THE WAR IN REVIEW
THE WAR IN REVIEW ALLIED forces battering their way through Germany this week were obliged once again to share the publicity spotlight with new and dramatic developments in the Pacific. In one of...
...Taking cognizance of the fact that this type of fighting—almost guerrilla warfare—will con-tin ue, Gen...
...Military developments in the Pacific were highlighted by a sensational air-sea battle in Japanese inland waters...
...Although the American forces lost 3 destroyers and suffered other damage at the hands of Japanese land-based airpower, the enemy force was driven back with heavy losses, including the sinking of the great battleship, Yamato...
...Even when pinched off in small pockets the enemy continued to fight...
...Gestapo butcher Heinrich Himmler's paper, Das Sehwarze Korps, said that Germany is "only days or perhaps weeks from absolute collapse...
...Units of the American 9th were also banging along the road to Berlin...
...The Canadian 1st Army was pushing north and northwest into the Netherlands...
...Within Germany itself there was frank admission from high Nazi officials that the end was near...
...The 7th Army has captured more than 200,000...
...In one of the darkest weeks of the war for the sons of Nippon, Tokyo quaked under the impact of shattering military and political blows that sent Japan's second wartime government into discard...
...Admiral Baron Kantaro Suzuki, could carry out the Emperor's command to form a new government, he was faced with a new crisis on the political front: the denunciation of the Russo-Japanese neutrality pact by Soviet Russia...
...More Than A Million Prisoners In Europe the war seemed definitely to have lost its former pattern of 2 gigantic forces fighting it out on a straight north-south line...
...On a great swirling front, Allied forces were moving against the enemy in every direction...
...The Soviet drive up the Danube had reached Vienna...
...Some units of the American 7th were striking due east while others joined with the French 1st in the push southward toward Switzerland...
...Pacific Command Announced What effect the shake-up in the Japanese government would have on Tokyo's future course could not be judged immediately...
...On the Eastern Front the Oder River line was still static, although rumors continued to circulate that the Red Army was on the verge of a lunge at Berlin...
...Douglas Mac Arthur...
...Kuniaki Koiso announced its resignation...
...Many an American commentator thought that his appointment would soon bring peace overtures from Japan...
...Reeling under the hammer blows of the American advance into the Ryukyu Islands, a little more than 300 miles from the Japanese homeland, the government of Premier Gen...
...In the Philippines, Gen...
...Dwight D. Eisenhower declared that there probably will never be a "clean-cut military surrender" of Germany and promised that when victory is achieved, he will proclaim it to the world...
...MacArthur announced that Japanese casualties had risen to 314,854 since the beginning of the campaign to free the islands...
...Units of the 9th and 1st American armies were hacking away at the Ruhr pocket, driving in from the east, south, and north...
...The American 3rd continued to set the pace, having hammered the deepest eastern wedge into the Reich...
...Meanwhile, all speculation and rumors over who is to take command of the drive on Tokyo were put to rest this week when Washington announced that a joint command has been set up for that purpose...
...The British 2nd battered northeast in the direction of Hamburg'and Bremen and directly east toward Berlin...
...On Okinawa, Yank landing forces were meeting stiffening resistance as they advanced inland...
...The paper insisted, however, the German people were still convinced of the "rightness of our cause" and that they would continue to fight on even though their military chances were decreased even more...
...American naval units protecting the Okinawa invasion intercepted an enemy attempt to bring up naval assistance in support of the Okinawa defenders...
...Eisenhower's statement was interpreted as a repudiation of the rumor that he had been meeting with German officials to discuss surrender...
...At mid-week American headquarters in Paris announced that the 3rd, 1st, and 9th Armies had bagged more than a million German prisoners...
...Before the new premier...
...Enemy shipping in the first 3 months of 1945 had sustained losses of nearly 750,000 tons, either sunk or damaged...
...See Week in Review, Page 3.) The new political crisis raised the prospect of Russian entry into the war against Japan and brought widespread speculation that Tokyo might take the initiative with an invasion of Siberia in an effort to ward off a giant pincers movement against the homeland from Russian forces in the west and Americans in the south and east...
...B-29 Superfortresses, will remain under the command of Gen...
...It is known that Suzuki has the reputation of being a "moderate" in Japanese politics, having opposed the extreme militarist clique which led the Japanese government into the present war...
...Chester Nimitz will command all naval forces in the drive...
...German resistance, however, remained stubborn...
...the 20th Air Force, composed of the long range...
...Heading the U. S. ground forces will be Gen...
...It is, of course, always possible that there might be in Germany a sudden upsurge of popular resentment against the war, which would lead to a much easier pacification than that described," he said...
...Henry Arnold, commander of Army Air Forces...
...No figures are available on the prisoners captured by the new 15th Army...
...As the Russian troops broke into the city the Russian radio bombarded the Viennese with pleas to rise against the Nazis and promised that Austria would remain free and independent with no change in its social structure...
Vol. 9 • April 1945 • No. 16