OCCUPATION BY JAPANESE

Southland Times, Issue 24499, 29 July 1941, Page 5

OCCUPATION BY JAPANESE

Planes And Vehicles At Saigon LONDON, July 27. ' The Japanese occupation of IndoChina has begun. The main forces Will I arrive between now and Thursday, Japanese planes and army vehicles i arrived at Saigon yesterday. Four ' Japanese destroyers are now at Saigon 1 and a cruiser and three destroyers are lat Camranh Bay. Japan has demanded i that Thailand join “the New Order in I East Asia” according to a statement i issued by the Chungking Board of I Military Operations. ■ The Domei News Agency stated that measures to counter British and American encirclement had been considered by the Thai Government. The agency adds that an emergency meeting of the Thai Government ordered its air force to prepare for emergency. British newspapers are warning Japan that Britain would be compelled to resist any Japanese attempt to occupy Thailand, as such action would menace Singapore. I The clamping down of the British ! and American “long-distance blockade | on Japan’s war factories is regarded in London as a red light warning that any I further aggression would mean war. ; AMERICAN FLEET AT SEA I A report originating in London says the United States Pacific fleet is on the high seas, but officially this cannot be confirmed. President Roosevelt’s order bringing the military and naval forces of the Philippines under the command of the armed forces of the United States and the reports of the strengthening of the Singapore defences are regarded in the United Sattes as an indication that Britain and the United States are prepared to fight if necessary to protect their interests in the Pacific. Authoritative quarters in London believe that Japanese aggression against Indo-China has so long been anticipated that British and American preparations have been amply taken. It is probable that no British or American ship will, have to be withdrawn from the Atlantic or the Mediterranean, nor will other British programmes in Europe or Africa be weakened in order fully to protect Pacific interests. In The New York Herald-Tribune, Major George Fielding Eliot, the wellknown military correspondent, says that the current coup leaves Japan far from her goal. Her Indo-China supply lines are vulnerable to attack from Hong Kong and Manila. There are no roads to enable the Japanese to concentrate men and supplies in Indo-China for a great campaign against Thailand and British Malaya. Indo-China itself cannot support a great offensive of any kind. “If the Western powers, with or without Soviet aid, stick firmly together and determine to resist with armed force any further Japanese aggression they still have every means of doing so,” he says. “The Japanese move in Indo-China does not greatly improve Japan’s position. It can be dangerous to our interests in the Far East only if we permit it to become so.”