Defeat Into Victory

by Field-Marshal Viscount William Slim

  The corps commander in these circumstances decided to transfer the attack from the western and northern slopes of the Aradura Ridge to the eastern, a method now made possible by our capture of Naga village. The redispositioning of the troops for the new attack, and the necessary patrolling and reconnaissance, occupied some days. The attack proper began with an attempt by 5 Brigade to take Big Tree Hill, some two thousand yards north-east of Aradura. This attack was held up towards evening, but was resumed next day with tank support and was successful. The whole brigade then advanced to the west of the road, cutting the Japanese supply routes to their troops high up on the Aradura Ridge. This was the end of the enemy resistance. As our troops advanced, the Japanese pulled out and the Aradura Ridge was ours.

  The successes that the 2nd and 7th Divisions had been able to achieve in the last month had been helped in no small degree by the skilful and mobile operations of 23 L.R.P. Brigade in the very difficult and roadless Naga country on the left of 33 Corps. Through the jungle and over the hills, by tracks, passable only on foot or at the best by pack animals, the columns of the brigade, air supplied, thrust round the enemy flank and struck at his communications from the Chindwin. Apart from the enemy resistance, the mere physical exertion of slipping and sliding, heavily loaded, up and down these soaking tracks was a test that only tough, well-trained, and determined troops could have passed.

  Columns circled the right flank of the Japanese main position and took Kharasom, a nodal centre of enemy supply tracks, about twenty-five miles due east of Kohima, against considerable opposition. The action of these columns achieved a threefold success. They cut the main northern Japanese supply route at the most awkward time for him, they constituted a threat to his rear whose strength he found it difficult to assess, and they stimulated the active support of the local tribesmen. These were the gallant Nagas whose loyalty, even in the most depressing times of the invasion, had never faltered. Despite floggings, torture, execution, and the burning of their villages, they refused to aid the Japanese in any way or to betray our troops. Their active help to us was beyond value or praise. Under the leadership of devoted British political officers, some of the finest types of the Indian Civil Service, in whom they had complete confidence, they guided our columns, collected information, ambushed enemy patrols, carried our supplies, and brought in our wounded under the heaviest fire—and then, being the gentlemen they were, often refused all payment. Many a British and Indian soldier owes his life to the naked, head-hunting Naga, and no soldier of the Fourteenth Army who met them will ever think of them but with admiration and affection.

  It was clear now, at the beginning of June, that on the Kohima front the enemy was breaking and pulling out as best he could. While he still fought stubbornly as an individual, the cohesion of his units and the direction of his forces were obviously failing. The time had come to press on and destroy what was left of the 31st Japanese Division. The Supreme Commander, on the 8th June, issued a Directive that the Kohima–Imphal road was to be opened not later than mid-July, and I was grateful to him for not being stampeded by more nervous people into setting too early a date. I intended that the road should be open well before mid-July, but I was now more interested in destroying Japanese divisions than in ‘relieving’ Imphal.

  So was Stopford. His plan was for the 2nd Division, with the bulk of the corps artillery and tank support, as his main striking force, to push down the Imphal road. The 7th Indian Division was to advance south-east in pace with the 2nd Division through the country to the left of the road, thereby protecting the flank of the British division and cutting off an enemy attempting to disengage to the east. Simultaneously, 23 L.R.P. Brigade was called on for further exertions in an advance on Ukhrul. This would exploit the special qualities of each formation; the hitting power of the 2nd Division group; the ability of the 7th Division to operate on pack transport away from roads, with little artillery support and on a lighter supply scale; and the extreme mobility of 23 Brigade on air supply. It was hoped that die 2nd Division would force the enemy off the road to their destruction at the hands of the 7th Division and 23 Brigade. In any other type of country, this should have been easy. 33 Corps now had superiority in numbers, artillery, and armour, and absolute domination in the air; but here the jungle, the hills, the single road, and, over all, the monsoon clouds and pelting rain made the development of our strength slow and its employment difficult. Small rearguards were able to delay our advance while larger parties slipped away, but only in great disorganization and at the expense of abandoning much of their equipment.

  On the 6th and 7th June, the 2nd Division, after mopping up in the Aradura area, pushed on towards the 55th Milestone on the Imphal road. There was some sharp fighting with Japanese rearguards before this was reached, and it is typical of the difficulties encountered that on the latter day the Royal Engineers with the leading troops had to clear three landslides and five road-blocks, pick up numerous mines, and replace two sizeable bridges. Luckily, in most instances the enemy, while he blew up the spans, neglected to destroy the abutments, and our engineers, who had shown the forethought to provide themselves with the original blueprints of all bridges, were able to calculate and carry well forward what was required for replacement of the spans.

  The first serious opposition was met at Viswema at about Milestone 60. Here the enemy held a strong rearguard position on a great ridge across the road, covered by mine-fields, artillery, and interlocking machine-guns. Our leading troops were held up, and, during the evening of the 8th June, forced to fall back a little. Next day a strong flank-attack was directed against the ridge but, in the thick jungle, mist and rain, mistook one hill feature for another and missed its objective. The error, so close and broken was the country and so stiff the enemy resistance, was not discovered until the 11th June. The attack was then reorientated and went in finally on the 14th. It was successful, and many enemy were killed as they attempted to withdraw. About four miles were gained along the road, but then delay was again caused by a blown bridge. This and another enemy rearguard slowed the advance and only a few miles were covered, so that, by the evening of the 16th, the leading troops were halted about a mile short of Mao Songsang.

  Mao Songsang was the crest of the watershed between Kohima and Imphal. It offered another—the highest—of the ridges running roughly at right angles across the road. All our information was to the effect that the Japanese intended to hold this very strong position in a final attempt to bar the advance of 33 Corps on Imphal. Viswema had been a covering position to be held for some days while Mao Songsang was prepared. During the 17th June, many enemy positions located on the Mao Songsang ridge were heavily bombarded by night, while encircling movements round both the east and west flanks were launched. To everyone’s surprise the enemy abandoned his positions and slipped away. This was, I think, the first time in the Burma campaign that such a position had been surrendered without a fight—a most significant change in Japanese mentality.

  The 2nd Division pushed on hard at the heels of the enemy during the 18th and made its best advance up to that time—some fourteen miles—but was then held up a few miles short of Maram as the Sappers rebuilding a bridge were heavily mortared.

  Meanwhile the 7th Division had advanced on a wide front east of the road, meeting at first no opposition, but pressing hard on the retreating Japanese, who abandoned guns, mortars, and equipment of all kinds. Contact was regained on the 6th June some ten miles south-east of Kohima, and, on the night of the 7th/8th, an indecisive attack was put in on a Japanese position on the Kekrima Ridge a few miles farther east. After a number of encounters among the broken hills, a detachment managed, after a nightmare march of some days through pathless and dripping jungle, to outflank the position and the enemy, having delayed our advance until the 13th, pulled out. On the 16th, the 7th Division reached and cut the main Japanese east-west supply route, the Tuphema–Khorasom–Somra track, at the same time threatening Mao Songsang from the rear. On the 17th
they fought to within a mile of the village. There is no doubt that the action of the 7th Division decided the Japanese to abandon that position, which they could have expected to hold for a considerable time against attack from the north.

  The maintenance of the 7th Division was now becoming a problem and, its immediate task completed, it was concentrated east of Mao Songsang to operate by fighting patrols against the remaining tracks used by the enemy and to round up stragglers. The main supply line of the division was first a twelve-mile twisting ribbon of mud along which jeeps skidded and slithered, their wheels spinning, and then along a pack animal and porter track.

  All this time, the columns of 23 L.R.P. Brigade had pushed on wide to the east. Mountains and rain were their chief opponents, but in a series of small, scattered encounters in dripping jungle they ambushed bewildered Japanese mule trains, inflicted casualties, took prisoners, still rather a novelty, and completely dislocated the enemy line of communication. Again, the contribution of 23 Brigade to 33 Corps’ advance was real and effective.

  To my great annoyance at this time I was laid up in hospital in Shillong for some days, by an attack of malaria with some unpleasant complications. My annoyance was twofold. First, because I could not visit the front at this very interesting moment, and, second, because I had always preached that to get malaria was a breach of discipline. I had delivered what I felt to be some very effective exhortations to the troops on this theme and I felt now it would be a little difficult to repeat them. In fact, I had only proved on my own body the truth of my contention. Troops were forbidden to bathe after sunset and I had disobeyed my own orders. Returning very muddy and dirty late one evening I had washed in the open and been well and deservedly bitten by mosquitoes. However, I was attended while in hospital by my American Deputy Chief of Staff, Colonel Burton Lyons, and a small tactical headquarters. With his usual cheerful efficiency he soon had everything organized, and I was closely in touch from my bed with all that went on.

  It was indeed going very well. Torrential rain was slowing up operations on all sectors of the Assam front, but in spite of it, by the 18th June, 4 Corps’ 5th Division was, by attacks along the Kohima road and short hooks to each side of it, slowly approaching Kangpokpi. Although Scoones had ordered this division to advance to Karong, I had later told him not to let it go beyond Kangpokpi. I did this because reports were then coming in of considerable reinforcement of the Japanese forces south and east of ImphaL I expected, even at this stage, some further trouble from them, and I did not wish the 5th Division to get too far away from the 17th. Besides, 33 Corps was making satisfactory progress south. I should, I think, have been wiser instead to have urged Scoones to push on along the Kohima road as far and as fast as he could. I exaggerated the danger of renewed attacks on Imphal, and, by what was in effect slowing up the 5th Division, I allowed a considerable number of Japanese to escape between it and 33 Corps towards Ukhrul and the Chindwin. It was largely because of this that Ukhrul proved later to be so well defended.

  By the 18th June, the spearheads of my two corps were some forty miles apart on the Kohima road, the 2nd Division approaching Maram and the 5th nearing Kangpokpi. Although he had given up the much stronger defences of Mao Songsang, the enemy attempted to hold against the 2nd Division another rearguard position at Maram, about eight miles farther south. The weight of our artillery preparations and air-strike, combined with the rapidity of the 2nd Division’s deployment and infantry attack, was such that, instead of holding for the ten days ordered, this rearguard was overrun and mostly destroyed in a matter of hours. This was the last serious attempt the enemy made to delay the advance of 33 Corps. It was now evident that the 31st Japanese Division was disintegrating and the enemy higher command no longer controlled the battle. In Karong, for instance, our troops captured the almost complete equipment, maps, and documents of the 31st Divisional Infantry Headquarters, and at Milestone 92, the double-span bridge, although prepared for demolition, was rushed before the enemy Sappers could fire the charges.

  On the 22nd June, after a brush with fleeing enemy at the Kangpokpi Mission Station—a Japanese headquarters as it had been mine two years before—the tanks of the 2nd Division met the leading infantry of the 5th Division at Milestone 109. A convoy, which was waiting for this moment, was at once sent through, and 4 Corps had its first overland supply delivery since the end of March.

  The Imphal–Kohima battle, the first decisive battle of the Burma campaign, was not yet over, but it was won.

  CHAPTER XVI

  PURSUIT

  AT Fourteenth Army we were now out for much more than the mere expulsion of the invaders, or even their destruction. Evidence was coming in to me daily of the extent of the Japanese defeat, of their losses in tanks, guns, equipment, and vehicles, and of the disorganization of their higher command. In spite of the enemy reinforcements that were being sent into Burma, I calculated that after the defeats he had suffered on all three Burma fronts, Kawabe, the Japanese Commander-in-Chief, would desperately need time to regroup and refurbish his battered forces. There was no hope of any considerable amphibious operation against Southern Burma; we had not got the landing craft, and, even if we had, the Japanese battle fleet, now returned to Singapore, so dominated the Indian Ocean as to make such attempts too hazardous. I believed, more firmly than ever, in spite of the doubts of so many, that, if we were to regain Burma, it must be by an overland advance from the north. For the first time this now seemed a practical proposition. If we could drive the enemy over the Chindwin, establish bridgeheads on its east bank, and be ready to push a considerable force into the plains of Central Burma immediately the monsoon ended, we could strike Kawabe’s main force in front of Mandalay before it had recovered. This now became the object of all our efforts.

  General Giffard, with the same thought in mind, had already, in the second week of June, directed me:

  (a) To re-establish communications between Dimapur and Imphal.

  (b) To clear the Japanese from the area Dimapur–Kohima–Imphal plain–Yuwa–Tamanthi.

  (c) To be prepared to exploit across the Chindwin in the Yuwa–Tamanthi area, i.e., along a stretch of some hundred and thirty miles of river.

  The first of these three tasks Fourteenth Army had now completed; the second we were about to undertake; the third I had begun to plan as much more than mere exploitation. It was to be a second and final decisive battle. To fight it I must have, by the time the monsoon ended:

  (i) The necessary divisions, replenished, trained, equipped, and placed ready to move.

  (ii) A vastly improved system of communications to the Chindwin, an adequate land and air transport organization, and enough supplies collected well forward.

  (iii) Bridgeheads, firmly held, across the Chindwin.

  Fourteenth Army Headquarters, wholeheartedly backed by 11th Army Group, set to work at once on the first two of these requirements, which represented a colossal labour, especially for the administrative, technical, and training staffs and services. I snatched time from all this to visit most forward formations to congratulate them on what they had achieved and to spur them on, weary as they were, to an all-out pursuit. The troops responded magnificently. In spite of every difficulty of climate and terrain, the pursuit was pressed with relentless vigour right through the monsoon. I had asked for the impossible—and got it.

  I allotted the task of clearing the enemy roughly north of the line Kangpokpi–Ukhrul and eastward to 33 Corps, and all south and west of that to 4 Corps. This was based on the existing positions of formations, but as it entailed a joint attack on Ukhrul by the 7th Division of 33 Corps and the 20th Division of 4 Corps, it was not a very good boundary. I soon realized this and transferred the 20th Division to 33 Corps, so that the attack on Ukhrul should be co-ordinated by one commander.

  Ukhrul was the rallying point for the Japanese 15th and 31st Divisions and for all detachments and stragglers, east and north of Imphal. The enemy hoped that Mutaguchi’s Fifteenth Army, s
hielded by the weather and the ground, would be able to receive a large part of the reinforcements that were coming into Burma at a rate of six or seven thousand a month. Optimistic even still, the Japanese Command seemed to have decided to fight on to keep a hold in Assam.

  By the 1st July, Ukhrul was encircled. The 7th Division attacked from the west and north, the 20th Division closed in from the south and south-east, and 23 L.R.P. Brigade repeated its old role of cutting the escape routes to the east. Two days later, after overcoming stubborn resistance on all lines of advance, our troops were fighting in the outskirts of the village. Although these enemy detachments had suffered heavily and stragglers and small parties were daily being mopped up all over the area, it was not until the 8th July that the whole of Ukhrul itself was finally in our hands. Even then a considerable force of Japanese, cut off on the Ukhrul–Imphal road, held out until the 14th, when it was encircled and wiped out, all its guns and transport being captured. What was left of the enemy 15th and 31st Divisions was now in rapid retreat for the Chindwin, still covered by small but tenacious rearguards.

  The physical difficulties of the pursuit were great. A typical entry from the War Diary of one of the brigades engaged reads:

  Hill tracks in a terrible state, either so slippery that men can hardly walk or knee-deep in mud. Administrative difficulties considerable. Half a company took ten hours to carry two stretcher cases four miles. A party of men without packs took seven hours to cover five miles.

  On the day Ukhrul fell I transferred another division, the 23rd, from 4 Corps to 33 Corps, and made Stopford responsible for all operations east of the Manipur River. He was thus entrusted with the pursuit on the Palel–Tamu axis, while 4 Corps, in addition to cleaning up the Bishenpur track area and south of it, where formed bodies of the enemy still held out, continued to control the advance on the Tiddim road. It was on these two routes into Burma, the Tamu road and the Tiddim road, that fighting and interest now mainly centred.