The Timaru Herald SATURDAY, MAY 19, 1945. Importance Of Okinawa

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVII, Issue 23205, 19 May 1945, Page 4

The Timaru Herald SATURDAY, MAY 19, 1945. Importance Of Okinawa

JHE determined resistance of the Japanese on Okinawa, the island in the archipelago lying some 300 miles south of the Japanese mainland, is sufficient evidence of the importance the enemy attaches to this territory. The loss of Okinawa—and it will be lost—means that the mainland, already being blasted daily by air attack, will come easily within the range of an increasing number of land-based planes. On Okinawa there has already been some of the most savage and costly fighting of the Pacific war and it is clear that the enemy is determined to make a supreme effort to hold off the Americans because he knows that if he cannot slay the Allied advance on this island, then he has no chance of holding it anywhere. To that extent one of the decisive battles in the Pacific is now being fought on Okinawa. Of the islands leading to the mainland Okinaw'a seems to be the best defended so far. Old stone buildings and tombs have formed the basis of a skilfully constructed defence system which cannot be shattered with less than direct hits from the heaviest missiles. Therefore American progress has been slow, but advances are being made and it seems probable now that the core of resistance will not be able to stand for much longer. The complete occupation of the island will bring the war almost to its final phase, and if this fact is kept in mind the apprehension now apparent in Japan becomes understandable. There can no longer any doubt that the Allies plan to make a direct assault upon the Japanese mainland; the “softening up” process has already begun, and the war is following the pattern which proved so successful in Europe. Continuous American air attacks on great Japanese cities must already have done useful disruptive work, and it was proved in Germany that a country can endure a long period of bomb"”'ing before the process of disorganisation is complete. Possession of Okinawa would provide a base from which combined Allied air forces could operate against Japan, and once the island is occupied there is certain to be intensification of the air raids upon the mainland. While everything points to a great concerted attack upon Japan itself, there-is other fighting to be done which will absorb the attention of large Allied forces. Before the war is finished it will be necessary to dislodge the Japanese from all the places they occupy. The campaign in Burma provides a good example of the kind of fighting yet to be done. Just as it was necessary to smash and destroy the German army, so it will be necessary to eliminate the Japanese in all the territory where they are established. When the enemy is cleared from Burma that eliminating process will need to be continued into Malaya and also into China. That Japanese strength is diffused in this way makes it improbable that unconditional surrender of the kind made in Germany will be possible in the Pacific War. The Japanese seem likely to fight on in every place where they are established; this will probably cause the war to linger on for a long time and the “mopping up” operations seem almost certain to continue after the issue has been obviously decided against Japan itself. Japan could be occupied and yet the war might continue for two or three years before the last verdict is won. Post-War Planning r pHE Royal Swedish Commission on Post-War Economic Planning, under the chairmanship of Professor Gunnar Myrdal, has for some months been engaged in studying the problem of post-war employment. Almost simultaneously with the publication of the White Paper on Employment Policy in Great Britain, the Commission issued a “comment” recommending that public investment should be varied in the opposite direction to private investment. Its most recent memorandum states, however, that “the question of co-ordinating municipal investments with the Government’s general anti-cyclical policy has so far not been satisfactorily solved. The possibilities of fitting municipal investments into the general employment policy by expending them during a depression and by restricting them during a boom have as yet been too limited.” The recognition of these limitations has now led to the proposal that (1) investment in housing, if incapable of anti-cyclical expansion and contraction, should at least be stabilised so as to avoid its taking part in and reinforcing general cyclical fluctuations; and that (2) every possibility should be explored of evening out the flow of private investment expenditure. The evolution of thought in Sweden has thus proceeded along exactly the same lines as in Britain. A study of the methods of co-ordin-ating the capital expenditures of private industry is now recognised in both countries as one of the most important problems of Employment Policy. What are the methods that might be employ 'd? asks the Economist. The Swedish Royal Commission proposes the instant setting up of an “Investment Council” to study primarily three different methods; voluntary co-ordination; the creation of economic incentives by investment subsidies, tax reliefs and interest policy; and direct control. The importance for full employment purposes of industrial location and of labour mobility is as clearly recognised in Sweden as it is in Britain. As these investigations proceed, a more intensive exchange of views between the two countries should prove of value to both.