Immediately it was available, Stopford sent the leading 5 Brigade of the 2nd Division up the road towards 161 Brigade, now held up short of Kohima. The first enemy road-block encountered was rushed, but the second, six miles farther on, repulsed an unsupported infantry attack. Next day the divisional artillery and some tanks arrived. A second attack broke through, but the Japanese counter-attacked. They were beaten off and the column pushed on. During the next few days several positions barring the road were taken in stiff fighting until, on the 15th April, 5 Brigade and 161 Brigade joined hands. The next brigade (6) of the 2nd Division was then brought up and freed 161 Brigade for its advance to relieve Kohima. On the 18th, the brigade, with tank, artillery, and air support, launched an assault astride the main road and along the ridge on its right. Progress was at times slow, as the enemy reacted with fierce local counter-attacks, but Warren’s men finally broke through and joined up with the hard-pressed garrison, clinging grimly to their smoking hill-top. A Punjabi battalion was the first to enter, and at once took over part of the perimeter from the exhausted defenders. Kohima was relieved.
After dark the wounded were brought out under fire and carried to ambulances that had crept close up under such cover as could be found. Next day, the 19th, 161 Brigade continued its attack, but failed to take Kuki Piquet, though some advance was made. Throughout the day, the road back was kept open, and by it Kohima was restocked, so that many of the garrison got their first full meal since the siege began. On the 20th, 6 Brigade of the 2nd Division moved in under cover of artillery and relieved the rest of the original garrison. At six o’clock on that morning Colonel Richards handed over the command he had so gallantly held and collected his men. Three hours later they marched out, and, just below what had been the hospital, they found lorries waiting to take them from the dust, din, and stench of death in which they had lived for eleven days.
They had endured much. Forced into an ever contracting circle by the relentless assaults of vastly superior numbers, their casualties had been severe. There had been no evacuation for the wounded, and men were hit again and again as they lay in the casualty stations. Thirst was not the least of the trials of these devoted men. Sieges have been longer but few have been more intense, and in none have the defenders deserved greater honour than the garrison of Kohima.
Although the small force that had been cut off on Garrison Hill had now been relieved, most of Kohima Ridge itself remained in hostile hands. With their centre on the town, the Japanese held an immensely strong position, some seven thousand yards long, astride the main Imphal-Dimapur road. The natural defensive strength of a succession of steep, wooded ridges had been improved by the Japanese genius for inter-supporting field works and concealment, until it was as formidable a position as a British army has ever faced. Its flanks, extending into high and most difficult country, were protected by inaccessibility. The enemy also had detachments dug in well forward on tracks which led through dense jungle to the main road and railway. There was thus the constant threat of infiltration and of movements against our rear. It was always a wonder to me why Sato did not attempt a bold stroke of this kind. It would have been typically Japanese, and he had, even at this stage, enough troops for it if he cared to take some risk at Kohima itself.
Our own build-up was proceeding rapidly. The concentration of the 2nd British Division was practically complete—too complete as far as its transport was concerned, for its lorries, parked nose to tail, threatened to turn the two-way main road into a one-way track. An attack by twelve Oscars on a mass of this useless transport, jammed into a village, lent point to my exhortations to 33 Corps to get it out of the area. Luckily the R.A.F. maintained such a degree of air superiority that we did not pay the heavy penalty that should have been exacted. Relieved of this excessive transport, the division found, like others in Burma, that it could move faster and more freely without it. The leading brigade (33) of the 7th Indian Division had arrived, also by air, from the Arakan fighting, and 23 Chindit Brigade was already advancing in several columns south-east from the railway. One of these columns had its first serious and successful brush with the enemy on the 16th April. On the 22nd it attacked a strongly held village but was repulsed. Within the next few days, in co-operation with a well-directed air strike, it again attacked and this time took the village.
Stopford, commanding 33 Corps, whose headquarters was established at Jorhat, was rightly urging the 2nd Division to advance, but the terrain and the type of warfare were new to British troops, while the unavoidable arrival of the division piecemeal made the task of Grover, the divisional commander, a difficult one.
His plan was for one brigade of the 2nd Division, supported by the bulk of the artillery, to keep up heavy pressure against the Japanese centre at Kohima while the two remaining brigades, one on each flank, carried out turning movements to seize high ground behind the Japanese front line. 161 Brigade was placed centrally as a General Reserve, and 33 Brigade ofthe 7th Division was held back to cover Dimapur. The columns of 23 Chindit Brigade were to continue their thrust south-east towards Jessami to cut the Japanese supply routes from the Chindwin. When the two flank brigades had reached their objectives it was intended to launch the main attack in the centre.
Starting on 21st April, the leading battalion of the left brigade (5) crossed the valley by jungle tracks to the east of the main road and climbed two thousand feet to a track running along the ridge due north from Kohima. Here it found a large Japanese position prepared for defence but unoccupied. During the next few days, hampered by rain on the slippery ascent and dependent entirely on animal and porter transport, strange to British troops, the rest of the brigade joined them. On the 29th, an attack on further Japanese positions, this time occupied, failed; and the brigade was held up well short of its final objective.
Meanwhile the other flank brigade (4) had scrambled up steep ridges towards the enemy left, meeting little opposition, but owing to rain and the difficulties of movement and supply it did not make progress as fast as had been expected.
The centre brigade (6) was, on the night of the 22nd/23rd April, heavily attacked on the shambles of Garrison Hill. In fierce hand-to-hand fighting the Japanese were beaten off, but for the next two days our men were under constant pressure and bombardment, much as the original garrison had been. On the 22nd, an attempt with infantry and tanks to relieve the pressure failed, as the tanks were held up by difficult ground. Then, on the night of the 27th a more formidable assault—the first of a series of attacks and counter-attacks—was launched on the Deputy Commissioner’s Bungalow. This had once been a charming house in a delightful garden, but was now a heap of rubble in a devastation with one chimney only standing, black and twisted against the sky. This attack, after desperate fighting, succeeded in reaching and holding, not only the site of the house but the bluff in the garden, which overlooked the Kohima crossroads and denied them to the enemy—a very valuable tactical success. On the night of the 29th/30th the Japanese made a final attempt, in an all-out counter-attack, to regain possession, but failed with heavy loss. Each side was left holding part of the garden, with the tennis court as a no-man’s-land between them, and with hand grenades shuttling back and forth in the place of tennis balls.
As neither flank brigade could make the progress hoped for and as the centre brigade was hard pressed opposite Kohima itself, the divisonal plan was changed. The wider turning movements were abandoned, and it was decided to deliver a more concentrated attack on the Japanese position so that all three brigades could act in close tactical combination and in turn have the full support of the divisional and corps artillery.
This set-back was disappointing, but the 2nd British Division was now complete, the 7th Indian was coming in well and would be followed by 268 Indian Motorized Brigade. I should soon have here the two-to-one superiority over the Japanese that was my aim at both Kohima and Imphal, but I was determined not to push Stopford, at this stage, beyond the pace he considered wise. He was the last commander to drag his f
eet, and his 2nd Division, the spearhead of his attack, while as brave as troops could be, was inexperienced; its very dash rendered it liable to heavy casualties unless its attacks were deliberately prepared with all possible support. So, although I continued to divert artillery ammunition, petrol, and air strikes, badly needed on other fronts, to 33 Corps, I did not nag at them to hurry. The corps had to win its first battle; 4 Corps, comparative veterans, could wait.
There were not wanting at this time those who, crediting from a distance the alarmist reports that always circulate at such moments, urged me at all costs to ‘break through and relieve Imphal’. I had no intention of yielding to pressure; Imphal was in no danger of falling. It is not the easiest task of a superior commander to stand between such pressure and his subordinate commanders, but at times it is his duty. General Giffard, who understood the situation well, increased my debt to him by the firmness with which he did this now.
The battle of Kohima was a bloody one. The first full-scale assault by the 2nd Division under the new plan was so delayed by rain that it was not until the 3rd May that deployment was complete. The plan was for 4 Brigade on the right to capture G.P.T. Ridge, advance to Jail Hill, and link up with 6 Brigade in the centre, which by then, having broken out from Garrison Hill, should have taken Kuki Piquet and F.S.D. Ridge. 5 Brigade on the left was to occupy Naga village and dominate the Treasury area. The attack was to be supported by tanks and by all available guns, firing time-concentrations in support of each brigade in turn.
The attack began in the early morning of the 4th May. 4 Brigade, delayed by undiscovered Japanese bunkers, reached G.P.T. Ridge, but was unable to secure the whole of it, nor to approach Jail Hill. By nightfall on this part of the field the enemy positions and ours were inextricably mingled. 6 Brigade failed to take Kuki Piquet and, although its tanks reached F.S.D. Ridge, the infantry, subjected to devastating fire from other enemy positions, could not dig in or remain. A portion only of the ridge was held by nightfall and here again British and Japanese were mixed up together. 5 Brigade entered Naga village, but during the night of the 4th/5th May were counter-attacked heavily and pushed back to the western edge of the village, which they managed to hold. The Treasury area remained firmly in enemy hands.
During the 5th May both sides were exhausted. The British could attempt no more than local consolidation, and, luckily for us, the Japanese launched no counter-attacks. On the 6th, all brigades made attempts to improve their positions by local attacks, but only minor adjustments at the cost of considerable casualties were achieved. Stopford now handed over his Corps Reserve, 33 Brigade of the 7th Indian Division, to Grover who, on the 7th May, used one of its battalions to attack Jail Hill, from which on previous days heavy and accurate machine-gun fire had hampered both 4 and 6 Brigades. The attack with great gallantry reached its objective, but was unable to dislodge the enemy from his deep bunkers, and we were again forced to abandon Jail Hill.
After four days’ bitter fighting with heavy casualties, the assault had little to show. While the 31st Japanese Division certainly lacked initiative, it had all the enemy’s fanatical stubbornness in defence. Our troops were again discovering that it was one thing to reach a Japanese bunker, another to enter it. Nor had artillery bombardment and accurate attacks by Hurricanes and Vengeance bombers on the limited areas engaged had much result. The most effective weapon proved to be the tank, firing solid shot at point-blank range; but the wooded terrain, its steepness, and the wet that made tanks churn everything into liquid mud, restricted their use. It was clear that the battle would be prolonged and savage.
During the 8th, 9th, and 10th May, while its forward troops remained in close contact with the enemy, 33 Corps prepared to renew the attack. A main feature of the plan for the fresh attack, on which the corps commander insisted, was to be a generous use of smoke to screen the attacking troops from the enfilade and long-range machine-gun fire that had proved so damaging.
The main objectives in this attack, Jail Hill and the D.I.S., were allotted to 33 Brigade of the 7th Division, but as both these were enfiladed from G.P.T. and F.S.D. Ridges, 4 and 6 Brigades of the 2nd Division were to clear the latter features before 33 Brigade reached its objectives. The attack began on the night of the 10th/11th May, but that of the 2nd Division was only partially successful. When dawn came the enemy still held several bunkers on the reverse slopes of G.P.T. Ridge and a strong-point on F.S.D. Ridge. The main attack by 33 Brigade fared better. Probing forward in the darkness, a Punjabi battalion found Pimple Hill unoccupied and promptly dug in on it. The Queen’s Regiment, after a stiff fight, was, soon after dawn, in possession of most of Jail Hill; and a second Punjabi battalion, although they suffered considerably, had cleared the D.I.S. area. As the light strengthened, both these battalions were attempting to dig in on their gains, but were being greatly hampered, not only by fire from the front but by accurate enfilade from automatic weapons on G.P.T. and F.S.D. Ridges, not yet free of enemy. The situation of the two battalions, hanging on with great determination in the mud and rain but losing men fast, was relieved by a heavy smokescreen put down at 8.45 a.m. by our artillery for several hours. The Japanese did not appear to have laid out any fixed lines of fire, and the effect of their machine-guns was reduced to such an extent that our men were able to dig in.
During the 11th, both battalions were reinforced, and after dark, with the help of Indian Sappers, they cleared a mine-field in the cutting between Jail Hill and the D.I.S. area, which up to then had prevented tanks from joining them. The fight was resumed on the 12th, when in the afternoon, aided by tanks, further progress was made on Jail Hill and in the D.I.S. area, but little elsewhere. At dawn on the 13th, in the face of our pressure, the surviving Japanese in both places fell back, and mopping-up was completed by midday. Seeing that the key-points of Jail Hill and the D.I.S. area were lost, the enemy evacuated G.P.T. Ridge, F.S.D. Ridge, and Kuki Piquet, which were occupied by the 2nd Division.
While this considerable action was going on, our other positions all along the front were being cleared up and extended by local operations. Typical of the Japanese resistance was the last phase of the prolonged struggle for the Deputy Commissioner’s Bungalow, where, although cut off, some enemy in deep bunker continued to fight stubbornly. Sappers made a track up which a tank could climb and the Dorsets then attacked with its support. Each bunker was engaged in turn by the tank’s 75-mm. guns, whose effect at thirty yards was decisive. Japanese attempting to escape were bayoneted or shot; none tried to surrender. The few remaining bunkers were demolished by pole charges thrust through their loopholes and, by the afternoon of the 13th May, the Deputy Commissioner’s Bungalow, his garden and tennis court, which had acquired an almost ritual significance, were all finally in our hands at remarkably low cost in casualties.
Treasury Hill was the next objective of 33 Brigade. A Gurkha battalion was concentrated on Garrison Hill during the 14th for a deliberate attack next day, but from patrol reports the brigadier concluded that most of the enemy were pulling out and he ordered an infiltrating attack in the dark. By first light on the 15th, the Gurkhas, meeting practically no resistance, had occupied the whole of Treasury Hill.
The gains thus made in a few days since the 10th May changed the whole picture around Kohima. The most satisfactory feature was the failure of the Japanese anywhere to counter-attack—evidence of their increasing disorganization under these heavy blows. There followed on this part of the battlefield a short lull while both sides regrouped themselves for a renewal of the struggle.
Meanwhile, on the Imphal front fighting as bitter but more diffuse had been claiming my attention. It was not without its moments of anxiety, for Scoones was being hard pressed.
Like unevenly spaced spokes of a wheel, six routes converged on to the Imphal plain to meet at the hub, Imphal itself:
(i) From the north, the broad Kohima road.
(ii) Also from the north, the foot-path down the Iril River Valley.
(iii) F
rom the north-east, the Ukhrul road.
(iv) From the south-east, the tarmac Tamu-Palel road.
(v) From the south, the rugged Tiddim highway.
(vi) From the west, the Silchar-Bishenpur track.
It was by these that the Japanese strove to break into the plain. The fighting all round its circumference was continuous, fierce, and often confused as each side manoeuvred to outwit and kill. There was always a Japanese thrust somewhere that had to be met and destroyed. Yet the fighting did follow a pattern. The main encounters were on or near the spokes of the wheel, because it was only along these that guns, tanks, and vehicles could move. The Japanese would advance astride the route, attack our troops blocking it, and try to outflank or infiltrate past them. We should first hold, then counter-attack, and the struggle would sway a mile or two, one way and the other. All the time our airmen, who played so vital a part in these battles, would be daily in sortie after sortie delivering attacks at ground-level and hammering the enemy’s communications right back into Burma. Gradually we should prevail, and, driven from the spokes of the wheel, the Japanese would take to the hills between them. Relentlessly we would hunt them down and when, desperate and rabid, they turned at bay, kill them. This pattern repeated itself along each of the spokes as, on one after the other, we passed from defence to offence.
Our casualties in this kind of fighting were not light. The infantry, as usual, suffered most and endured most, for this was above all an infantry battle, hand-to-hand, man against man, and no quarter. Our heaviest losses were among the officers, not only in the infantry who in this close fighting could not fail to be conspicuous, but among the artillery observation officers who to give accurate support pushed on with the leading troops, and among the young tank commanders who, regardless of safety, kept their turrets open or moved on foot so that they could guide their tanks through the jungle.
Defeat Into Victory Page 39