NO EASY ROAD

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 September 1942, Page 2

NO EASY ROAD

FEDERAL PRIME MINISTER ON WAR DEMANDS MAINTENANCE OF MAXIMUM ARMY. SHIPPING & OTHER PROBLEMS. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) CANBERRA, September 10. “It is essential for the preservation of freedom that Australia’s civil needs must be subordinated to the needs of the fighting forces, which have before them a stupendous task,” said the Prime Minister, Mr Curtin, in the House of Representatives. “The strength of the army is less than I and the command would like it to be. In the absence of air and. sea supremacy I am not prepared to detract from the strength of the army by allowing men to be withdrawn from it to engage in other occupations. The work of those who are now in the army must be done by those who were previously in non-essential occupations. “For the next six months the problem of the United Nations is so stupendous that it is not conceivaable that we in Australia should expect to be given anything that we can provide, for ourselves.” Mr Curtin said he knew of no easy road ahead. Till the enemy had been dealt a serious blow —till the initiative had been wrested from him —so much shipping would be required for force;? equal to launching an offensive in the south-west Pacific that its allocation could not be reasonably expected in the near future. Highly-trained troops had to be held as reinforcements for the Ninth Division of the A.I.F. in the Middle East, and that was one reason why Australia’s army had to be maintained at the maximum strength. The obligation to hold Australia had to be met primarily by the Commonwealth’s manpower and resources, and the urgent need of supplying Russia and the Middle East would prevent any great increase in the aid that could come to Australia.