NO GROUNDS FOR COMPLACENCY

Southland Times, Issue 24996, 8 March 1943, Page 5

NO GROUNDS FOR COMPLACENCY

Australia Still In Danger (Special Australian Correspondent, N.Z.P.A.) (Rec. 10 p.m.) SYDNEY, March 7. Federal Ministers emphasize that the victory in the Bismarck Sea does not necessarily mean security in the southern Pacific. “Our worry today is that people are too inclined to complacency,” declared the Minister of Shipping and Supply, Mr J. A. Beasley, who said that the safer Australians felt the more reluctant they were to stand up to their responsibilities. Warning that the enemy would make new attacks, Mr Beasley added if the war ended tomorrow with the Japanese still in possession of the occupied islands, peace would be merely a respite with an inevitable new war in 20 years or sooner. The famous American war news analyst, Mr Raymond Gram Swing, says: “The annihilation of the convoy has not proved the impossibility of an enemy invasion of Australia, but it has proved that any invasion attempt would be ruinously costly.” ! Many American commentators believe that the Bismarck Sea convoy was part of a planned series of Japanese moves having the direct invasion of Australia as their ultimate aim. But whatever the basis for this conjecture, there is unlikely to be any confirmation from the Japanese, who have not mentioned the disastrous battle in any news broadcasts. “The Japanese weather man has probably committed harikiri by now,” commented a senior Allied Air Corps officer, discussing the factors contributing to the obliteration of the enemy armada. “Although flying conditions

were far from perfect for the great part of our air operations, tire heavy storm being used by the convoy as a protective cover did not extend as far south as was evidently expected. Our aircraft were able to find holes in the clouds through which to make their strikes.” A Washington message quotes an American Air Force general as saying that with no more than seven per cent, of the United States monthly output of planes he would guarantee to blast a way right to Tokyo. American war correspondents in the south-west Pacific are warning the United States against the assumption that the destruction of the convoy shows that General MacArthur has ample aircraft. The New York Times correspondent says: The Allied Air Forces in Australia are nothing like as big a fleet as some American commentators credit General MacArthur with having under his command. His air chief, LieutenantGeneral Kenny, could use many more planes—and evidently with very good effect. ENEMY PLANS UPSET “Japan was going ahead with plans to invade Australia when her 22 ship convoy met disaster in the Bismarck Sea,” declared Admiral Yates Stirling, former chief of the United States Naval Staff. “The Allied victory has greatly delayed Japan’s time-table and possibly stalled it for ever.” Admiral Stirling gives several reasons for his belief that Japan was developing plans for the invasion of Australia. These include: (1) For the first time Japan appears to have advanced as far as she can elsewhere. Her foothold in the Aleutians is weakening, the British have the initiative in Burma, while the Chinese fronts are holding. (2) She has available millions of troops and over 7,500,000 tons of shipping to throw into the effort. (3) She has built a powerful ring of air bases in the islands north of Australia despite frequent attacks by General MacArthur’s bombing and strafing planes.