Indies had not been destroyed, and the enemy were undoubtedly using them.. Asked if sufficient Japanese ships had been sunk to impair the enemy's] supply, Colonel Knox replied: "Our submarine campaign is being pressed* very energetically. Navy records show: that our submarines have sunk 123 Japanese ships in the Pacific, and pro-* bably sunk 22 and damaged 32 others."; Colonel Knox added that ndthing: now was happening in the Solomons; except a lot of air. activity. Guadalcanal gave the Americans a firjn base> in an advantageous place for future-' operations. He surmised that the reason th» recent Japanese air losses were less favourable to the Americans than tha: earlier ratio of five to one was thatr the Japanese had introduced later model planes and better-trained flyers* Asked what effect the 65 American.; bombing attacks have had on Munda airfield, in New Georgia. Colonel Knox answered that the Japanese were now: able to make only limited use of this base.