GUERRILLA BANDS

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXII, Issue 264, 7 October 1942, Page 2

GUERRILLA BANDS

MANY JAPANESE KILLED. (N.Z. Press Association —Copyright.) (Special Australian Correspondent.) (Rcc. 12.10 p.m.) SYDNEY, Oct. 7. Australian soldiers who have been fighting behind the Japanese lines in New Guinea since March have been invalided home. The men were members of units cut off when the Japanese took Lac and Salamaua. They immediately organised themselves into guerrilla bands and conducted continual hide and seek warfare against the enemy. Frequently they crept down from hills and attacked Japanese aerodromes and encampments, blowing up runways and installations, set booby traps, laid land mines, and burned stores and equipment. So thoroughly did they learn the art of jungle warfare that three of them were able to hold off 100 Japanese, being armed only with tommy-guns. The Australians killed a dozen and then escaped. One night in June the party went into Salamaua and killed 90 Japanese with Bren and tommy-guns, antitank' bombs, and high explosives. Inc surprised troops rushed screaming to the beach. *. It had been an all-in war day and night, said one of the men. r lhc Australian casualties had been surpusingly small and few of our troops had fallen into Japanese hands. Comrades of the invalided men are still carrying on the fight.