ALLIES’ GAINS AND LOSSES

Waikato Times, Volume 129, Issue 21599, 9 December 1941, Page 4

ALLIES’ GAINS AND LOSSES

So far-reaching are the changes brought about by Japan’s declaration of war on Britain and the United States that it will take some time to assimilate all the factors involved. The British Empire was, of course, at war with Germany and Italy, but extension of the conflagration to the Far East means the opening of another enormous front in direct contact with a number of British countries. In the United States the upheaval will be far greater, because until yesterday the United States was, technically at least, at peace with the world. That great country has found it necessary to leap from a peace to a war footing in a single day. Just what that means is being experienced by 130,000,000 people today. Fortunately, the United States’ policy of assisting Britain with the supply of machines and materials has already placed American industry in shape to engage in war. America will have discovered that assistance to Britain was of incalculable value to herself. The fact that the decisive phase of the war is likely to be fought at sea should allow the American war industries to proceed with the manufacture of munitions for common Allied use without any interruption; indeed, with greatly increased energy and effect. But the United States has other urgent problems to solve at once. Her great foreign population, or such of it as is sympathetic towards the Axis, must be kept out of harm’s way. “Isolationism” among genuine Americans must now be a thing of the past. Japan has decided that question. The declaration of war means more than that. There must now be a reorientation of the relations among some of the greatest nations on earth. Alliances in many instances must again be adjusted to the new conditions. Again it is a world war. No important nation is free from its toils; none can hope to escape in greater or lesser degree the hardships and the perils that such an upheaval brings in its train. Broadly, the Allies have incurred the enmity of Japan but gained the full support of the United States. That salient fact stands out as a beacon of hope, for no other nation on earth has resources equal to those of the United States. Those immense resources will be brought to bear in the battle for freedom at the earliest possible moment.