FIGHT FOR INDIA ARMY OF 3,600,000

New Zealand Herald, Volume 79, Issue 24244, 9 April 1942, Page 7

FIGHT FOR INDIA

ARMY OF 3,600,000

NO FBESH BOMBINGS NAVAL CLASH EXPECTED PLANE-CARRIERS SOUGHT (Eecd. 0.35 p.m.) LONDON, April 8 An alert was sounded in Madras early on Tuesday morning, but no enemy aircraft appeared. Monday's raids on Vizagapatam and Cocanada were made by five aircraft in each instance and the casualties were light. There have been no more Japanese raids on India or on shipping in the Bay of Bengal since Monday, states a New Delhi message received to-day. The battle for control of the Indian

Ocean is considered to have opened -with the Japanese air attack on Colombo, and in the concentration of enemy naval forces in the Bay of Bengal. Japan is expected by some London observers to throw greater forces into this battle than into the assault against Australia. The Evening Standard's naval correspondent writes: "News is expected any day now of a battle between our Indian Ocean naval forces and one or more Japanese aircraft-carriers, but distances are so great that the finding of raiders is as difficult as destroying them."

COLOMBO'S DEFENCE INSPIRATION TO OTHERS SEARCH FOR PARATROOPS X- . LONDON, April 7 Tribute is paid in London to Colombo's successful defence against the Japanese air assault. The Times says: "It was the reward of courage and efficiency such as other threatened cities and bases in the area will be inspired to emulate. Inhabitants of Colombo, whose gentle appearance and suave manners seem ill-suited to the age, behaved, as Admiral Sir Geoffrey Layton said, no less courageously and calmly than Londoners when they first met their ordeal of courage. , "The man-in-the-street would, however, have been of little avail but for the efficiency of the defence Services and the smooth co-operation of the various branches. This time, if anyone was surprised, it was the attacker. The enemy aircraft which were certainly destroyed amounted to nearly half of the whole ..attacking force, and as for the rest, tile-return of damaged aircraft to a carrier ship is more difficult than return'to a land base." The hunt is now proceeding for the Japanese who baled out over Ceylon. Like every other territory in that ocean, Ceylon has been reconnoitred for years with a view to the coming struggle and among the warriors who fall to earth in Ceylon some may be far from helpless fugitives.

30,000 AEROPLANES UNITED STATES OBJECTIVES (Eecd. 6.30 p.m.) WASHINGTON, April 7 The Senate unanimously passed the 19,062.000,000 dollars War Appropriations Bill, containing a modified compromise measure for limiting war profits. The compromise provision, which gives the Government authority to renegotiate contracts which might yield unreasonable profits, was advanced by Administration leaders in order to avoid the passage of the flat 6 per cent profit limit previously voted by the House of Representatives. Profit restriction faces further modification by a joint House and Senate committee that will meet in an attempt to adjust many differences between the two chambers over the huge wartime fund bill. The bill carries funds for 30,000 aeroplanes and equipment for the army of 3,600,000 expected to be in the field by the end of the year.

FERRYING PLANES WIDE-SPREAD OPERATIONS PROGRESS IN UNITED STATES (Reed. 5.35 p.m.) WASHINGTON, April 7 The Army Air Force Ferrying Conimand is flying aeroplanes to Russia, China, Australia and other beneficiaries of Lease-Lend over world-wide routes, the War Department disclosed to-day in announcing changes in the Command. Colonel Harold George assumed charge of the Ferrying Command, succeeding Brigadier-General Olds, who will be transferred to another assignment. The War Department said that under General Olds' direction in ten months the Flying Command had been so expanded that it is now conducting operations on a larger scale than civil air lines in America. It has established a world-wide network of communications, weather stations and bases. Necessarily, details must be secret, but the ferrying operations emphasise the war's global character. Untold tales of heroism are written in the daily reports of these fliers, who are building a system of airways to supply the United Nations' needs.

SOLDIERS KILLED EXPLOSION OF AMMUNITION, CAIRO, April It An explosion of captured Italian ammunition on a lighter wharf near Suez kilHed eight British soldiers and 22 Egyptian workers, while 80 more Egyptian workers are missing. The ammunition was .being unloaded from a ship when it exploded, * i