ENEMY EVACUATION

New Zealand Herald, Volume 79, Issue 24369, 3 September 1942, Page 3

ENEMY EVACUATION

MILNE BAY MYSTERY HEAVY JAPANESE LOSSES (Heed. 10.55 p.m.) SYDNEY, Sept. 2 Jungle fighting of the guerilla type continues at Milne Bay, says to-day's communique referring to the continued mopping-up by Australian troops. Increased numbers of dead Japanese are being found by advancing Australians. Whatever the reason for the Japanese withdrawal, it was certainly a hurried operation. Religious considerations as well as a fear that enemy intelligence might discover valuable information from notebooks and equipment ordinarily impel the Japanese to gather their dead before retiring. On this occasion even some of the wounded were left behind. No estimate of the Japanese casualties at Milne Bay is yet possible, but there is growing evidence: that substantial losses were inflicted on the enemy by Australian militiamen stationed at the beach. The defenders ambushed one newly-landed detachment and killed more than 200.

Hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition were expended by Australian fighter pilots in attar-king enemy personnel. They are known to have caused heavy casualties. One airman | has told how he killed a group of 50 j -Japanese who were having a meal in a I jungle clearing. j Among the equipment left behind by | the enemy were flamethrowers, which j the enemy have introduced for the first j time in the Pacific war. There is no evidence that flamethrowers were used | at Milne Bay, but it is thought they j may have been carried as an experij merit in terrorising atactics. I Observers here are increasingly mysi tificd by the enemy withdrawal. ''There ! is no blinking the fact that the Japan- | ese evacuation of Milne Bay came as a I complete surprise," the war corresponj dent of the Sydney Morning Herald | says. "It is difficult to understand why, j holding temporary control of the sea i lanes leading to Milne Bay, the Japani ese did not attempt to reinforce rather | than take off their troops." ! SEA CONTROL THE KEY DECISIVE SUCCESS WANTED SYDNEY, Sept. 2 ! The military correspondent of the I Sydney Morning Herald issues a warnI ing that the Japanese threat to Port 1 Moresby has not abated, and that the I revival of aggressive enemy activity | in the Lae. Safamaua and Kokoda seci tor.s must be correlated with the Jap- ! anese plans to converge on Port | Moresby from other directions. "Sea control is the key to the situation," he says. "The position at sea must be resolved decisively in our favour before j there can be any strategical safety in | the South-west Pacific." USE OF MEXICAN PORTS PROPOSAL FOR ALLIES (Reed. 10.35 p.m.) MEXICO CITY, Sept. '2 The President of Mexico, General ! Manuel Camacho, has sent a message j to Congress saying he was shortly subI mining to it a measure extending to : Furopean Powers fighting the Axis the | right for their warships and planes to j j use Mexican {>orts and airfields, i He lias also announced that he is I ! creating a national defence council to < govern wartime production and co-ordin-! ate the whole war effort. The council j will be composed of representative of the Government, of agriculture, of labour, business, industry and the professions. He expressed his unshakable faith in i the final triumph of the United Nations. j "Our chief duty," he said, "is to co- I operate with the democracies to speed j the end of the war." He emphasised ' Mexico's cordial relations with the j I'nited States and recalled that his ' country .bad pledged herself to use all her resources in the fight against the Axis, and had agreed not to conclude a separate armistice or peace. He added that the Mexican Army had been com- ! pletely reorganised and equipped with ; modern material. BEAUFIGHTER'S VICTORY | LONDON, Sept. 1 Three Arado ('German) float-planes took off from their base in occupied i France early yesterday afternoon, ft was their task to intercept U-boat hunters of j the Royal Air Force Coastal Command, ! Wfilinglon-Whitieys and Sunderlands. j Instead, they met a Coastal Command j Beniifighter, which in less than two I minutes sent two of them crashing to ] the sea. From other daylight patrols yester- j day one Fighter Command and one j Coastal Command aircraft are missing. ]