Evening star., 1942-03-15
Can Jopon Exploit
Her Conquests?
BIZ Owen L. Scott.

planned offensive-based upon domi-
nance in the air-can do to nations less
well prepared and less strong in the air.
Japan in three short months has con-
quered an empire Of immense wealth.
She has taken one of the richest sections
Of the British Empire, the vastly rich
Dutch Empire and the important and
potentially rich Philippines.
Her acquisitions include great resources
of oil, rubber, tin, iron ore, vegetable
oil, manganese. chromium, gold. timber.
agricultural lands Of great productivity
almost everything, in fact. that the jap
anese need to make theirs self-suff1-
cient empire of wealth and power.
All Of this was carried out with the
use Of no more than 100000 men and
$500 airplanes, plus some smaller units
Of the Japanese fleet and section Of
the Japanese merchant marine. There
were several thousand casualties and
some ships were lost, but the gains Of
conquest make the losses seem inflnitesi-
NAL by comparison.
This record is far more impressive than
that of Hitler. After two and one-half
years Of war and the loss of at least
1000 900 men In killed and wounded,
Hitler still lacks the riches In raw ma
terials upon which he could build self
sufficient empire. His troops have covered
a lot of ground and can show immense
areas that are conquered but the vital
oil and mineral areas remain uncon-
quered.
Japan applied new technique OF blitz
warfare and found her opponents as
soundly asleep, If not more soundly
asleep, than the Germans found their
opponents.
The Japanese blitZ was based upon a
combination of sea and air attack, Just
as Hitlers was based upon land and air
attack. At one opening stroke she
knocked out temporarily the basic power
Of the American Pacific Fleet. She really
had not expected the luck that came her
way in this enterprise, but after it did
come the rest was easy.
Today Japan sits astride an island
empire that extends for 1000 miles from
her own island mainland to Australia.
That empire is protected by large num-
berS Of island bases in the Pacific that
must be reduced by any force that seeks
to regain the ground lost in the last
three months. The job of reconquest, in
turn, is going to be far more formidable
than was the job of conquest.
On the way down to Java and Aus
tralia the japanese blitz rolled smoothly.
The country which Is officially re.
ported to have produced 10000 military
type planes in 1941-at least 10000 Of
them of combat types-had very few in
the Philippines or Hawaii. Those that
were on hand were not provided with
bombproof hangers so that they were
readily disposed of on the ground At
Singapore 1t was the same story OF next
to no planes. It no longer need be a
secret that high official Of the Dutch
East Indies when in Washington revealed
that the United States had permitted his
government to have so modern planes
when they were offering to buy and pay
| for 1000. They were given 300 anti
| quated planes that could not do so we'll
against the Japanese.
Toward the end some Allied air
strength was provided but it was too
| little and too late. Dutch officials when
here at the time the japanese blitz was
rolling insisted that If a few hundred
planes were provided the japanese could
be stopped and II 1000 we're available the
| Japanese could be defeated. However,
there was not time to move and to supply
any such total Of planes. The Japanese
had been laying their plans for years
and had every detail rehearsed and pre-
pared.
Now the question Is whether Japan is
| to be permitted to exploit the empire
she has conquered.
The answer is that she is not likely to
have the chance to develop the potential
| strength that lies in her newly con-
quered territory. Her industrial strength,
like this country's military strength, is
| largely potential. And it takes longer to
build up vast industrial machine out Of
available raw materials than 1t does to
build vast military machine out Of an
available industrial machine.
AS result, unless Japan by new VIC
tories succeeds in blocking of the ap-
proaches to her home base she will be
hit some devastating blows before an
other three years have gone by.
The remaining bases for getting at
| Japan directly are three. First, there is
China. which can be highly effective
base If some way can be found to get
supplies to the interior. Second, there is
Siberia, including the Kamchatka Pen
insula, which is within easy striking
range Of Japan proper. Third, there is
Alaska and the Aleutian Islands that
stretch westward toward Japan.
| People Of this country are likely to
become much better acquainted with all
of these areas before the present war is
ended
However, there is not much the United
States can do to Japan that really will
hurt her severely until American strength
is built up at sea and in the air Before
Alaska can be provided with adequate
facilities for handling large numbers Of
ships and planes and before those large
numbers are provided they must be built
and transported to this outpost Of the
United States
And before Siberia can be used against
Japan Russia must take hand in this
Pacific phase Of the war and must stop
the japanese from doing to the Vladi-
vostok area and the Kamchatka Penin-
sula what she did to the Philippines and
1 Malava and the Dutch Fast Tpdiae