CONTROL OF GILBERTS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 87, Issue 280, 26 November 1943, Page 5

CONTROL OF GILBERTS

SECURED BY US. FORCES FURTHER MOVES EXPECTED SOON (By Telegraph—Press Association- -Copyright! Recd. 9.40 p.m. Pearl Harbour, Nov. 24. With the fall of Betio Island, in the Tarawa atojl, the main Japanese stronghold in the Gilberts, the capture of the entire group is believed near. Remnants of the Japanese garrisons are being hunted down on the Tarawa, Makin and Abemama atolls. Landings are believed to have been made on other atolls in the Gilbert group. Engineers have already begun the construction of aerodromes which will be 1500 miles away from Truk, main Japanese naval and supply base in the Pacific. Jaluit, in the Marshall Islands, another important enemy base, is within 400 miles.

Betio, Tarawa, which already has a large aerodrome, was captured shortly after noon on Wednesday, when a desperate Japanese counter-attack was crushed by the 2nd Marine Division.

A Navy spokesman said: “This counter-attack actually accelerated the island’s capture, since it. enables the Marines to wipe out the Japanese en masse instead of hunting them down in small groups. Nearly 4000 Japanese are believed to have been slain on Betio, which fell. The Japanese there were well prepared with artillery, mortar, machine-guns and pill-boxes to make a death stand. All reports indicate that very few enemy troops were taken alive. Fierce fighting raged day and night, the troops often being locked in close combat with the bayonet.

About 5000 Japanese were garrisoned on the Tarawa atoll (comprising eight islands, of which Betio is the largest), and about 1000 on Makin. Tanks were used to assist the capture of Makin, where the installations seized include a wireless tower, barracks, a seaplane run, several jetties and munition and store dumps. The capture of these important Gilbert Islands means that a 200-mEe gap has been opened in Japan’s Central Pacific defences. The stage is now believed to be set for the invasion of the Marshall Islands, which are still under bombardment bv landbased Liberators and carrier-based aircraft.

When he announced that American forces had won control of the Gilberts, Admiral Nimitz said preparations were being made for further attacks. He added that it was too early to recasualty figures on either side, but those of the Japanese were very heavy.

Indicating the great United States naval strength in th it area, a war correspondent aboard a task force flagship said the escorting naval units numbered more than 20, including at least one great battleship. The number of American troops en. gaged in the operations has not been indicated, but one statement says that "tens of thousands of men have been training for an offensive which threatens grave setbacks for the Japanese in the Central Pacific.” The magnitude of the Marines’ victorious assault on these islands may be visualised in the light of the fact that it took the Japanese seventeen days to capture Wake Island, held by only a few hundred American Marines. The United States forces took 21 days to capture Attu Island, in the Aleutians.

MOVE INTO POSITION ENGLISH VIEW OF PUSH (Special Correspondent—N.Z.P.A.) Reed. 7 p.m. London, Nov. 23. /“It is perhaps unwise to herald each new American stroke in the Pacific, as the opening of the long-awaited amphibious offensive,’” says the Manchester Guardian in a leading article. “This may have to wait till the surrender of Germany. But what we see at the moment is the taking of positions from which this offensive may one day be launched and from which, till then, we may waste Japan’s resources in aircraft and shipping.” The Manchester Guardian refers to the importance of taking Tarawa as an air base, and asks: May we detect from this attack the beginnings of a wider strategic movement in the war in the Pacific? It adds that the possession of Makin and Tarawa and also of Wake Island would end the immunity of the Marshall Islands. “If the Allies can settle themselves and their aircraft in the outer line of Japan’s protective screen not only would the enemy losses mount, but they might also be induced to risk a major sea encounter,” it says. “Japan might bring out her fleet if she saw her oceanic position being whittled away by air and sea raiders striking at her communications from islands astride them which were once her own.” The paper warns that if this is the strategy we must expect it to take a long time to unfold. The Daily Telegraph expresses the view that the latest operations are only preliminary, but that they begin a new phase of war with the Japanese. The loss of the Gilbert Group would threaten the Japanese communications with all their island conquests and open a central route for the American air and sea power. It adds that one of the main purposes of the Allied strategy throughout and round the Pacific must be to bring the Japanese fleet and air force to action. "The large American operations of ali arms in the Gilberts are the beginning of an attack through the centre of the Japanese conquests at the heart of Japan,” the paper says. "Converging blows from South-east Asia through China may well speed the downfall of Japan, but every economical means of stretching the Japanese forces and wearing them down will assist the main blows. "The oceanic advance is the most direct, and it has deadly possibilities before it reaches the coast of Japan.” The New Delhi correspondent ol The Times, commenting on the Japanese hdme front, says that General j Tojo is showing signs of uneasiness. Conferences were recently held in Tokio of public prosecutors and other high judicial officials, to whom Tojo declared that the war was a battle of I spirit against spirit and of will against ! will. So long as the Japanese spirit existed victory was certain, he said, but I they must not be over-optimistic. The i Government was now strengthening l the home front, on which the most! important need was control of speech I and the prevention of any split in na- ’ tional opinion. “The people are effectively muzzled, and the spill must he looked for >n high places,” the correspondent says.

FOUR JAP DESTROYERS SUNK BY ALLIED FORCE

(Special Australian Correspondent—N.Z.P.A.) Recd. 9.30 p.m. Sydney, Nov. 25. Four Japanese destroyers out of a force of six have been sunk in action with Allied light naval craft between Rabaul and Bougainville. A fifth enemy warship was hit, leaving only one to escape undamaged. No Allied ship was hit. The battle opened in the very early hours of this morning and developed into a running fight, terminating just before dawn. General MacArthur’s communique, announcing the action, says: "In the Solomons Sea our light naval forces intercepted a force of six enemy destroyers athwart a line from Rabaul to Bougainville and defeated it. Four enemy destroyers were sunk and one damaged. The enemy advanced in two groups. The first, consisting of two destroyers, was sunk by torpedo action. The remaining four, attempting to escape to the west, were engaged in a running gun action. Two were sung and one received hits. We sustained no damage.” The Allied naval force, probably comprising destroyers of at least equal strength with the enemy, made a bold move in pursuing the fleeing Japanese destroyers into waters where action by Japanese land-based bombers was likely. However, Allied fighters were summoned to provide aerial cover for our warships. No reports have yet been received of any attempt by the enemy at air interference. Despite Japanese claims to the contrary, this is the first naval action in the Solomons area since November 2, when one cruiser and four destroyers were sunk and one received hits. We fere with American landing .operations at Empress Augusta Bay, Bougainville. To-day’s communique from the South-west Pacific headquarters also reports the sinking of an 8000-t.on Japanese freighter-transport at Halmahera, in the Molucca group, off the western tip of New Guinea. The vessel received five direct bomb hits as well as a number of damaging near misses. SATELBERG AREA FAILURE OF JAPANESE COUNTER-ATTACK Recd. 9.5 p.m. Sydney, Nov. 25. The Japanese lost 50 killed in their latest abortive counter-attack against the Australians pressing on Satelberg, New Guinea. Their attack, made on the coastal area near Bonga, where the enemy’s supply line to Satelberg has been cut by Australian forces, was dealt with by our patrols. Four minor Japanese air raids on our rear positions failed to cause damage or casualties. Allied planes continue to pound enemy supply and communication lines. Over Sio. on the north-east New Guinea coast, Allied fighter patrols intercepted nine escorted enemy bombers, shooting down two fighters and probably destroying another fighter and a bomber. One Allied plane was lost.

In the Solomons American forces on Bougainville island have extended the perimeter of their Empress Augusta Bay bridgehead by three-quarters of a mile. Seventy-five Japanese have been killed in patrol clashes. Allied fighters, intercepting a large Zero formation, shot down five enemy fighters. Enemy aerodromes in southern Bougainville and on Buka have been attacked with about a further 100 tons of explosives.

JUNGLE WARFARE NEW GUINEA CONDITIONS

• Special Australian Corre»n>ondent—N.Z.P.A.i Recd. 7.20 p.m. Sydney, Nov. 25. Although countered by the use of aerial transport and mechanical roodmaking equipment, the jungle remains the supreme factor in the New Guinea warfare.

An Australian correspondent who has recently returned from Finschhafen—the Satelberg area—says that supplying forward troops in the battle areas is still the most pressing problem of jungle fighting. Aeroplanes drop stores while bulldozers smash tracks for jeeps, thus assisting to ease the supply problem. But often the principal contact with the enemy is maintained by light patrols who must go into strange Japanese-infested country carrying only a lew tins of bully beef and a packet of Army biscuits for sustenance.

The correspondent, urging the neen for an overhaul of the A.I.F. soldier* personal issue in certain directions, says some items of the United States equipment: are markedly superior for jungle warfare. He- instances the American flyproof eating utensils, the more convenient type of water-bottle, and the mosquito-proot hammock. High praise is given to the American units who have had to co-operate with the Australians in the recent New Guinea land fighting—particularly the beach scouts, engineers and ai* cooperation officers. "It would be buying a fight to say a word against the ‘Yanks,’ ” writes the correspondent, "and I am certain that as the action develops the friendship between two armies will become warmer still.”

Declaring that New Guinea Is the World’s most venomous and exhausting battle-ground, the correspondent adds: “I doubt whether any country could present such enervating extremes—coastal depressions where not a breath of air stirs to temper the heat, and towering mountains whose summits even the natives shun because of their terrible wind-storms The soldier knows that New Guinea calls for a price for every minute ho treads its uncertain way. Every part of his daily routine brands him as a stranger—the purifying tablet he must put in every drop of crystal-

clear river water to deaden its germs; the vitamin pills he takes in place of fresh food and to ward off scurvy; the salt he consumes to counter excessive sweating; the daily specific to tight malaria; the rigid wearing of gaiters so that mites 1n the kunai grass will not bite his legs and give him scrub typhus.” Australian newspapers have published editorials recently agitating for the increase of official news of the New Guinea land battles, claiming that the brief headquarters announcements have not given adequate appreciation of the severity of the fighting nor of the enemy strength opposing the Australian forces. DICTATED BY NAVY REAL PACIFIC STRATEGY Recd. 11.15 p.m. New York, Nov. 25. “Admiral Nhnitz’s offensive places the old controversy of Pacific strategy in an entirely new light, for it discloses that the real strategy in this theatre is dictated by the Navy,” says the New York Herald-Tribune’s writer, Walter Lippniann. "What Nimitz is undertaking now is essentially what the Navy has always intended to in a war against Japan gain commajid of the Western Pacific and make the Japanese island empire subject to American sea-power. The Navy never intended to fight the main action against Japan from Australia. We had to fight from Australia only because our unpreparedness in 1941 compelled us to retreat to Australia. The Navy has never agreed to the idea that the main attack against Japan could be launched from the distant and inconvenient places to which disasters and defeat compelled us to retire. Thus the wdiole controversy about the size of tha force assigned to General MacArthur has been fictitious, for while the controversy has been aired in Congress and the press the actual concentration of American power for the main challenge to Japan has been progressing secretly in another theatre—the theatre where the Navy always meant to make the main effort.”

The Herald-Tribune in a leading article says:—"lt is safe to say that henceforth every Japanese action in the Solomons, New Guinea. Burma and China will be affected by the feverish calculations forced upon Tokio by Admiral Nimitz’s advance. This came in high time because the situation in China is not too good, preparations in India are slow, and the New Guinea offensive alone is too feeble to exert a decisive effect. But with the new factor introduced into the Pacific equation results should begin to appear.”