BUNKER DEFENCES

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 116, 18 May 1944, Page 5

BUNKER DEFENCES

RELIED ON BY JAPANESE Rec. 11 a.m. RUGBY, May 17. Although the Japanese still maintain their road block on the ImpnalKohima road, the British forces are slowly pushing them back east and north of the Imphal plain and steadily regaining their positions round Kohima itself. Meanwhile, on the south coast, British troops have been withdrawn into high ground behind the villages now flooded by the monsoon which they captured at the outset of the camapign. While the situation on the western side of Burma thus shows no particular change, President Chiang Kai-shek has chosen this time to launch a campaign from the east, which is evidently co-ordinated with the Ameri-can-Chinese offensive towards Myitkyina from the north-west and north. The Japanese system of bunker defence is a most important factor in the Manipur fighting, as also in Arakan and an authoritative description of it is given in a dispatch from the Kohima front. An army observer writes: "Two days after our troops captured Kohima Ridge the enemy has not counter-attacked, but is contenting himself with firing on the lost positions with light machine-guns sited in-the isolated bunkers which are still holding out. . "As a result, our movements in that immediate area are restricted. Although we hold nearly the whole of Gaol Hill, the buildings on its crest are for the moment untenable because of the fire from bunkers with a highlydeveloped tunnel system. It may take a few days to dislodge the Japanese from their underground warren. ADVANCE SLOWED DOWN. "The tanks which are co-operating with the infantry have been engaged in liquidating the bunkers with some success. Enemy guns shelled the ridge from south of Kohima in the ground of the Deputy Commissioner's bungalow. J "The bunker defence system has achieved a certain amount of success in slowing down our advance. The system, which is peculiar to the Japanese, reflects his war philosophy. "The Japanese lives in the bunker, fights in the bunker, and' if his defence is broken, dies in the bunker. The bunkers vary from a pne-man foxhole with a lid to a section bunker which may accommodate from six to 26 men provided with all conveniences. "Where it is possible the Japanese site their bunkers on the cloud line of a hill-top. They are always in a group, the number depending 'on the size of the feature to be defended. Mutual protection is the principle of the defence and the bunkers are placed to obtain all-round criss-crosses of fire. "Our solution to the bunker problem is tank artillery fire at point-blank range."—B.O.W.