MAGNIFICENT FIGHT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 29 February 1944, Page 4

MAGNIFICENT FIGHT

BRITISH AND INDIAN TROOPS IN BURMA Japanese Plan to Destroy Divisions Goes Astray ENEMY TROOPS THEMSELVES ENCIRCLED HEAVY CASUALTIES INFLICTED (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 10.7 a.m.) RUGBY, February 28. Lieutenant-General A. F. P. Christison, commanding the Fourteenth Army forces in Arakan, says: “I cannot be too proud of their magnificent courage and devotion to duty during a long and difficult battle. The troops waged a fierce, relentless and overwhelmingly successful war on a big enemy force which sought to cut their communications and destroy them with an enveloping movement. Instead, the Japanese force has itself been largely destroyed, a conservative estimate putting their dead at over 1000 and wounded at 2000 out of an original task force of approximately 8000. Our own casualties have been immeasurably lighter. So far as the killed are concerned, the advantage is probably at least three to one in our favour. Lieutenant General Christison explains that the Japanese plan was to seize with a large force the Ngakyedauk Pass, the only road connecting the British troops east and west of the main Mayu Range, thus cutting the force in half and depriving the Seventh Indian Division of all supplies and attacking it in the rear. Another smaller Japanese force was to cut the main north-south road and thus isolate the Fifth Indian Division. A general assault was to be made east of the Mayu Range. The object was to complete the destruction of both divisions, to be followed by a sweeping advance into India. The opening stages were carried out with acustomed Japanese ruthlessness and boldness. Seven thousand men succeeded in moving through thick jungle round our flank and infiltrating through our necessarily detached forward positions. They did seize the vital Ngakyedauk Pass and cut the main Bawli-Maungdaw Road. They delivered the fiercest and most reckless assaults on both the rear and front of the Seventh Indian Division. They were so sure of success that they broadcast that our divisions were thrown into confusion, were surrendering or annihilated. But the troops, British, Indian and Gu.rka, everywhere stood firm. Not a position was yielded. The attack from the front was beaten back. In the rear, instead of helpless units, the enemy found grimly-defended boxes which he assaulted again and again. When he broke in, he was counter-attacked by infantry gunners, signallers, clerks and transport drivers and driven out again with bayonets and grenades. Then the Fourteenth Army passed to the offensive. The Fifth Division, although harassed on its own front and with an enemy force astride its communications, came to help the more hard-pressed Seventh Division. From every defended area in the Seventh Division, mobile forces issued and flung themselves on the nearest enemy. From the north, reserves moved down rapidly into the battle. The Japanese in turn were the defenders and encircled. Gradually they were driven back, hemmed in, split up, hunted and killed. Most of them, with their accustomed tenacity, fought to the death. Some battered wounded escaped through the jungle to the south. A few surrendered.