THE PACIFIC ZONE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24970, 17 July 1942, Page 3

THE PACIFIC ZONE

ALLIED OFFENSIVE URGED RELIEF FOR RUSSIANS CHUNGKING. July 15. “Both Germany and Japan are now making desperate bids, as they must score successes in the summer in order to enable them to sustain a long war.” The Chinese spokesman, stating this, added: “Thus the duration of the war will be determined by the crucial three months ahead.” He expressed the opinion that if the Allies could win back some of the Japanese positions in the south-west Pacific this summer the psychological as well as the material blow to Japan would be tremendous. The Minister of Information, Mr Wang Shih, said an Allied offensive launched from Australia against the Japanese in New Guinea and British Burma would have the same effect as a second front in Europe. “ German pressure on Russia,” he said, “ can be relieved by new Allied counter-attacks, both in the West and East, in Europe and in the Pacific. The Japanese are ready to attack Russia, and therefore attacks on Japan in the Pacific will take pressure off Russia.” The Tokio radio quoted a speech by the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs, Admiral Togo, in which he declared that the Soviet Government had assured Japan that the Russians’ new treaty of alliance with Britain and the agreement with the United States did not contain provisions regarding Japan. Admiral Togo added that the relations between Japan and the Soviet Union would continue to be regulated by the 1941 treaty of neutrality. FORMER MINISTER’S VIEWS SITUATION GRAVER THAN EVER LONDON, July 15. Mr L. Hore-Belisha, former Minister of War, in a speech, said he thought the situation and prospects at present were graver than ever, certainlv worse than at the time of the Battle of Britain. He added: “What a tragic commentary on our lost opportunities it is that, while the Russians are being pressed back across the River Don, we cannot take land action to relieve German pressure. There is something plainly wrong with our methods. Unless we drastically eradicate our shortcomings in organisation and personnel the time will come when it will be too late to avoid disaster.”