Evening star., 1943-04-15

been regretfully denied. America is
to consider Japan only after Hitler
is beaten-maybe year or two or
three years from now.
Meanwhile, Japan, with an en-
pire of natural resources, gets the
time to forge machine tools with
which to make more bombers and
more ships, more submarines and
more destroyers to carry on against
our smaller fleet and smaller air
force.
AS long as Japan can keep the
fight thousands of miles away from
her mainland she can continue to
gain the time she needs to build up
her shipping and to copy the latest
models of American bombers and
fighter planes.
Vast Distance Away.
To date Japan has managed to
keep the battle areas far away from
her shores. Small wonder that the
Japanese feel that their arsenal is
safe and that they can, within an
other couple of years. build up suffi-
cient strength to fight at least a
stalemate with the United Nations.
They certainly cannot have any
hope of winning-unless, of course,
winning" means to the Japanese
holding the United Nations away
from the mainland of Japan and
wearing out our forces with a war
that lasts from three to seven years.
Gen. Macarthur and his air COM
mander 1t. Gen. George G.. Kenney,
have laid all the facts before the
Washington Government. The same
facts were laid before the British
and American governments long be-
fore the air generals came to WASH
ington for their recent conferences.
But the decision was to concentrate
on beating Hitler.
Time Favors japanese.
AS long as our planes can knock
lots of japanese airmen from the
skies, the American people will
doubtless feel that we are making
progress. An objective appraisal will
not bear out such optimistic as
sumption. Time runs in favor of
the Japanese now-they have been
given time already to build string
of air bases from the western end
of the Netherlands East Indies to
Timor, the easternmost point near
est Australia-an expanse of more
than 1000 miles. This means that
a ring of air power-a kind of Magi-
not line of the airs being built up
which is capable of harassing our
bases and certainly capable of keep
ing us on the defensive for months
and months to come.
Meanwhile, our Navy, which has
already made deeper sacrifices of
men and ships than the small force
we have in the Pacific should have
been asked to bear, will remain
more or less stagnant in the far
Pacific-unable to carry on an offen-
sive because of a lack of air UNI
brellas.
Blunt Warning.
Clearly, if we had aircraft car
riers, our Navy could take the offen-
sive but we have lost the bulk of our
aircraft carrier strength So have
the japanese. The japanese, how
ever, have what may be called land
based aircraft carriers in the form
of dozens of bases supported by
ground troops.
Gen. Macarthur, in blunt state
ment which could only have been
issued because he felt it was time
to tell the truth, points out that
Japan controls the sea lanes to Aus
tralia and that unless she can be
knocked out of the skies, our posi-
tions will continue to be menaced.
If there should be a debacle for
us in the Pacific, the blame will rest
squarely on President Roosevelt, as
the British Prime Minister is not
accountable to the American people.
The prayers of all of lis must be
that the President will be proved
right and that our present air
strength will take care of the de-
fense. But it is unhappily a fact,
on the other hand, that We are not
giving either the Army or the Navy
enough weapons to start an often
sive against Japan for some time to
come. This means a long, long war
unless the policy is changed soon.
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