NEW BASES ON SAIPAN

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 128, 27 November 1944, Page 5

NEW BASES ON SAIPAN

GREAT THREAT TO JAPAN

. ,„_ NEW YORK, November 25. \ New York Times" correspondent ?L c Pa *cilL c headquarters says that the Twenty-first Bomber Command is planning a pattern of destruction for Japan vastly exceeding anything the Super-Fortresses are able to do from the bases in China.

. The distance from Saipan to Tokio is only 1500 miles, enabling Superfortresses to strike at Japan two and a half times from the Marianas in the time required for a single mission from the bases in China. This means that tor the same amount of fuel a plane can deliver five tons of bombs. instead of two. ~lts '^Questioned naval control in the Pacific enables the United States to haul to the Marianas the colossal volume of material needed for round-the-clock operations against the enemy. PROFITABLE, ON WHOLE. ~ Bri§, adier-General Hansell, chief of + £ £ wenty-nrst Bomber Command, told the Press that the results had not J5 et _e?Pectations, but on the whole the Tokio raid was profitable, says the Associated Press correspondent on Saipan. Cloud prevented some of the Planes from finding their specified targets but only four failed to bomb worth-while targets. One plane was brought down by enemy action over lokio and another has failed to return and is presumed to have been lost.

The crews said that a new type of extremely fast twin-engined fighter ™ Q e i hf hmde? of the enemy defence. The flak was light except in the area of the Imperial Palace. Some planes came home on two and three engines and some landed on Guam. A Japanese Imperial Headquarters communique acknowledged the loss of seven Japanese planes in the Tokio raid and claimed that five Super-Fort-resses were shot down and nine damaged.

The assistant chief of air-raid defence, Kenichi Kumagai, speaking over Tokio radio, said that the raid would increase Japanese war production because it had heightened the anger of the industrial soldier. Manila radio said that 60 American carrier-based planes raided Manila and Clark Field today. Two were shot down, it was claimed.