BURMA FRONTIER

Timaru Herald, Volume CLIII, Issue 22470, 4 January 1943, Page 2

BURMA FRONTIER

Patrol Activities

Growing Allied Army

The fighting retreat of General Alexander’s troops in Burma last May took the line of the Chindwin River and into the range in the Manipur region of Assam. British patrol activities have been increasing since the monsoon ended about the beginning of November, the latest movement being in the direction of Akyab, which, with the spacious harbour of Kyauk-pyu, further south, provides the Japanese navy with very valuable bases less than half-way down the coast of the Bay of Bengal. The mountain range which runs into the Himalayas in the north and divides Burma from Assam continues south close to the Bay of Bengal shore, but its termination at Cape Negrais does not end it to the eye of a geologist, for the same series of folds is continued in the Andaman and Nicobar islands. Rugged Country In the north, this range is narrow and there known as the Patkai hills. Further south, the direction changes from south-west to south, and the range broadens out and encloses the Manipur plateau. Individual parts have received different names —the Naga hills, the Chin hills and the Lushal hills, for instance —but from Manipur southward the whole range is known as the Arkan Yoma, the peaks of which rise to 10,000 feet. Along this line, with its heights, and ravines, rivers and jungle, a growing Allied army has been keeping contact with the enemy and training for its special task. In May, after he had extricated the two very thin divisions which were in Burma, General Alexander, now directing the campaign in Libya, said: “We have held the Japanese off from any possibility of invading India before the monsoons. We have given India five months to prepare, and perhaps the monsoons will give her another five months.” New Reading System Part of the preparation during the months that have elapsed must have been the construction of roads at numbers of places into the mountain barrier. There have been references in the news to the work of drivers on difficult and dangerous routes. When a new campaign opens, an idea of the location of the roads will be indicated; patrol work Is not likely to give a key to the system. It will be recalled that Alexander had to destroy a good deal of his motor transport and his tanks owing to his inability to get them through the mountains.

It was stated in October by the Delhi correspondent of Reuter’s that the Allies certainly intended to open a second front soon against the Japanese in Burma. General Sir Archibald Wavell had made a four-day tour of the north-east defences, during which he had crossed into Burma. He had spent many hours with officers, who in twos and threes had been scouting' into north-west Burma using new and little-known routes. This reconnaissance he had ordered to be extended. Some of the tribesmen of the mountain frontier have rendered valuable guerilla service to the Allies. The Nagas, using their own weapons and jungle craft. hare worried and damaged Japanese patrols.