World Battlefronts: BATTLE OF THE PACIFIC: How to Fight Japs

How audacious Japan’s military leaders have been in stretching their fingers over thousands of miles in the Pacific can now be clearly judged. In all their expansion to the south and west—from Wake to Burma and from the Solomons to Luzon—the Japanese have probably not used more than 200,000 men, while China and Siberia have tied up perhaps 1,200,000. On many an island the Japanese stationed only suicide crews, whose sole mission was to get what information they could.

>In the southeastern Solomons the Japanese had only some 3,000 troops when the Marines launched their offensive.

>The overland “assault” across New Guinea’s mountains consisted of a handful of troops, as the Australians found when they chased them back over the steep peaks and through the steaming jungles. In all New Guinea, which is bigger than Texas, it is estimated that there are not more than 20,000 Japs. General MacArthur has enough men to retake New Guinea, but offensives risk ships and the prize may not be worth the cost.

>For their fading adventure in the Aleutians, the Japanese allotted only about 3,000 troops (alarmist figure: 25,000).

>In the perfectly planned, perfectly executed Malayan campaign that ended at Singapore, the Japanese used fewer than 75,000 jungle fighters against 92,000 British troops who were pitifully untrained for such warfare. Jap casualties were probably fewer than 5,000.

>On Bataan the Japanese outnumbered the American defenders. But, General Wainwright’s troops finally ran out of supplies and suffered huge casualties.

>All the Dutch East Indies (pop. 70,000,000) were defended by only 20,000 white troops and 50,000 poorly trained natives, so the Japanese simply dashed in, barely noticing their casualties. Said Prussian Militarist Carl von Clausewitz in 1812: “On no account should we overlook the moral effect of the rapid running assault. It hardens the advancing soldier against danger, while the stationary soldier loses his presence of mind.”

Japan’s enemies were learning about the Japanese weapon: surprise is worth many divisions. They were learning, at last, how to fight the Japanese brand of jungle warfare. And in the Aleutians, in the New Guinea area and in the Solomons the Japs were taking a course in the cost of long communication lines: about 344 planes lost, 19 ships sunk, 21 damaged since Aug. 1. The Japanese could put a few hundred men on an island. Supplying and reinforcing them was another matter. Wake Island is farther from Tokyo than it is from Honolulu; Kiska is about 1,000 miles from any known Jap supply base. And the list of Japanese surprise possibilities was fast running out. This was no time for optimism, but it was good to know that Japan had troubles, too.