AUSTRALIAN ANXIETY

Evening Post, Volume CXL, Issue 63, 12 September 1945, Page 7

AUSTRALIAN ANXIETY

IDEA OF "SUCCESSFUL DEFEAT"

SYDNEY, September 11. Australia is adding a loud voice to those who are protesting against a solt peace for Japan. Day alter day the Press and public are complaining about the "gloved hand" policy which General Mac Arthur has hitherto purSUTlie publication of Mr. Justice Webb's report on Japanese atrocities has brought a fresh flood of cries of vengeance and demands that the guilty should be brought to justice. As the Sydney "Sun" says, all people stand solidly behind the Government of Australia in insisting that Japans war criminals, from the highest to the lowest, shall be made to pay for their °rThe "Sun" adds that there is widespread fear that the Japanese leaders and people are getting away with the idea of a "successful defeat." The Allies owe it to the world to see that the peace is made harder for Japan till the last bowing and smiling sadist is convinced that there can be no "return to Singapore in 20 years' time." (The Japanese commander of Singapore, General ltagaki, said a few days ago that he expected to return to Singapore about 20 years hence.) The "Sydney Morning Herald" believes that the rage and detestation aroused throughout the English-speak-ing world by the mounting flood of stories of Japanese atrocities will become a deciding factor in shaping the peace terms for Japan.

PUBLIC BEWILDERED,

"We are learning with the most profound disgust that the ultimate expression of Japanese military honour lies in the vilest methods "of murder and torture," the paper says'. "It is consequently not surprising that the public in distant lands, no less than war correspondents on the spot, are evincing bewilderment at what seems to be a disposition in the Allied High Command to treat the surrendering enemy with a leniency wholly out of keeping with the retribution which such crimes demand.

"Not only have no forceful steps yet been taken to bring the individual perpetrators of atrocities to justice, but also little attention seems to have been given so far to impressing upon the Japanese people the nature and consequences of their defeat."

The "Daily Telegraph" supports a suggestion that. Australia should fly delegates to centres where Australian soldiers and civilians have been interned'by the Japanese. On their return the delegates would speak authoritatively of the horrors the Japanese