MACARTHUR’S FORCES

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 78, 10 March 1943, Page 5

MACARTHUR’S FORCES

ILL-EQUIPPED AND UNDERMANNED NEW YORK PRESS STATEMENT New York, Mar. 8. “General MacArthur has been left ill-equipped and under-manned in Australia exactly as in the Philippines,” declares the New York journal “American” editorially. “Despite American mass production and mass mobilisation he is denied supplies of men necessary for a mass offensive against the Japanese, but he accomplished herculean, indeed almost miraculous results. He saved Port Darwin and Port Moresby, recovered Papua with little at hand, but always with discouragement and desperation dogging his heels and always with a sense of frustration. Every American believes a commander who has done so much with so little could have changed the whole course of the Pacific war and should be adequately armed and manned. With an adequate share of men and goods produced in the past year General MacArthur could have cleared the Japanese from all New Guinea, Timor and Rabaul by now. General MacArthur probably should command the entire American war effort on all fronts, but since he was delegated—in a sense relegated—to the Pacific why don’t we supply him with the men, planes and munitions needed to win completely that important war?” —P.A.