JAPANESE AT BUNA

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 20959, 5 December 1942, Page 3

JAPANESE AT BUNA

ENEMY’S HEAVY PRICE

SAVAGE BEACH FIGHTING

(By Telegraph--Press Assn. —Copyright.) (10.40 a.m.) SYDNEY, Dec. 5.

Fighting along the Buna-Gona front is becoming still “closer, tougher ancl fiercer,” a south-wesl Pacific General Headquarters spokesman declared to-day.

No marked positional changes in the Papuan land battle are reported in General McArthur’s latest communique. But Australian troops are pressing in relentlessly near Gona and have now isolated an enemy force in a beach strip 40 or 50 yards long by 200yds. deep. The Japanese are still lighting savagely within this small sector, but are paying a high price in their last-ditch stand. Over 40 or 50 enemy dead have been counted on the outskirts of the area and some hundreds of wounded must have been moved within the defences. .In the Buna village area, war correspondents still write of the Japanese resistance as “fanatical.” Snipers have to_be “picked off almost every Lee” and machine-gun nests reduced one by one. Many of these posts are ■built of fuel dumps filled with sand. They provide staunch buffers against Allied fire. Barges of Troops Sunk

Air fighting is still raging over the contracting battlefield. It is nowrevealed that on Wednesday Beaufighters strafed and sunk four enemy barges off Gona. Two of the barges each carried 20 Japanese. No further reports have been received of the withdrawal of the Japanese convoy of reinforcements, which, at dawn on Wednesday, was reported to be 40 miles north of Buna. Some days may elapse before the benefits of the latest Allied land gains become apparent. At Gona the Japanese are now completely cut' off from retreat along the coast towards Salamaua. The Allied •drive on Sananaida is expected to provide a line of advance, enabling our forces to avoid many of the swamps protecting the Japanese fortified positions. In their drives our men have by-passed some enemy strongpoints and the mopping-up of these is reported to be proceeding. Like German Fighters

Airmen who took part in the attacks against the Japanese destroyer convoy which was forced to flee from Buna early on Wednesday morning, say that some of the enemy fighters which protected the convoy strongly resemble German ME 109 s.

An American general interviewed the crews of the giant four-engined Liberator bombers when they returned to their base after attacking the convoy. One gunner claimed to have shot down a Zero. “But this is the first time you ever a Zero,” said the general. “Are you certain that you shot it down, and that it did not just dive away from you.” A note of grave uncertainty was discernible in the gunner’s voice as he answered: “I think I must have destroyed it, sir. 1 saw one wing fall off and the Zero began to drop. As it rolled down, the other wing seemed t.o tear apart. What was left of the plane fell into the sea.”