Greymouth Evening Star. SATURDAY, JUNE 17, 1944. PACIFIC REVIEW.

Greymouth Evening Star, 17 June 1944, Page 4

Greymouth Evening Star. SATURDAY, JUNE 17, 1944. PACIFIC REVIEW.

lend themselves to predictions

and varying estimates, and few campaigns have been more notable in this respect than the Anglo-U.S.A.-Japanese conflict. One main school of these prophets is impressed with the might of Japan, and refuses to be comforted by Allied successes, declaring that the Japanese main armies have not been met, and that when it comes to dealing with the inner ring of Japanese defences, their navy and air force will make a much better showing. It also asserts that, on China’s fate depends the issue. If Chungking falls and the Chinese pull out of the war, the Anglo-Americans will be left “to carry a baby” that will be burdensome in the extreme, entailing years of conflict at

enormous cost of Allied lives and money. There are other jeremiads but the foregoing will be enough 1o go on with. The other school, the optimists, is mainly American, with Mr. Roosevelt as the chief prophet. In a recent loan-drive speech, he declared that Japan was faced with early surrender, or national suicide. Mr. Stimson, Secretary for War, is also confident that Japanese strength has been over-rated, if qualifying his assurances with the warning that the utmost effort by the Americans is still necessary. Admiral Halsey in his farewell message 1o lhe men serving in the Southern Pacific, reminded them of what has already been achieved against the Japanese, and predicted greater things to come. It is not to be expected that American Service chiefs would be publicly despondent about the prospects, but the extent of their optimism is significant. Tojo also gives his “pep” talks, and promises that it will be the Japanese who will initiate an offensive, but if any in his audiences are informed concerning the developments in the war against the Anglo-U.S.A., they must find it difficult to accept even half of what he claims as well-founded. The U.S.A, naval and aerial forces are drawing closer to the Japanese mainland, from North, Past and South. This week’s bombing of the enemy mainland by supciFortresses was but a herald of future and larger attacks on Tokio and elsewhere. These raids will do more to impress the Japanese people than the larger and more important successes by the Americans in the Carolines or further south. The Japanese army which until lately could afford to ridicule the Japanese navy for its poor showing and reluctance to fight, now has its own wounds to lick. Japanese soldiers have had to take hidings in the Southern Pacific and Burma and must be losing confidence. They are discovering that fighting ill-equipped and mostly untrained Chinese is much easier than meeting expert Allied forces with all the latest armaments at their command. Tf Pearl Harbour gave the Japanese impression that the Americans were “easy meat,” subsequent events must have made the Japanese think again. Month after month, Japan has continued to lose ships and planes by the score, and however large her resources, the total effect must be now felt seriously. Ou the other hand, the Allies are not yet at the peak of their armaments production. The fact that the major attack against Germany is being accompanied by greater offensives in the Pacifie must cause Tojo and his colleagues to think of what will happen to Japan, once all the Allied effort can be directed against her. A review of the vdiole Pacific situation, to-day, suggests that the optimists among the Allies are more justified than the pessimists.