World Battlefronts: GLOBAL COMBAT

A year ago these lines curving across the hemispheres would have looked like wishful thinking. About a year ago every Allied line of attack seemed to be a line drawn in sand, to be erased by the next Axis tide. Russia’s effort to attack at Kharkov had been wiped out and the Nazi armies flowed around Stalingrad. Rommel had rolled the British back from Bengasi and was beating against the gates of El Alamein. On the other side of the world the U.S. fought frantically to keep a toe hold on a 90-mile-long island in the Pacific.

But last week these spearheaded lines were channels through which Allied tides could now flow, flood and finally overwhelm Berlin and Tokyo.

Winston Churchill had good cause to feel pleased. Despite the wrangle over a “second front” he had persisted in putting first things first so that now Britain’s lifeline from Gibraltar to Malta to Alexandria was secured. The solid red lines on the map showed more than the routes of a southern invasion of Europe. They showed that the geographical sinews—if not the social and political sinews—of the British Empire, upon which the U.S. depended too, had been saved and restored. That was one reason why Mr. Churchill was pleased to call the Mediterranean the “third front.”

Bloody Way. Russia, involuntary collaborator in the Empire’s restoration, banged massively against the east wall of Festung Europa. In point of size this was still the No.1 front.

No. 2 front was still in the plans of the High Command, gathering weight. When it came, Churchill warned, it would be the “bloodiest portion of the war.” When that time would be was the High Command’s secret. Also a deep secret was its route. The shortest way is across France and the Low Countries, the same road over which the Wehrmacht poured in 1940.

In the Mediterranean, “third front” potentialities were great.

The U.S. Fifth Army and Britain’s flower, the Eighth, threatened Germany from the south. Sardinia and Corsica were stepping stones to southern France and the Rhone Valley route.

Also full of potentialities were the Balkans. The Aegean Islands led to Salonika and the Vardar Valley. .The Balkans bubbled with rebellion, ready to turn on the German the minute his hand loosened its grip.

Pacific Ways. Many units of the British Fleet, once desperately occupied in the Mediterranean, could now steam east to the Pacific front. British warships manned by veteran crews could be thrown against the Jap supply lines. To protect those lines the Jap fleet was already spread too thin.

This was one certain fact in a Pacific situation which presented nowhere near the clear picture of the European theater. The Pacific came later on the High Command’s calendar. Japan was still top strong to make the end seem so certain. How best to capitalize on the weaknesses of Japan’s overextended positions was the subject of hot debate. The decisions were still secret; the possibilities were fairly clear.

From India, Lord Louis Mountbatten could direct a campaign against Burma. His objectives: 1) a strong position in the rear flank of Japan’s southern empire; 2) the Burma Road, over which supplies could be punched through to China; 3) possibly Malaya and Singapore, which could be exploited again as a naval base from which to harry the Jap lines to The Netherlands East Indies.

From Honolulu, Admiral Chester Nimitz could attack with carrier forces and amphibious troops across the central Pacific, seizing bases from which the Navy could get athwart Japan’s communications with her southern holdings. The other Navy objective: to seek out the Jap and destroy him. Supplementary to Nimitz’s drive, but more as a diversion than a major operation, planes could attack Jap outposts from the Aleutians.

Between Mountbatten and Nimitz, on what has been the No.1 front since the Pacific war began, General Douglas MacArthur would finish pinching off Rabaul, advance along New Guinea to a position which could threaten the East Indies.

This more or less supplementary role was not MacArthur’s idea (see p. 35). His strategy and ambition was to drive for the Philippines, with the U.S. Navy supporting him, knocking out flanking Jap island bases on the way, bypassing those which were too far eastward to cause him trouble.

All the spearheaded lines on the map stop away short of Tokyo. How would Mountbatten proceed across the part of China which is firmly held by Jap troops? Where would Nimitz head after he had seized the bases on the Jap periphery? How would he destroy a Jap fleet which refused to engage? Where would MacArthur go from the Philippines?