The Japanese Will Retreat Into Manchuria

By ANAIOLE V. BAIKALOFF
The laps have made all the necessary preparations for moving their Government, the armed forces and the munition industries to Manchuria and North China should their position on the Japanese mainland be made untenable by the Allies. Such is the gist ,of the latest reports on the Far Eastern situation which reached me through the well-informed American sources.
It is known that this plan, in its general outline, was worked out long before the outbreak of the Pacific conflict. The Japanese industrialists, acting upon Government instructions, were busy for several years developing rich iron and coal mines in Manchuria and the Northern Chinese provinces and erecting steel works and munition factories there
This work is almost completed by now, and the Japs feel sure that should they be forced to withdraw from Japan proper, they would not lack the essen tial means for the continuation of the war on the continent of Asia.
JAPAN'S HOME GUARD
All training and rehei military establishments are being gradually transferred from Japan to the suitable localities on the continent, :aid the naval bases in Korea, Manchuria and China are being improved and strengthened.
The so-called Kwantung Army, quartered mainly in Manchuria, is said to have been brought up to the strength of 2.5 million men. and is being constantly reinforced by fresh drafts of young recruits. The defence of the Japanese islands against the invasion will be largely entrusted to the Home Guard, which is now feverishly organised upon the model of the German Volkssturm.
All these measures are intended to create conditions for a prolonged war. The Japs are still entertaining the hope that they might persuade the Americans and the British to conclude a negotiated peace and thus retain the most important fruits of their aggression. Conditions prevailing in China seem to favour this long-range policy. China is divided into three: her northern and littaral provinces are under the authority of the pro-Japanese Nanking Government; in the north-western provinces the Communists are strongly entrenched; and the Chiang Kai-shek Government are in the south-western Parts or the country.
Lately the Nanking Government and the Communists, who received a good deal of encouragement and support From the Soviets, have gained strength, while Chungking has weakened both politically and militarily. The sum total of this information
implies that the Pacific War is likely to be a long and expensive business, and that it will last rot a long time if even the Japanese islands are reduced and occupied by the Allies. A newspaper correspondent recently returned to this country after three years' work in and near Australia gives it at least five more years.