BEST PROGRESS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 305, 26 December 1944, Page 4

BEST PROGRESS

CAMPAIGN IN BURMA

DRY WEATHER HELPS

Never since the Allies set about the reconquest of Burma lias progress been so fast as in the past six weeks. The Japanese have been squeezed out of the triangular tip of Northern Burma, and British, forces are moving with as much rapidity as the country permits from north and west against the more valuable Central Burma regions. These encouraging advances are being made with the benefit of dry weather, which may be expected to continue for four or five months (writes Geoffrey Tebbutt in the Melbourne Herald). May to October is, with local variations, the period of the monsoonal rains. Winter, with tracks dry and streams low, is the better campaigning season in Burma. Even the air arm is far more effective in the present conditions, and the concerted movements of these first months of the dry season show that great preparations were made during "the wet," when large-scale troop movements were impossible or unprofitable. Treacherous Weather Airmen of this front, with experience in Europe and elsewhere, told me that they have known no weather worse than that over Burma in the wet season, when, in half an hour or so, the ceiling may drop from 22,000 feet to "the deck." and when every type of meteorological treachery threatens them. Dry-season flying there is, however, generally in fair conditions. This will mean much to the R.A.F. and the American Air Forces, not only in bombing and scouting operations, but in the supplying of forward troops, who sometimes had to go on short rations in the thick weather because the transport pilots could not find them, or could not themselves get off the ground. Allied preponderance in the air in Burma is even greater than Allied numerical .superiority on the ground, so that, with the growing advantage of new airfields west of the border mountains, the ground campaign should have increasingly strong support at shorter ranges. Total Japanese strength in Burma has been estimated at nine or ten divisions. It is public property that three army corps—4th, 15th and 33rd —'are available to the British command for the Burma operations. These include British, Indian, West African and East African units, with Indians in the majority, and with the addition of levies and other local forces. Thus, the Japanese would be outnumbered by Sir William Slim's 14th Army alone, and Lieut.-General Daniel Sultan, the American commander in the north, has a command which includes one Imperial and five Chinese divisions. Ijines Liong, IVot Weak The weight of our greater numbers should be more effective as we close upon the interior lines of communication by rail, road and river which had been principally in Japanese hands. Our lines, from Bengal, Assam and Imphal (Manipur State) certainly are long. But, with the consolidation of gains, dry weather for • the improvement of roads, and with a splendid fleet of air transport, they need not be weak. Correspondents in Burma properly emphasise the importance of the links now foi'ged between the various Allied forces from the Chindwin, across the Northern Irrawaddy Valley, and almost to the Chinese border. Hitherto, there was a series of fronts so scattered that, although they formed a loose strategic whole, they were for tactical purposes, almost independent. Now, the only isolated front is Arakan, just inside Burma, on the Bay of Bengal, where seasonal advances are being made, and v/here Commando raids with Indian naval support have been carried out. Two "Indaws" The troublesome nomenclature of Burma, in relation to the capture of the oil-producing centre of Indiw, 25 miles east of the Upper Chindwin, calls for a little further explanation. It is being called "Oil Indaw" to distinguish it from the other Indaw, 100 I miles to the north-east, in the upper Irrawaddy Valley. "Oil Indaw" yielded only a very small proportion of Burma's prewar production of 275,000,000 gallons of petroleum. The main fields are far to the south, around Yenangyaung,, in the Irrawaddy Valley, below Mandalajr, where we shall be confronted with » large job of un-seorching to restore Burma oil ■ production. It is from Mandalay southward, too, that Burma holds most of its population of 17,000,000. Five thousand square miles of Burma, and 2000 "inhabited localities" (Southeast Asia Command insists on borrowing the Russian phrase) have recently been recovered by the 14th Army. Attitude of Burmese Except for Bhamo (normal population, 7800) and ■Myitkyina. (7300), both taken by the Chinese under American direction, the "inhabited localities" have so far included no sizable town. As we approach Mandalay, the current objective, we shall learn the effects of the intensive propaganda employed by the Japanese against the Allies, and especially the Chinese. These, I was told recently by a Burma Government authority, had been considerable, and that there was reason to expect difficulty in keeping Burmese civil officials at their posts to assist in the inaugural tasks of the difficult reconstruction