JAPAN’S SETBACKS

Grey River Argus, 18 June 1942, Page 5

JAPAN’S SETBACKS

What Are Her Reserves ?

NEW YORK, June 16. No Navy could withstand Japan’s Pacific losses, without being forced to curtail operations, says the Christian Science Monitor’s naval correspondent. • . , He adds the warning that Japans present strength cannot be estimated, since no exact information is available about her initial strength on December’ 7. , Speculating on the cause of Japan s infrequent exposure of her battleships, the correspondent says: This could be due either toi her lack oi faith in their usefulness, or the. desire to .husband'her meagre store for ultimate all-out attempt for mastery of the Pacific. Now is th P propitious moment for the United States navy to start a drive that will push back the Japanese to their islands. i ' . , The “New York Times’s” Washington correspondent believes the Aleutian Island victory, though smaller, may be fully comparable with Midway, and that the Japanese have now been driven beyond the AleutiansWake Island-Hawaii-Panama line, that marks the American sphere. He adds with this line secure, air and naval forces would be free to organise the offensive type of operations necessary to carrv the war to Japan, either from Australia, or west from Hawaii, by attempts to roll up the scattered Japanese bases and th'* forces planted in the mandated territories.