NOTES ON THE WAR

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 51, Issue 3175, 28 September 1942, Page 8

NOTES ON THE WAR

mandorski Islands in the Behring

Sea. It was probably, to neutralise these bases that the Japanese occupied Ottu and Kiska in the Aleutian group with the design of hampering American aid to Siberia if Japan should decide to attack the Soviet.

Aid otherwise than by air would be difficult, for the sea outlets to Eastern Siberia, including Vladivostock, are completely masked by the Japanese islands running up to the Up of Kamchatka. The Japanese naval base of Paramushiro is only eight miles from the Kamchatkan shore.

But the United States ba« been strengthening its position in Alaska and improving bases there and a highway through Canada to Alaska should now be well advanced. Across Behring Strait the distance to the Siberian mainland is short, but road communication with the area threatened by any Japanese attack will be long and difficult.

JAPAN’S NEXT MOVE? WHAT IS SHE PLANNING? THREAT FROM VLADIVOSTOCK Apart from the prolonged battle for Stalingrad, which, with the Germans in the outskirts of the city, has risen to a new pitch of intensity calculated to hasten a decision one way or the other, there is a comparative lull in the fighting almost everywhere else, at least on land. The Middle East has been quiet for some time past, but so is the Far East now. Nothing but “patrol activity” is reported even on the recently fiercely active front in Chekiang. It is a case of “all quiet on the Far Eastern front.”

It cannot be suggested that this curious state of affairs represents a “stalemate” an equilibrium of force! leaving both sides content to stay put. The Japanese aggressors in the Far East have so far suffered no great disaster nor has the attrition of war gone so far as to reduce Japanese strength to the point where it must remain passive or on the defensive. The recently-conquered new empire in the south has reached the limits of strategic security already, and any attempt at further advance in this direction —towards Australia and New Zealand—could hardly commend itself to the shrewd military heads of Japan as worth the cost. iPort /Moresby and. the Solomons would, of course, come within the defensive boundary and are therefore likely to remain objectives for security reasons.

Any attack on India would be a risky operation, again hardly likely to be worth the trouble, when Japan has already a good frontier to her “sphere” in Burma.

The complete conquest of Southern China would have much to recommend it from the standpoint of a roundedoff southern Japanese empire, but the withdrawals in Chekiang after earlier successes in this to indicate that Japan has plans for her- military forces. Ts it not probable that these include, first and foremost, an attack, in eastern Siberia, while the Soviet is fighting for its life in Stalingrad?

Importance of Siberia

That part of the Siberian mainland which faces northern Japan at a distance of a few hundred miles —Vladivostock is only 605 miles in an airline from Tokio—is a standing danger to Japanese security. The new Japanese empire can never be safe if the heart of Japan itself is at the mercy of air attack as such close quarters. The fate of western Germany under air bombardment by' the R.A.F. must be a constant reminder to the Japanese of the danger to themselves unless they can eliminate the air bases in Siberia by conquest. This is a cardinal factor in the Japanese attitude towards Russia. It led to the Manchurian conquest, which began just over eleven years ago and has been followed by frontier brushes with the Russians ever since. .Altogether, it is stated, there have been over 3000 engagements, varying from patrol clashes to pitched battles, between Russian and Japanese forces on the Manchukuo-Siberian frontier in these years.

In the Changkufeng Hill battle in August, 19'38, heavy artillery, tanks, and aeroplanes were used, and the Japanese got the worst of it. Chaiigkufeng Hill was found to command with its artillery the railway from the new Japanese naval base at Seishin, in Korea, to join the elaborate military rail system in Manchukuo. Both Sides Prepared

Both sides have prepared for a clash in this region. The Japanese have built strategic railways—of no economic value—throughout Northern Manchukuo, fanning out to various points of the frontier. From these points they could strike at the TransSiberian railway where it skirts the Amur River, a few miles to the north and where it leaves the river at Khabarovsk to skirt the frontier to Vladivostock.

Strategically the advantage is to the Japanese who have much shorter lines of communication grouped within a compact salient. The Russians have given the problem of the defence of Eastern Siberia, particularly the Maritime Province, a great deal of attention, and they are not likely to -be caught napping. The whole area has been built up as a defence unit, with its own resources in raw materials and war industries. 'Both sides have naval bases in the areas between Japan and Siberia, often at easy distances from one another. The Russian bases include Petropavlosk in Kamchatka and Ko(Continued in previous column)