HISTORY OF PACIFIC WAR

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 4704, 17 August 1945, Page 3

HISTORY OF PACIFIC WAR

Japan launched her tremendous attack on Britain and America with the notorious raid on Pearl Harbour on December 7, 1941. Her treachery gave her an initial advantage, and in a comparatively short time she had overrun valuable British, American- and Dutch territories in the Far East and the Pacific and islands of groat strategic importance.

Early in 1942 Australia and New Zealand were under the threat of invasion, but the battle of the Coral Sea halted the Asiatic onrush and gave the Allies a valuable breathing space. General Douglas Mac Arthur, rescued from the Philippines, removed the threat to Australia with a series of masterly blows, while at the same time the American Naval Command in the South-West Pacific loosened the enemy’s grip on the Solomons and New Britain.

Then came Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz’s island-hopping advance across the central Pacific. Command of Iwo Jima and Okinawa enabled the Americans to mount a terrific aerial offensive against the Japanese homo islands and to prepare for the invasion of the homeland. Japanese reverses in Burma and the Australian invasion of Borneo added to the discomfiture of the Tokio war-lords. Then came the Potsdam declaration which called upon the Japanese to surrender, but the ultimatum was ignored.

The steadily mounting* aerial offensive culminated in the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, which, together with the Russian declaration of war less than a week later, finally convinced Japan’s leaders that resistance was futile.