“NO SOFT PEACE”

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21816, 12 September 1945, Page 5

“NO SOFT PEACE”

BE ATEN_ ENEMY AUSTRALIAN DEMAND AVENGING OF CRIMES (Special Australian Correspondent.) (10 a.m ) SYDNEY. Sept. 12. Australia is adding a loud voice to those protesting against a soft peace for Japan. Day after day the press and public are complaining about the “gloved hand” policy -which General MacArthur has hitherto pursued. The publication of Sir William Webb’s report on Japanese atrocities has brought a fresh flood of cries for vengeance and demands that the guilty be brought to justice. As the Sun says: “All ~tfe people stand solidly behind the Government c c Australia in insisting that Japan’s war crimin als, from the highest to the lowest shall be made to pay for their crimes. The Sun adds: “There is a widespread fear that the Japanese leaders and the people are getting away with the idea of a successful defeat The Allies owe it to the world to sec that peace is made harder for Japan until the last bowing and smiling sadist is convinced there can be ho “return to Singapore in 20 years’ time.” (The Japanese commander of Singapore, LieutenantGeneral Itagaki 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-speaking world by the mounting flood of stories of Japanese atrocities will become the deciding factor in shaping the peace terms for Japan Deciding Factor in Peace

The Sydney Morning Herald, in an editorial, say's: “We are learning with the most profound distrust that the ultimate expression of Japanese military honour lies in the vilest methods of murder and torture. 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 the 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 no forceful steps have yet been taken to bring the individual nerpetrators of atrocities to justice, but little attention seems to have been given so far to impressing upon the Japanese people the nature and consequences of their defeat. Mission to Camps Urged

The Daily Telegraph _ supports the suggestion that Australia should fly delegates to centres where Australian soldiers and civilians have been interned by the Japanese. On return, the delegates would speak authoritatively of the horrors the Japanese perpetrated and could impress a picture of Japanese cruelty on the .records of civilisation for all time.

The Daily Telegraph recalls that Britain and America sent a similar delegation to see the horror camps of Germany and its report hardened the hearts of the Allies and ensured that the German war crimmals would never escape. The Daily Telegraph says: “We must bring the facts clearly to the people of the world for, on the world’s- understanding we have to depend fjor policies which will preserve us against the rise of the same elements in \Japan again.”