Please wait. Contacting image service... loading

Article text

MWhe aUasafla
PEERTH.
VIGILANS XT AUDAX.
One Hundred and Tenth Year
of Publication.
MONDAY, MAY 11, 1942.
RESPITE.
Throughout the week-end Austra
lians have been heartened by the
accumulating evidence that the first I
big naval and aerial action ever to
be fought In the vicinity of Austra
lian waters has resulted in an initial '
victory for the Allied cause. Our
jubilation has been shared by our
kin throughout the British Common
wealth and particularly by our allies
in the United States, whose men,
ships and planes would appear from
the guarded information yet avail
able to have borne the brunt of the
engagement with the Japanese
oceanic forces. The enemy has been
repulsed in a renewed effort to con
tinue his southward drive off the
north-east coast of Australia. We
can legitimately feel elation at the
triumph of the Allied naval and air
units, at their skill and intrepidity
in interception and action, and at
their will to attack and win in this
first major test since the fall of Java
exposed Australia to the fury of the
storm raised by Japan.
This engagement, fought between
New Guinea and the Solomon
Islands in waters which wash the
Queensland coast will doubtless go
down in history as the Battle of the
Coral Sea-probably as the First
Battle of the Coral Sea. It was
really joined last Monday and it had
"ceased temporarily" by Saturday,
presumably broken off by the Jap
anese in their withdrawal, as we
have been told of the Allied deter
mination to continue offensive
operations, and these are now being
maintained in the air. Even at this
stage we cannot assess the full
measure of the action, since we have
no knowledge of the total strength
of the forces actually engaged on
either side, or still available for use.
Quite obviously, the enemy cannot
be allowed to obtain any informa
tion beyond what he has already
gleaned in combat of the composi
tion of the fleet which is holding the
ocean gateway to the south. The
Japanese claims of damage inflicted
on the Allied fleet have been offi
cially described as fantastic, and
they have very likely been put out
as the familiar Axis trick to elicit
information, but the references to
battleships may be a hint that opera
tions on the grand scale have been
begun.
The Coral Sea action has been
described, notably in London, as
the greatest naval battle since
Jutland. This may well be confirmed
when the full story Is told. But we
have yet no warrant to think that
we have reaped in the Coral Sea the
comparable fruits of the Jutland
battle, which, for all the controversy
which has raged interminably over
its tactical conduct, had one de
cisive result--that the British Grand
Fleet maintained the supremacy of
the seas and the High Seas Fleet of
Germany never again emerged from
German waters to challenge it. The
Japanese navy has suffered very con
siderable losses during the five
months of the Pacific war, but it is
still largely unimpaired in its essen
tial strength. That must be remem
bered in this time of thankfulness,
and there is every reason to expect
that a reconsolidation. and reinforce
ment of the enemy strength will lead
to a renewal of the attack. It would
be ridiculous to Imagine that the
issue has been decided in the north.
That must still depend on the Allied
capacity to bring adequate naval
units to bear, under, the vital pro
tection of carrier-based, and land
based, aircraft to meet the proba
bility of a second blow.
In the very circumstances In
which the enemy was repulsed
during last week's kction there are
chastening thoughts. The earlier
disclosures of the Japanese rein
forcement of their positions to the
north-east of Australia, and of in
creased naval and transport activity
In the region of Babaul, Indicated
the imminence of a definite enemy
move. It was being made in the
Coral Sea when it was temlxrarlly
frustrated by the Allied initiative and
it must have had one of two alter
native purposes. The Japanese were
either attempting to extend that*
naval control south-estad by
seizing a chain of Islands including
New Caledania and Fiji towards,
New Zealand with the objdct of
cutting the Allied line of communi
cations across the Southern Pacific,
and thus blockading Australia or
driving down upon the Australian
mainland itself to eliminate this'
counter-offensive base by a direct
attack before the operation threatens
to become too costly. The time fac
tor may be particularly Important
in the latter case If some plan of
combined Axis strategy is really h:
contemplation for the great cam
paigns which are looming in the
northern hemiapherh. In either event
it is pertinent to recall that the
offensive tenacity of the Japanese
was sufficient to Ignore the heavy
cost of the naval battles of the
Macassar Strait and the Java Sea
and to drive on to conquer Java,
consolidate control of the Nether
lands Indies and Malaya, and to
continue their operations both west
ward to Burma and south-esatwas d
towards Australia. The first phase
of the check to the Japanese on the
threshold of Australia was in their
inability to gain control of the air
over New Guinea. The second phase
is the repulse of the amphibious
expedition which they built up in
the Eabaul and the Solomon Islands
zone during the serial conflict.
There Is indubitably a third pbasc
to come which will be crucial to our
whole defensive plan, and it may
include feints or full-blooded at
tacks towards Darwin or our own
west coast as well as towar&s
the north-east. The Battle of the
Coral Sea baa gained us a respite to
mobilise more effectively to resist.
We dare not rate the result any
higher than that for the present.
$