MacArthur’s Position Neither Fish Nor Fowl

Northern Advocate, 20 November 1943, Page 4

MacArthur’s Position Neither Fish Nor Fowl

NEW YORK, November 19. A thorough survey of the Pacific west of the Solomons clearly demonstrates that Allied forces lack strength for a major thrust, says the “New York Daily News" correspondent (Jack Turcott) in a despatch from the South-west Pacific. This may be the deliberate policy of London and Washington, intended to save soldiers and planes for other areas, says the correspondent, but a premeditated publicity campaign in the United States proclaiming that the Pacific is now armed with half America’s power has certain “sinister implications.” Mr. Turcott asserts that he flow across the Pacific twice in the last seven weeks and observed impressive American strength at several oceanic bases which literally dot the Pacific eastward of the Japanese mandated islands. Indeed, the United States has thousands of combat planes and hundreds of thousands of soldiers in the Pacific, but the most sizeable portion of them defend places becoming more and more remote from active combat zones. Resources Out of Touch Strong installations at Fiji. Samoa. Hawaii and the Aleutians are naturally gratifying for the Americans, but they are all not available to General Mac Arthur, although he commands the only Pacific army zone where fighting is in progress. General MacArfhur is even unable to requisition Admiral Halsey’s fleet from the Solomons, New Hebrides and New Caledonia, although Washington, which apparently desires to leave a contrary impression, has blared forth the. announcement that Admiral Halsey is under General MacArthur’s command. Mr. Turcott concludes that General Mae Arthur’s position is -neither fish nor fowl, as United Stales officialdom restricts him from anything except minor campaigns. ■ If he commanded everything in the . Pacific, including the hundreds of thousands of Americans who have never seen, and probably never will see, action, he could redeem the Philippines within a year and then go on to defeat Japan.