MAJOR CAMPAIGN

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 77, 24 October 1942, Page 5

MAJOR CAMPAIGN

URGED AGAINST JAPAN LAND DRIVE FROM INDIA REOPENING OF BURMA ROAD Sydney, Oct. 23. An immediate major Asiatic continental counter-offensive against the Japanese is being urged from many quarters. Far Eastern correspondents of Australian newspapers stress as the first necessity of the campaign to re-open the Burma supply route to China. Danger is foreseen that if Japan’s Asiatic successes arc further extended her defensive position will become so strengthened that her defeat will certainly be some years delayed and she may even become impregnable because of her manpower resources and the impossibility of cutting her off from raw materials. It is contended that advantage should be taken of Japan’s present pre-occu-pation with the South-West Pacific where she has been forced to divert considerable strength by the American success in the Solomons.

Some well informed observers are quoted as believing that following the rehabilitation of the Pacific position Japan’s next moves will be —(1) The invasion of Bengal to begin the conquest of India: and (2) the capture of Yunnan bordering on Upper Burma to prevent the Allies restoring the supply line to South China. Siberia will not be invaded until Germany achieves the maximum penetration of Russia in Europe and then only if Hitler destroys the Red Army’s offensive power. Edgar Snow, now the Far Eastern correspondent of the New York “Saturday Evening Post” and author of “Red Star Over China” and a leading authority on Far Eastern affairs, says Japan is reported to be planning to join her home islands to the Asiatic continent with an undersea tunnel to Korea. She is also working feverishly to complete the railways linking Bangkok, the Siamese capital, and Rangoon, the occupied-Burmese capital, the Lashio-Burmese terminus of the former supply route to China, Saigon, in souih Indo-China, and Singapore in order to ensure the free flow of vital rubber, oil, tungsten and chromium supplies. “The Allies can defeat Japan to-day only by a major campaign of cutting her off from these essential resources she is trying to secure ,” says Mr Snow. "The alternative —the successful invasion of Japan proper—can hardly be conceived without a continental base.” POLITICAL STRATEGY The primary move in a land drive on Japanese-held territory from India advocated by Mr Snow must be one of political strategy—the proclamation of freedom for all advanced colonial people. The Allies could thus count on full mobilisation of India’s and Burma's 400,000,000, he believes. “Then with only a small fraction of the American forces now being poured into Europe we could safeguard the remaining bases in East Asia and launen an early coun-ter-offensive to re-open Burma and restore China’s active front” REINFORCEMENTS FOR INDIA Mr Snow urges America to reinforce India at much greater strength. “In a lew months that opportunity will no longer exist. What can be done now with five divisions and 100 planes will afterwards require ten times that force. A war which can be fought now largely with Indian supplies on the spot may afterwards have to draw entirely on American bases 15.000 to 18,000 miles distant.” Mr Snow observes that Japan to-day is the world's second largest empire populated by 500,000,000 people, xf India were conquered Tokio would rule more than half the men and women on the earth.. “Tokio hopes we will continue to neglect our Asiatic bases until we shall have none left when the time comes to support our eventual Pacific counter-offensive.”—P.A. Special Australian Correspondent.