AUSTRALIA: Help to the Middle East

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In the crucial days of early 1942, Australia compelled Winston Churchill to send home its ground units from the Middle East to protect its own shores from the Japanese. Last week, for the first time since then, Australia moved back into the Middle East. It announced that it would send an R.A.A.F. jet fighter wing to help the British, and provide support for a new international Middle East Command.

The move would leave Australia without first-line air defense at home: two of its squadrons are now in Malaya, two others in Korea. But Australia has moved forward since its World War II days, when defense forces were split into two groups—volunteers who fought abroad, conscripts for home defense. Now all of Australia's defense forces must serve wherever the government sends them—and the government's policy is to meet threats before they directly menace Australia's shores.