OCR Text |
Show J: Holding Dutch East Indies ;! s Vital to United Nations itx Crescent of Islands Blocks Jap Aggression 'tH By Forming Barrier Between Continents Of Asia and Australia. KE. By BAUKHAGE a ILL iiy, 1 National F arm and Home Hour Commentator iX WNTJ Service, 1343 H Street, N-W, f Washington, D. C. By the time these words are printed print-ed Singapore may have fallen. Japanese Jap-anese bombers may be raiding Australia and Japanese ships may be in Australian waters. Even so, according to the sober prediction of those in diplomatic and official circles cir-cles who are able to look at the war I roap without wishful thinking, the ""J tide may still be turned against the Japanese if one condition remains the same. That condition is that the United Nations continue to hold key territory in that slim crescent of islands, is-lands, the Netherlands Indies which form a barrier between the continents conti-nents of Asia and Australia. There are two reasons why these experts believe this Malaysian barrier bar-rier may be held in spite of Japanese Jap-anese gains north and south of it. First, as one military man put it, "by rule of thumb Japan has already stretched her supply lines so far from her home bases that they may be expected to snap in vital spots." Second, because of successful delaying delay-ing actions now going on, time is. fighting on the side of the United Nations, time for sufficient re-enforcements re-enforcements to arrive, especially from the United States, which will - snatch air superiority away from the j Japanese and thus affect the tide of f battle. Japan has so far extended herself, her-self, experts agree, that a powerful ' blow might topple her over back-j back-j wards. General MacArthur has held a Japanese army of 200,000 men In the Philippines. Huge land, air and H sea forces have been drawn into the i H siege of Singapore. Japanese troops are fighting in Burma, 3,000 miles J from the Manchukuoan border. They jl 1 are spread fan-wise from Sumatra k in the west 4,000 miles along the f equator to the Solomon islands be--" yond New Guinea. United Nations' Barrier It is the barrier the United Nations Na-tions have established from Sumatra 81 to the Solomon islands, with. Java , as the key point, upon which Japan II. may break her curved scimitar of ' offense. Japan has already penetrated C scattered islands in some places in Borneo, New Guinea, in the Cele-bes Cele-bes and in the Australian mandated 111 islands in the Bismafck archipelago. JJ But there are many dents in her sword already more than 31 ships lost in the first few days of the bat-pld bat-pld tie in the Macassar straits, which lie between Borneo and the Celebes. Si Many more such losses will be ir-reparable. ir-reparable. Successful, although scattered at-tacks at-tacks by American and Dutch planes and submarines and surface I ships are taking their toll. And even S though Japanese units may secure some island bases near enough to bomb the Australian coast, and , some ships are able to slip through i to raid coastal towns, the sword hand will be badly strained. The tough, well-fortified, well-supplied island of Java can deaden her blows. And if enough other bases for allied bombers and subs remain from "nich the far-flung Nipponese lnvad-rs lnvad-rs can be harassed, her course j westward and southward can be checked. For the United Nations fighting at TJ:! Malaysian barrier it is simply ,e!p Problem .of hanging on. For the hat United States it is a problem of pro-ykf pro-ykf oucing and delivering the goods, s"!; Against us is first our late start e ; war production; second, the great JStfCe to Iront-about six tSS fs fron loading to Imloading; fi third, lack of ships. ,n'o High Gear We cannot make up lost time but "'s agreed that. Donald (Battling) mi?1 and S war Production board i ep us in high gear from now : the ships, by June we will V " Producing them at the rate of two B . "-cargo ships. , As for the '-J whir!!? Cargoes' flghtinS Planes- beta t0 be shipped-they are b., , ned out in rapidly increas- numbers. The figures are secret. 1? Wn,,i7. l on g00d authority that it v. ke only 2'000 m Planes to J ciflc S,!uperiority in the whole Pa- U); needed t ' far less than that are Z" the establish superiority in JaL, nt &sWme area since at hLmurt keep a 'arge air force $ cities 6 r defense o her own the tanks and men, these needs are not so pressing, but tanks will soon be rolling to the tune of a thousand a month, and Garand rifles for next year's army of seven million men are being turned out a thousand a day at the Springfield arsenal alone. MeanwhUe, the men on the fighting fight-ing front say this to America and England: "Hurry. Cut red tape. Take risks. Don't wait until you have-had what you think is enough. Send what you have, risk it. We'll risk our lives to use it" If we are willing and able to answer an-swer this message, Japan may be toppled over on her heels. With Singapore Singa-pore in Japanese hands some Japanese Japa-nese elements would be able to filter through the island barricade toward Australia. The fall of MacArthur will release thousands of Japanese soldiers, the 'fall of Singapore, thousands more. If the key defense of Java goes, the Japs can then flood south to Australia Austra-lia and perhaps isolate "that continent conti-nent of hardy fighters. The invaders invad-ers can also swarm westward through the Straits of Malacca, take Rangoon, gateway of the Burma road. They can move submarines into the Persian gulf and the Red sea and threaten the life line to Britain's Brit-ain's middle east armies and Russia. Rus-sia. Once China is cut off, Japan will offer her a very favorable peace. Chiang Kai-shek would not accept, but his followers might accept. That would mean thousands more of Japan's effectives could be released, and if Russia's supplies are cut off Hitler could take Moscow while the Japanese troops move on Siberia. And so we can understand why the United States, fighting to hold their island defenses in the southern Pacific,- are praying pmt tar the -next few weeks that we will risk what we have to bastion them. Even though it be little it need not be too late. The Hermit Of Sharktooth Shoals The Hermit of Sharktooth Shoals came to town the other dey with the surprising news that instead of being an enemy of man, the man-eating man-eating shark is now to be regarded as one of man's best friends, and an especial friend of the farmer's. The Hermit is a former newspaper newspa-per associate of mine who has renounced re-nounced the noise and tumult of cities and now helps conduct a shark Ashing establishment at Fort Pierce off the east coast of Florida. Along with most people, I had thought that the commercial use, if any, for sharks was limited to the hides, for belts and shoes. But now I learn from the Hermit that shark liver oil is teeming with vitamins and is in great demand by pharmaceutical houses for those yellow pep pills that Americans are consuming in great numbers these ,days. But that, it seems, in no way limits lim-its the usefulness of the lowly shark. After the hide has been stripped off and the liver extracted, the carcass can be ground up and made into a high potency fertilizer, rich in urea and nitrates. And that's where the shark's value to the farmer comes in. Last year the Hermit and his sharking colleagues tossed overboard over-board two million pounds of perfectly perfect-ly good carcasses; simply because they didn't have the machinery necessary nec-essary to convert the defunct fish into fertilizer. This year, what with the announced shortage of nitrates and fertilizer, the Hermit feels that it is high time the government took an interest in the matter, and he is now in Washington for that purpose. The more I hear about the shark profession the more colorful it sounds. The Hermit, for instance, tells me that the sharkery's president presi-dent and founder is a prominent scientist, sci-entist, Dr. Alexander van Beyer, who has pioneered in the development develop-ment of vitamin products from shark livers. The doctor has Chinese Chi-nese connections and is a member of the Hip Sing long which is an aid in the marketing of another byproduct, by-product, shark fins. The Chinese regard shark fins as a great deli- "More than this, I understand that shark meat-by any other name-is name-is an excellent food. Instead of letting let-ting the sharks eat us we may turn toe tables and eat the sharks- Who knows? |