1940-01-20 — Page 3

THE CHINA MAIL, JANUARY 20, 1940

NAVAL

POWER IN

TANK A

POWERFUL

THE PACIFIC WEAPON

the Tanks won the last war, in The annual report of Mr." Edison, the U.S. Secretary for the Navy, which opinion of the British and French with the has just been published, is of parti-high commands. Tanks, cular interest, because it reflects the help of low-flying fighter and bomber the war in naval changes since February 13, 1938, planes, certainly won

If the outcome of the war when Japan refused to afford any Poland. further information with regard of her is decided on the Western Front, it

will be tanks that will decide it, building programmes.

The choice is between a deadlock victory, There is no and a tank

unarmoured other alternative, since troops cannot break through the sort of defensive lines which have been or are being prepared here.

Its principal significance lies in the fact that it demonstrate that satisfac- | tion of the U.S. naval authorities with the present programme of construc- tion; and this is the first occasion on which the United States has been able to give its views about the "Six Year Programme" which the Japanese adopted on March 6 of this year.

Whether an armoured force can break through those lines remains to be seen, but it is significant that in The existing American programme the Polish campaign Germany reveal- six armoured rose out of President Roosevelt's famed that she possessed .ous Naval Message to Congress on divisions, each of 400 tanks, and four of 200 tanks, a January 28, 1938, when he asked ap-light divisions each proval for the (£160,000,000 sterling force which might, in the opinion of at par) and allowing a 20 per cent. | leaders who are optimistic about the increase in naval tonnage over the capabilities of armoured fighting ve- previous treaty limits. By the time ❘hicles, seem strong enough also to beat the bill passed both Houses, on March the anti-tank defences that are ready 30, the estimated cost had risen to in the west.

The German tank and the four- more than 1,113 million dollars; and

armoured car have no sooner had the members voted for wheel-drive it than the Navy Department request-already won in Poland, and have pro- ed an increase to 1,300 million dollars vided the actual evidence of victory (£260,000,000 sterling). This was in the earlier bloodless campaign in because of the enormous cost of the Austria and Czecho-Slovakia. three "super-battleships” and the two interesting to remember how often the aircraft-carriers. On May 18, 1939, German Army communiques in 1918 the presence of the building under this programme for insisted that it was the year 1939-1940 was sanctioned. It tanks in overwhelming numbers which included two battleships, two light caused the Germans to retreat, how cruisers, eight destroyers, and eleven assiduously the pre-Hitler Reichwehr built up its tank corps surreptitiously smaller vessels.

in Russia, and how energetically and how secretly the Germany Army has developed its armoured divisions the last six years.

ง

BREAK-THROUGH

It is

METHOD

in

JAPANESE PROGRAMME The Japanese incensed by this new gramme, retorted by retaliatory *Six Year Plan," costing 1,205 million yen (about £150,000,000 at par). In

Every army in the west has anti- announcing this plan, Admiral Yonai stated that the Japanese Navy had to tank guns and anti-tank rifles that can equal the strongest sea-force in the stop tanks if there are not too many world, and that Japan had to build of them, but that is not to say that, if attack comes in new ships in light of the Vinson pro-a large-scale tank gramme and the British

sufficient force and as a surprise (and four-year

the use of smoke for concealment may the attack help to provide surprise),

One can will not break through.

plan,

It

It is under this plan that Japan is building the three 40,000-ton battle ships and the two aircraft-carriers to picture an unexpected attack, not by which Mr. Edison referred In his re-dozens, but by hundreds, of tanks, at port. Despite this new Japanese a sector of the line where the tanks

naval authorities will outnumber in anti-tank guns. activity, the U.S. still think that the existing building will be an attack by cruiser tanks, programme is adequate to maintain carrying field guns capable of batter- the anti-tank obstacles-anti- peace in the Pacific, although variousing announcements made since the out- tank trenches, steel rails, and guns-

The attack will be break of the European war make it that face them. clear that the actual building under supported by forces of fast light tanks, the American programme will be far which will rumble swiftly through the more rapid than was anticipated a gap cut by the heavy infantry tanks and the cruiser tanks and make havoc few months ago.

in the enemy's back' arcas, creating the kind of chaos through which the Polish Army retreated.

A FAMILY

OF SEA HEROES

The question which the German High Command must now be debating is whether this picture, which was created in the east, can be re-created in the west, in the face of the mud of northern France and Flanders, and in the face of anti-tank obstacles and

Twice Coxswain, Henry Blogg, of anti-tank guns on 1 scale such as Cromer, has won the V. C. of the life- | tanks have never faced before. boat service-the gold medal.

Now further honour has fallen to him. He has been awarded a second bar to the silver medal for gallantry which he already holds for the rescue, on October 9, of 29 lives from the Greek steamer Mount Ida.

The lifeboat took an hour and a quarter to get the men off the steamer, which had stranded on the Hals- borough Sands, So heavy were the seas that a dozen ropes-between the lifeboat and the steamer were snapped. The seas continually swept over the lifeboat and she was seriously damaged

ALL HEROES The second coxswain, J. J. Davies, the motor mechanic, H. W. Davies, and the assistant motor mechanic, J. W. Davies, have all been awarded bars to bronze medals. The eight other members of the orew have each "been awarded the thanks of National Lifeboat Institution on vellum, and the

membi award br

Royal

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THEATRE

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