Burma - The Longest War 1941 - 1939

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#1

Burma - The Longest War 1941 -1945

This is the title of a book by Louis Allen, but is also a truth. he goes on to say that the campaign in Burma was the longest in World War II, and was, arguably, also the most ferocious and the most varied. It comprised jungle as well as desert warfare; the longest retreat in the history of the British Army; the greatest defeat suffered on land by the Japanese Army; long-range penetration groups operating hundreds of miles behind enemy lines and ruthless hand-to hand fighting.

Personally, I have had numerous friends, some of which still survive, that entered the Burma campaign at the beginning and remained and fought (with the exception, in some cases, of a little R & R in India) through all of the major defensive battles and on to the offensive, including a number that saw action with the Chindit columns fighting for months deep behind enemy lines. Not only did the troops have the Japanese to contend with, and also the members of the Indian Army that had been recruited by the Japanese and formed the Indian National Army, but also the effects of prolonged exposure to the tropicla environment and the resulting diseases. It was an incredible time in British military history and from it rose, arguably, one of the best British generals that has ever lived:

Field Marshal Viscount ‘Bill’ Slim of Burma KG. GCB. GCVO. GBE. DSO. MC

http://www.burmastar.org.uk/slim.htm

Anyone wishing to contribute to this long journey, please feel free to do so.

#2

Slim’s autobiography/war memoir “Defeat into Victory” is an absolute must-read here. One of the very best if not the best book written by a General officer to come out of WW2, and one that does not gloss over his own failings.

Another one supposedly worth reading (although I haven’t read it yet) is “Quartered Safe out Here” by George Macdonald Fraser, author of the Flashman novels. He spend WW2 with the 14th Army under Slim, and apparently writes very highly of him.

For me, Slim is by far the best General officer on any side in WW2. Not for any particular battle, but for what he did with the forces under his command. He took an army that had been crushingly defeated and was running for the Indian border, and with minimal supplies/reinforcements built it up by leadership and force of personality into the force that destroyed the Japanese army in Burma. It wasn’t a small army either - IIRC only MacArthur in the Phillipines and possibly the USAAF did more damage to the Japanese. That is one of the outstanding achievements of WW2.

#3

The Road Past Mandalay by John Masters is a great account by a senior field commander who was behind the lines with the Chindits and in the thick of the Burma fighting.

This Wikipedia entry is a reasonable summary of Masters’ major war postings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Masters

#4

Thank you for your input pdf27 and Rising Sun.

Just as a footnote. George McDonald Fraser was a young Lieutenant with the Border Regiment when serving in Burma. Some readers may have difficulty with the Cumbrian dialect which he uses to recollect some of the conversations and humour in his book.

“You may talko’ gin and beer
When you’re quartered safe out 'ere,
An’ you’re sent to penny-fights an’ Alderhot it;
But when it comes to slaughter
You will do your work on water,
An’ you’ll lick the bloomin’ boots of 'im tha’s got it!..”
Extract: Gunga Din - Rudyard Kipling

Of course, one cannot speak of the British operations in Burma without reference to Major General Orde Wingate and his Chindits.

“There, was a man of genius who might well have become also a man of destiny.” Sir Winston Churchill.

http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/owingate.htm

#5

The Professionals: Slim and Mountbatten
‘Uncle Bill’ Slim was probably the greatest British general of the Second World War, but like the Fourteenth Army he commanded, he remains largely ignored in his own land. Always at the bottom of the Allied global list of priorities, lack of assets in Burma was overcome by improvisation and by cunning and deception in planning to create surprise. And Slim was a great leader. ‘He understood men’, wrote Australian Roy McKie. ‘He spoke their language as he moved among them, from forward positions to training bases. He had the richest of commonsense, a dour soldier’s humour and a simple earthy wisdom. Wherever he moved he lifted morale. He was the finest of Englishmen.’ Backing him to the hilt was the aristocratic Lord Louis Mountbatten. Widely regarded as a playboy, he was considerably more than that: the youngest supreme commander since Napoleon, Mountbatten and Slim formed an axis that halted the Japanese ‘March on Delhi’ in 1944 and swept them from Burma in 1945.

#6

The Mystic: Wingate
One of the truly great characters of the Second World War, Wingate was a blend of mysticism, passion and complete self-confidence tinged with darkest depression; he was obsessive, rude and overbearing. But he had a vision and his creation of Special Force - the Chindits - was revolutionary. Operating deep behind enemy lines and supplied entirely from the air, because Wingate believed ‘one fighting man at the heart of the enemy’s military machine being worth many hundreds in the forward battle areas.’ The Chindits suffered astonishing privations in the depths of the Burmese jungle: it was really air-mobile warfare before the advent of medium- and heavy-lift helicopters, and both Churchill and Slim spoke of ‘genius’.

#7

The Indians
More Victoria Crosses were awarded in Burma than in any other theatre of war, and most were won by Indian soldiers. The jawans (literally ‘boys’) of the Indian Army made up the bulk of the ultimately victorious Fourteenth Army. They were part of the largest volunteer army in history: Rajputs, Dogras, Sikhs, Jats, Punjabis, Garwhalis, Biharis, Ahirs, Amirs, Chamars, Rawats, Minas, Mahars, Coorgs, Assamese, Adibasis, Kumaonis, Pathans, Brahuis, Mers, Tamils, Telegus, Paraiyahs, Brahmans, Hindustani Mussulmans, Punjabi Mussulmans, Madrasi Mussulmans and Gurkhas from Nepal, representing practically every race and caste on the subcontinent, in ‘an army that won a victory … that vindicated the Indian Army’s honour and traditions before that army marched into the shadows’.

“…You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din!”
Extract: Gunga Din - Rudyard Kipling

#8

The British
When Mountbatten took command he addressed as many of the troops as possible. ‘I hear you call this the Forgotten Front,’ he said, ‘I hear you call yourselves the Forgotten Army. Well, let me tell you that this is not the Forgotten Front, you are not the Forgotten Army. In fact, nobody has even heard of you.’ Yet men came from every county in Great Britain and Ireland to fight the forgotten war in the fine old county regiments of the British Army; from Devon to Durham, Sussex to Sutherland, Lancashire, Leicestershire and London, Worcestershire, Westmoreland and Wales. And the words most often conjured up in relation to this war, from the Kohima Memorial, are still moving:

When you go home,
Tell them of us and say
For their tomorrow,
We gave our today …

#9

Burma was probably the most complex Allied campaign in the war, for reasons that included but went beyond the operational aspects. Some of these aspects were:

The Burma Road needed to be kept open to supply China, which was more important strategically to keep Japan occupied in China than keeping Japan out of India per se. Except that if Japan drove through India and joined up with Germany in the Middle East oilfields, which were critical to Britain’s ability to fight and of huge benefit to oil-starved Germany and Japan, the Allies would have been in a vastly worse position. The Allies feared this risk greatly.

British, American, and Chinese units operated in Burma, often with a fair lack of cohesion and, in the case of the Chinese, generally lousy performance with one outstanding exception.

Political considerations among some senior American commanders made them hostile to what they saw as operations designed to preserve British imperial interests in Burma and India.

The Indian independence movement complicated the defence of the Indian frontier, while Indian troops were heavily employed in the campaign.

The terrain was forbidding and produced some innovative responses such as Wingate’s as previously noted, along with the similar American force known as Merrill’s Marauders http://www.marauder.org/marauder.htm

Both Wingate and the American “Vinegar Joe” Stillwell were odd characters with a capacity to alienate people. Stillwell made it an art form, which didn’t help international relations.

The Burmese independence movement, represented in part by the Burma National Army which fought under Japanese control before switching to the Allies later in the war, was hostile to the Allies, which meant that the Allies weren’t always regarded as liberators deserving of local support.

#10

TheJapanese‘ Ask any man who fought against the Japanese in that campaign’, wrote William Pennington, ‘we all carry the same abiding hatred.’ But this is not so. David Wilson welcomed his former enemies to his home and to the 2nd Divisional Memorial at York. When he asked why the Japanese held a British memorial in such high esteem he was told, ‘because it is part of our history too now. We have nothing in Japan to remind us of our friends and comrades who lie with yours in Burma. It is our privilege to remember them here.’ In the Burma Campaign Fellowship Group John Nunneley saw ‘the spiritual rewards of reconciliation’. George MacDonald Fraser’s feelings were somewhere in between. ‘As to old grudges and hatreds … well one cannot help what one feels, and guilt and regret just don’t come into it.’ Seeing Japanese veterans interviewed on television, he felt ‘a curious sort of recognition of the wrinkled old bastards’.

#11

Odd that you should post this now. I had just finished reading the thread on Japanese cannibalism and, as a result of that and some other comments in other threads which tend to stereotype the Japanese as universally evil, was thinking about starting a topic providing more balance.

There is no question that the Japanese were often brutal and sadistic beyond Western comprehension (but so were the Allies in many instances, and I mean beyond Western comprehension) but there were also instances of Japanese kindness and consideration. Neither group had a monopoly on being good or bad. The problem was that two nations with irreconcilable military cultures clashed and each imposed its standards on the other to form overwhelming contempt for the other, e.g. Japanese contempt for surrendered prisoners and Allied contempt for wounded Japanese who attempted to kill Allies when approached to give them aid.

Anyone reading the diaries of Japanese soldiers cannot help but recognise that they were stoic under awful circumstances of privation, courageous, and committed to helping their mates just like every other effective military force. Some also reveal themselves as sensitive to nature and life, and caring family men, or just scared boys doing their best like many Allied soldiers. Not that it did them any good, as the diaries were recovered from the dead.

In Burma, as in Papua New Guinea, many Japanese were killed or, more accurately, just slaughtered when charging or even just wandering towards the Allies in a starved and desperate state. I knew an Australian soldier who did this in New Guinea. He was disgusted by just mowing them down as they came towards his position, starved and half-dead anyway. The sick and sad people he was killing were beyond hating. I’ve read of similar sentiments by British soldiers in the later stages of the Burma campaign (the Irrawaddy? - can’t recall my source).

One thing that all enemies have in common is that they endured the same battles.

#12

I suppose we have to demonise the enemy in order to destroy him, and when he inflicts such odious treatment upon his helpless victims, as did the Japanese very early in their war, the demonisation becomes simpler. I think the allies were, in the main, responding to the vile crimes of their enemy and, indeed, ‘tarred’ them all with the same brush.

It always amazes me how the human psyche has so much potential for good or evil, and how the perpetrators of evil are often victims of the same or another evil.

In the novel ‘A Town Like Alice’ the Japanese sergeant responsible for escorting the ladies about the country, is portrayed in a more balanced way. Indeed he, the sergeant, in the end, earns the sympathy and respect if not affection of the ladies. All that he wanted to do was to go home to his family.

It was not my intention to demonise the Japanese on this thread, albeit other contributors might, but merely to stick with the strategy and tactics of the campaign.

personally, I feel that if one must acquire anything from conflict, it ought to be tolerance - “Jaw, jaw is better than war,war!”

#13

I think that is correct.

The cycle of violence reinforced the Japanese in their belief that death was better than surrender to a brutal enemy, and each side got more brutal and unforgiving.

There were also obvious features of the Japanese mentality, such as the corrupted notions of Bushido, which contributed to aspects of Japanese behaviour which, by any standards, were appalling and bound to cause outrage and contempt towards them.

Westerners also had a pretty fair idea of Japanese attitudes and actions from the well-publicised events during the Rape of Nanking several years earlier, although strangely enough the Japanese high command issued a training manual which sought to avoid a repetition of that event by extolling high standards of conduct. There isn’t any evidence that this had much impact in the field.

#14

The CBI Theater is largely ignored here in the U.S. as well, and it isn’t because there were no Americans fighting in Burma. The “headline” events seem dominated by battles and campaigns in the Central and Southwest Pacific theaters, from Midway and Guadalcanal in 1942 to Okinawa in '45.

Merrill’s 5307th Regiment, codenamed GALAHAD, was patterned after Wingate’s Chindits, and fought a long campaign for Mytikyina.

JT

#15

The Americans
James Shepley of Time and Life remarked to Frank Merrill, commander of 5307th Composite Unit (Provisional), that the unit’s name had no appeal. ‘I’m going to call your outfit “Merrill’s Marauders”.’ The name stuck, and the only American combat formation in Burma received more and better press coverage than any similar sized formation elsewhere. But much more numerous were the engineer, signals and transportation corps troops in theatre, most of whom were African-American, and their contribution has previously been ignored. And some half of the 61,000 men forming the operational strength of the air force were American. During Fourteenth Army’s triumphant reconquest of Burma in 1945, three quarters of their supplies were flown to them in American aircraft.

#16

Possibly because Burma was seen as a campaign that was bogged down while the SWPA and POA land campaigns were heading directly for Japan. Also there were a lot more US troops engaged in the SWPA and POA than Burma, which was an American sideshow at best. And because MacArthur was a relentless self-promoter who made sure he got plenty of good press, even when he wasn’t doing much. Plus the island campaigns from 1944 were bloody affairs but relatively short, often giving a clear victory in a month or two while Burma just ground on.

#17

Truly said. The engineers did after all build the Burma Road.

JT

#18

One piece of good advice Bill Slim admits to receiving very early in the campaign, from a Chinese general (at this time the Chinese were the only ones to have defeated the Japanese on the ground), was not to withdraw when being flanked by the enemy, but to form a position all-round defence and ‘slug it out’.

“…This training was based on a short memorandum I had drawn up, giving what I considered to have been the tactical lessons of the 1942 campaign. The chief if these were:

(i)The individual soldier must learn, by living, moving and exercising in it, that the jungle is neither impenetrable nor unfriendly. When he has once learned to move and live in it, he can use it for concealment, covered movement, and surprise.
(ii)Patrolling is the master key to jungle fighting . All units, not only infantry battalions, must learn to patrol in the jungle, boldly, widely, cunningly and offensively.
(iii)All units must get used to having Japanese parties in their rear, and, when this happens, regard not themselves surrounded, but the Japanese, as ‘surrounded’.
(iv)In defence, no attempt should be made to hold long continuous lines. Avenues of approach must be covered and enemy penetration between our posts dealt with at once by mobile local reserves who have completely reconnoitred the country.
(v)There should rarely be frontal attacks and never frontal attacks on narrow fronts. Attacks should follow hooks and come in from the flank or rear, while pressure holds the enemy in front.
(vi)Tanks can be used in almost any country except swamp. In close country they must always have infantry with them to defend and reconnoitre for them. They should always be used in the maximum numbers available and capable of being deployed. Whenever possible penny packets must be avoided. ‘The more you use, the fewer you lose.’
(vii)There are no non-combatants in jungle warfare. Every unit and sub-unit, including medical ones, is responsible for its own all-round protection, including patrolling, at all times.
(viii)If the Japanese are allowed to hold the initiative they are formidable. When we have it, they are confused and easy to kill. By mobility away from roads, surprise and offensive action we must regain and keep the initiative.

These are the lessons I learned in defeat and I don’t think I changed them in any essential throughout the rest of the war.
(This will be reflected, initially, in the Battle of the Admin Box - 32B).

Source: Defeat Into Victory – Field Marshal Viscount Slim

*Recommend : The Little Men :-
A Platoons Epic Fight in the Burma Campaign – K.W. Cowper

http://www.vera.org.uk/BOOKS1.htm

#19

One of the difficulties with describing the hazards of jungle warfare to those who have not experienced it, is to convey just how scarey it is, when you have for much of the time in dense jungle, a very limited range of vision. Add to that a ferocious and merciless enemy that can be upon you at any moment, and one gets more of a feeling as to why much of the above training was necessary.

I have personally, and I’m sure others will be able to relate to this, directed a newcomer to an obvious trail, only to have him ask… “What F****** trail?”

#20

The Battle of the Admin Box.

The battle of the Admin Box was fought by the 14th Punjabis, the West yorkshires and the men of the 7th Division’s Admin Box, containing the divisional services units. The name of the battle has a dual meaning in that the service units had taken up a box formation when settling into position, and the ‘Admin Box’ is a piece of kit used by the British Army to store equipment.
But first:

By the beginning of 1944 the fact that the British could not claim to have defeated the Japanese in a single major engagement, let alone campaign, was beginning to cause serious concern to their American allies. The fault, in the opinion of many American officers, lay not in the fighting qualities of the British and Indian troops, whom they respected as being among the best in the world, but in their commanders’ lack of aggression and seeming inability to solve the problems of jungle warfare. This was an over-simplification of a very complex problem, and largely ignored such crucially important factors as air power, but was apparently emphasized when aggressively handled Australian troops inflicted a series of telling defeats on the Japanese in New Guinea.

Certainly, the speed with which the Japanese had overrun the Malayan peninsula, followed immediately by the fall of Singapore, the worst military disaster in the history of the British Empire, had profound psychological shockwaves. Hardly had these subsided that the army found itself conducting a long and painful retreat from Burma. Early in 1943 a limited offensive had been mounted in the coastal regions of the Arakan with a view to restoring morale. Unfortunately, the Japanese were very sensitive regarding this sector, from which access to Central Burma was possible, and they responded vigorously, working their way round the jungle flank to fall on the British lines of communication. Once again, the result was a difficult withdrawal and morale, far from being restored was further damaged.

There was the sickening feeling that the Japanese always seemed to be one move ahead, and that they were always able to obtain local air superiority. Nevertheless, as the year 1943 drew to its close, it was decided to try again in the Arakan, in greater strength than before, and by then the situation had changed somewhat. The elderly Hurricanes which had been battling to contain the enemy’s fighter bombers had been joined by faster, more manoeuvrable Spitfires. On 31 December the hitherto cocky and complacent Japanese airmen were bounced by the new arrivals.

In this action, eight of the Japanese Sally heavy bombers went down, a further three were claimed as probable kills, and five more sustained serious damage. Of the escorting fighters, five Oscars were shot down, plus a further probable and five were damaged. The RAF’s loss amounted to one Spitfire damaged and another destroyed while crash-landing.

On 15 January 1944 the Japanese returned in force, determined to regain mastery of the air. A tremendous fighter dogfight raged over the Arakan, resulting in six Oscars and ten Zeroes being shot down, plus a further Oscar and four Zeroes probably destroyed. The British losses amounted to one Spitfire, plus two Spitfires and a Hurricane damaged. A further air battle took place on 20 January. This cost the Japanese one Oscar and six Zeroes shot down, two Oscars and six Zeroes probably destroyed, and three Oscars and five Zeroes sent home riddled and trailing smoke. Two Spitfires were lost and three were damaged.

These actions, particularly the massacre on 15 January, were witnessed by jubilant British and Indian troops on the ground, and in themselves did a great deal to dispel any idea that the enemy was invincible.

Source: Last Stand - Bryan Perrett