AMERICANS PUZZLED

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 87, Issue 275, 20 November 1943, Page 3

AMERICANS PUZZLED

SOUTH PACIFIC SUPPLIES DISCUSSION P.ecd. 6 p.m. New York, Nov. 18. Americans are bewildered by sharply conflicting reports on supplies and reinforcements being sent to the South-west Pacific. In the past few days directly opposite views have been expressed on Allied strength in that theatre. Re viewing this "internecine war in the newspapers" concerning aid for General MacArthur, the New York Her-ald-Tribune points out that the statement by a headquarters spokesman flatly contradicts a dispatch from Curlin Spencer, Associated Press correspondent in the South-west Pacific, which touched oft the controversy and which General MacArthur’s censorship passed. Spencer’s message was that there had not been an increase in men or supplies going to the Southwest Pacific. The otticial spokesman later said that supplies being received in the South-west Pacific were much more than formerly, but were insufficient for a major offensive against the Japanese.

The Herald-Tribune points out that there is obvious confusion between General MacArthur's South-west Pacific command and the geographical area of the South-west Pacific containing also Admiral Halsey’s South Pacific command, which is well endowed with naval and aerial strength. "If there is an adequate force in that theatre no one cares a button what proportion is under General MacArthur and what is under Admiral Halsey, providing the whole is effectively used," the paper adds. “Further, whether Genera? MacArthur is getting 10, 20, or any other percentage of the total of United States overseas resources is meaningless datum unless one knows how much is going to each of the other areas and the broad strategic conception determining the distribution.”

The paper says that the affair is probably in the nature of an energetic commander’s fight for greater emphasis in his own theatre and concludes: “But when they conduct a battle in the newspapers before the public, utterly ignorant of all the significant factors, it is hardly a salutary process."