ISLANDS RAIDED

New Zealand Herald, Volume 80, Issue 24747, 22 November 1943, Page 3

ISLANDS RAIDED

AMERICAN BOMBERS

GILBERTS AND MARSHALLS (Reed. 7.15 p.m.) WASHINGTON, Nov. 21 American bombers on Friday carried their offensive against the Japanese-held Gilbert and Marshall Islands into the seventh successive day, says the Tokyo radio. Five new attacks on Wednesday and Thursday have been announced by Admiral C. W. Nimitz, Commander-in-Chief of the United States Pacific Fleet.

Carrier-based planes also dropped 90 tons of bombs on Nauru Island, west of the Gilberts. This continued offensive suggests a softening-up of enemy island bases preparatory to a future Allied invasion. Planes From Carriers The latest raids are announced by Admiral Nimitz's Headquarters as follows: "Carrier-based planes raided Botio Island, in the Tarawa group, Gilbert Islands, starting large fires. Landbased Liberators struck at the barracks, aerodrome runways and oil dumps on the Milii atoll, one of the most southerly of the Marshall group. Liberators also bombed the Malodai seaplane base, just to the north."

Carrier-based planes made Thursday's raid on Nauru Island, causing fires on aerodromes and destroying several grounded planes and setting fire to a ship.

The Tokyo radio says the latest Allied air attack, made on Friday, was on the Gilberts. Raids on Central Pacific islands announced earlier last week included two heavy attacks on Jaluit Island, in the Marshalls, and another attack on Tarawa, in the Gilberts. Strategic Value of Islands

The continuing; American air attacks ' on the Marshall and Gilbert Islands indicate that the strategic spotlight of the Pacific war is now moving north to the equator, says the New \ork Times military writer, Hanson Baldwin. "Plainly the attacks by Army Liberators, which are probably based on Nanumea, the Ellice Islands, Funafuti and Canton," he adds, "are preliminary to assaults on and occupation _of islands strategically important, which represent the outer shield of Japan's vast Pacific empire. They are stationary, indestructible 'aircraft-carriers,' the occupation of which would provide the United States with land bases from which to carry the war to the Carolines, Truk, Wake and Guam, to outflank Japan's position at Rabaul, to threaten the enemy's supply line, and signalise the start of the strategic offensive in the Pacific." The New York Herald Tribune military writer, Major Fielding Eliot, recalls that General Mac Arthur recently claimed that the Japanese were able to concentrate air power at Rabaul because they were not being seriously attacked in any other area. Major Eliot suggests that repeated raids on the Marshall and Gilbert groups hare been partly designed to change the situation and compel the Japanese either to weaken their air power on General Mac Arthur's front or lose their Central Pacific islands for lack of defence.

ALLIED PLANES ACTIVE

DAMAGE IN SOLOMONS (Special Australian Correspondent) (Reed. 8.30 p.m.) SYDNEY, Nov. 21 The heaviest air activity reported in General Mac Arthur's week-end communiques has been in the Northern Solomons, where Admiral Halsey's bombers are relentlessly pounding the Japanese aerodromes in an effort to keep the planes out of commission. Saturday's communique reported the destruction of 18 enemy planes in the Solomons. Sixteen wer-> shot down when our Corsair fighter patrols intercepted a force of about 35 escorted torpedo and dive-bombers attacking our shipping south of the American beachhead at Empress Augusta Bay, Bougainville. We lost two Corsairs in this air battle, but the pilot of one was saved.

AMERICAN NAVAL LOSS (Reed. 0.20 p.m.) WASHINGTON, Nov. 20

The United States Navy has announced the loss of the destroyertransport MoKean, as a result of an enemy aircraft attack off Bougainville on November 17.

A destroyer-transport is a heavilyarmed transport ship.

SUPPLYING MacARTHUR

SENATE INQUIRY LIKELY (Reed. 7.40 p.m.) NEW YORK, Nov. 23 The Military Affairs Committee of ' | the United States Senate may hold an 1 inquiry to find the amount of war supplies being sent to the South-west Pacific. The inquiry has been proposed b.v Senator A. B. Chandler, chairman of the committee, who recently toured 1 the war zones, The New York Sun columnist, David Lawrence, says that the quantities of supplies being sent to General MacArthur are the results of decisions by the American joint chiefs of staff. He adds: "The impression that General M acArthur is not getting a fair deal must evidently prevail at his headquarters, because press despatches from there seem to convey scepticism and doubt." The Christian Science Monitor correspondent, Joseph ffarsch, says that probably the best tip for an early conference between President Roosevelt, Mr. Churchill and Marshal Stalin is General .Mac Arthur's latest reminder of insufficient forces. "Preceding each Roosevelt-Churchill conference, there I are little flurries of press statements emanating from General Mac Arthur's headquarters. They always say the South-west Pacific is insufficiently supplied—so when it came again a few days ago observers concluded that General I\l acArthur knew that another big strategy conference was impending." Colonel F. Knox, Secretary of the Navy, told a press conference that the Allies were ahead of schedule in their campaign to drive the Japanese from the South-west Pacific. Re discounted an.v likelihood of Japanese fleet units being en route to the Southern Pacific, saving that no enemy surface forces had been encountered in the area since November 2, when American Marines landed on Bougainville. Trustworthy reports reaching Chung- ! king say that heavy Japanese troon . movements from Manchukuo and North , China are in progress with the South- . west Pacific as the most likely destinaj tion.