SLOW PROGRESS AT BUNA

Greymouth Evening Star, 24 December 1942, Page 5

SLOW PROGRESS AT BUNA

JAP. DEFENCES STRONG

NO SIGN OF COLLAPSE (N.Z.P.A. Special Australian Correspondent).

SYDNEY, December 23

Desperate fighting continues in Papua as the Allies endeavour to batter a fiercely disputed way through the Japanese defensive network of pillboxes, trenches, and barricades. Our progress is slow. In the capture of the Cape Endiadere area and the subsequent advance against the Buna airfield and the Buna mission, more than 100 separate fortified strongpoints were overcome. There seems to be no prospect of a Japanese collapse. The ultimate annihilation of this garrison is certain but while the Allied employment of tanks should hasten the inevitable end a maze of defensive -works still remains to be crushed.

Many months of arduous work evidently went into the construction of the * Buna-Gona fortress area, which is now reduced in size to less than three square, miles. General MacArthur’s communique to-day admits that “the intricate and thoroughly prepared positions of the enemy have made our progress relatively slow," but the vicious and fanatical suicide stand of the Japanese garrison has been the main delaying factor. In spite of an apparent shortage of food and ammunition the enemy troops have not cracked under relentless aerial and artillery bombardments and tank assaults. Although lacking anti-tank guns, they are now using Molotov cocktails, magnetic bombs, and heavy mortars as well as flame-throwers, as defensive weapons against our tanks. Enemy soldiers carrying bombs have thrown themselves under the tracks of tanks in vain efforts to halt them. To delay our infantry anti-person-nel mines were laid, but Allied sappers have been able to clear passages through the minefields. Japanese snipers are active both in front and behind our advance and enemy ambushes are frequent. In spite of complete control of the air and artillery superiority combined with the use of General Stuart tanks the Allied troops still face a mighty struggle before the last Japanese are evicted from Papua. While the Americans fight for Buna airfield the Australians push onwards to the Buna mission. A combined force has been steadily closing in on the enemy at Sanananda. American troops waded chest deep through thick black mud to gain the rear of the Japanese positions which halted our advance. It was found that the enemy had constructed machine-gun posts even in the swamp itself. The Allied force is now within two miles of the coast at Sanananda, having gained about half a mile of fierceJv'contested ground in the last few days. Two enemy trucks loaded with ammunition were captured in the Sanananda area. This is a severe loss to the enemy, whose prospects ol securing additional supplies have now faded to vanishing point.

STRATEGY CONTROVERSY

(X.Z.I’.A. Special Australian Correspondent)

SYDNEY, December 23. “The Pacific war faces its biggest battles in 1943,” says the Washington correspondent of the “New York Times.” Neither the Japanese nor the Americans have yet thrown into action such a fleet or number of aeroplanes as will certainly come to grips during the next year. With the Japanese as yet on the defensive in only a small part of their vast holdings, American war observers pre?: diet increasingly fresh enemy s moves on a grand scale.” * The correspondent says that attempts to land on the American Pacific coast or repeat, the 'attack on Pearl Harbour are entirely within the realms of possibility. It is certain, he says, that Japan will make a major Pacific move inevitably leading to great battles by sea and air. Thus the feeling is reported _ to be growing th. roughoil the United States that America's most pressing military task lies against Japan. The main support fur concentration on the Pacific even at the expense of other fronts comes from the formerly isolationist Mid.west. Advocates of this course press strongly for the immediate dispatch to China of sufficient bombers “to blast every source of supply and communication line that Japan is now maintaining with such apparent freedom.” A Republican Congressman (Mr Harold Knutson), of Minnesota, has called for the transfer to the Pacific of every American submarine now m the Atlantic and Mediterranean, “to torpedo out of existence the now free sea lanes by which Japan is replenishing her island bases.” A "New York Sun" writer urges a greater flow of American ships, aeroplanes, and men to the Pacific front. He writes: “If the British Navy, is going to be any help io the United States in the Pacific, if the aircraft that are being built in such huge quantities are to be of avail to the meagre American forces in the Pacific. the time for that help is now. Il J is not given now the Japanese can consolidate their positions and entrench themselves for several years. It may be assumed that the United Slates has put into the Pacific a relativclv small force to carry on a major war.’ If all eyes are fixed on Europe and the Pacific is to wait its turn, the co: i in the end may be /so big that when the Americans some day gel the facts they will protest bitterly at the neglect of our forces :n the Pacific." , ~ An Australian reflection ol the succinct, assessment of the Pacific war situation by the military correspondent of ihe “New York _ Times’ (Hanson Baldwin) that “it is nearly five months since ihe Marines stormed Guadalcanal —and we arc still 3400 miles from Tokio," comes from tne “Sydney Morning Herald, which expresses' the opinion that an Allied holding policy in this theatre plays into Japan's hands. “The bitter Gona-Buna struggle may well be visualised as a microcosm of the whole Pacific war,” says the “Sydney Morning Herald,” in a leading article. “Just as the Japanese have entrenched themselves in New Guinea by making the utmost use of the time between the invasion and the counterattack, so they are clinching their grip on the vast empire they have overrun, consolidating it within a protective ring and striving to extract from its resources the means of carying on a protracted war. Time is on their side in the sense that the longer they are left in possession the harder it will be to throw them out.” There is little doubt, however, that those responsible for the United Nations’ global strategy now view the Pacific war much more sympathetically than may have been the case six months ago. The increased numbers of Allied troops at various bases in this theatre are clearly not intended for purely defensive purposes. It may be that valid criticism of the Allied holding policy will be answered not by the obvious slow and costly development of the present Papuan and Solomons campaigns, but by bolder strokes. Lieutenant-General C. Emmons, Hawaiian military governor, who recently returned from Washington, said the Government of the island would be returned to the civilian

authority to the greatest possible extent consistent, with Oahu’s development as an offensive base.

JAPANESE LOSSES

(Rec. 11 a.m.) NEW YORK, Dec. 23. The Japanese are beginning to feel the effects of the war of attrition in the Pacific, says Hanson Baldwin, writing in'the “New York Times.” In the past year, the sinkings of Japanese merchant shipping exceeded the rate of construction. The Navy suffered severe losses, particularly carriers. However, Japanese air power felt the greatest strain. Japan lost 1500 planes in the Solomons campaign alone. Her aircraft losses are possibly' greater than replacements, which are only 1200 monthly.

“FLOATING ISLAND" SYDNEY, December 23

Another Japanese attempt to disguise a ship as a floating island has gone awry. The latest attack on a foliage covered enemy vessel was at Arawe in New Britain. Penetrating the camouflage, Flying Fortresses scored hits amidships with 5001 b bombs, sinking a medium-sized cargo vessel which is believed to have been bound for the north coast of New Guinea.

The Japanese have adopted the “floating island” camouflage from the Allies, who first used it in Java. Ships are covered with trees and foliage and hug the shore, making them difficult to separate from their inland backgrounds.

DUTCH EAST INDIES

LONDON, December 23

British naval aircraft have carried out heavy attacks on military targets on the island of Sabang, off the northern end of Sumatra in the Netherlands East Indies. An Admiralty communique says that the raid was made on Sunday night. Large explosions occurred, and wore followed by fires. Sabang. which commands the entrance to the Malacca Passage, is 1000 miles from Ceylon.