WAR IN PACIFIC

Grey River Argus, 11 May 1945, Page 4

WAR IN PACIFIC

allied offensives Successes Continued (Rec 810) WASHINGTON, May 9. General MacArthur in his communique on Wednesday stated: —- Sweeping across Davao Gulf, in a shore movement, units of our 24th. Division have landed on Samal, off the Mindanao mainland. They are rapidly clearing the island. Strong pressure is being exerted on the enemy’s positions in the Talomo River area. A bridgehead has been established across the river north of Mintal. “Our 31st. Division thrust seven miles eastward from Kibawe, while our northern spearhead is engaging M'aramag airstrip. “Our ground forces, with heavy air support, carried on mopping up an enemy force near a southern operations along our northern Luzon front, and continued to advance towards 110 in the central sector. “On Tarakan our forces have secured Api Hill, north of the airfield, and are advancing on the Djoeata oilfields. “Our bombers and fighters struck at Kudat aerodrome and also port installations in Brunei Bay, Miri and Bandjermasin. Widespread destruction is reported at shipyards and runways. The entire waterfront at Labuan Island was left in flames, with smoke rising 5000 feet. Search planes, sweeping shore lines, sank three coastal vessels. Patrol planes attacked Formosa. Escorted heavy and medium bombers raided Saigon. Our sea blockading planes ranged from Sumatra to Shanghai, sinking a destroyer, a sub-chaser and two freighters. Our heavy bombers attacked aerodromes in southern Celebes, and patrol planes attacked shipping in coastal sectors of the Netherlands East Indies. Neutralising attacks on New Guinea, the Bismarck and Solomon Islands were continued. * 1 Admiral Nimitz’s communique says —Our aircraft, ships and guns continued to support our 10th. Army troops in southern Okinawa on Tuesday. Adverse weather continued. Oui- troops continued to move southwards on Wednesday. Our Okinawa casualties up to Monday comprised 2684 killed, 13,020 wounded and 539 missing. Aircraft from carriers of the British Pacific Fleet bombed the Sakishima Islands, destroying two planes on the ground, and shooting down another. Two units of the British force suffered minor damage during an enemy air raid, but they remained operational. Their aircraft attacked Kisarazu airfield and Tateyama naval air station, south-east of Tokio, and also Marcus, Truk and Palau Islands. Lieutenant-General Giles, the new Commander of the Army Air Forces in the Pacific Ocean areas, has forecast a greater round-the-clock torrent of bombs against Japan than fell on Germany, says the New York “Times” Guam correspondent. Gen. Giles added that in addition planes from Europe and the greatly expanded fleet of Superfortresses, with new types, would be used, including the A. 26 'attack bomber and i 8.3-2 Dominator, which was a counterpart of the Superfortress, also the P.BO, a jet-propelled fighter, used on a few missions over Europe. He said targets will be decided by a panel of several hundred experts.

U.S. AIR RAIDS IN JAPAN. (Rec. 9.50). WASHINGTON, May 10. The U.S. 20th Air F'orce announced that more, than four hundred Superfortresses in daylight to-day (Thursday) attacked industrial and military, areas at, the southern tip of Honshu, Jaoan. for the first time. Other Superfortresses attacked air installations on Kyushu. JAP FUEL SUPPLY RAIDED (Rec. 12.30) NEW YORK, May 10. The United Press correspondent at Guam says: Superfortresses on May 10 dropped between 2000 and 3500 tons of explosives on targets which included a storage area, in Japan’s largest Tokuyama synthetic fuel factory, the main source for army planes to take oil. The refinery is one of the Japanese largest. General Giles told the Press that Japan’s fuel supply will be a high priority target. LONG WAR WITH JAPAN. NO SIGN, OF' GIVING IN. (Rec. 11.0). WASHINGTON, May 9. Mr Vinson, reporting to ' President Truman, said that war against Japan would grow in severity over a prolonged period. He expressed the view that the Japanese will fight to the bitter end. Mr Vinson pointed out that Japan has two great strengths. One is the willingness of her soldiers to die to the last man, rather than surrender. The other is her geographical position, making her hard to get at. Japan has an army of four million men, of which less than onefourth are sojith of Formosa and China. Japan also has several millions fit for service who have-not yet been called up'. Although the Japanese! fleet is crippled, it can still strike damaging blows in the waters protected by Japan’s land-based aviation. Japan’s air force is still a powerful defensive factor.

(Rec. 10.20) NEW YORK, May 9. Mr Grew (Acting-Secretary of State) commented on a flood of vague peace rumours. He denied that any peace offer, conditional or otherwise, has been made by Japan. HUGE U.S. WAR BILL WASHINGTON, May 9. The Secretary to the Treasury,, Mr. Morgenthau, disclosed that the United States’ total expenditure on World War II in Europe and against Japan to V Day amounted to £275,703 million dollars. World War I cost only 25,729 million dollars to November 30, 1921. CUT WAR TAXES NOW! SAYS U.S.A. SENATOR. (Rec. 11.40) NEW YORK, May 10. Senator George (chairman of the Senate Finance Committee) at a Press conference said; Congress must face the problem of post-war taxes immediately, and must provide for substantial reductions, both in corporation taxes and individual income taxes to be effective in 1946, even on an assumptic-n that war against Japan will last another year. The “Herald-Tribune” says: Senator George’s statement sharply disagrees with Mr Vinson’s view on taxes. Senator George added: “It would be very unfortunate for the country if we do not pull down our taxes by 1946. The world does not stand still. The wartime taxes cannot continue for a single moment when the war is over. The whole economy of the i country will suffer if the taxes are I not cut at the -earliest possible date, l JAPAN’S DETERMINATION. j NEW YORK, May 9. According to the Tokio radio the

Japanese Cabinet issued a statement expressing deep regret at the surrender of Germany, which shared a. common objective with Japan—self-ex-istence and self-defence. It addedThe sudden change in the .war situation will not bring the slightest change to our war objective. Japan will devote a total effort towards the complete destruction of the uniust sSte". ° f Bl ' l,ain “e Unftei