Lessons in Burma

By last week it was clear that the five-month-old British attempt to retake the west coast of Burma had ended in disheartening failure. As the troops and supply columns plodded through paddy fields and low hills over dusty military roads built by their own engineers last winter, they were sad proof that the British Indian command still had not learned the lessons taught by the Japanese jungle fighters in their invasion of Burma 16 months ago.

The main British objective was to retake Akyab, the small seaport on the coast of the Bay of Bengal. It failed for several reasons:

> The occupation of Akyab depended on speedy movement and sea landings. Neither was forthcoming.

> The troops used had been trained for the desert, had only a few weeks' jungle experience. They never solved Japanese tactics, never exploited the jungle. Casualties through disease and action approached 100% in the original units; replacements had even less training, hence the troops became rawer and rawer. Commanders were no more prepared for the jungle than their soldiers; they showed a singular lack of knowledge and imagination in their conduct of the campaign.

> At the Japanese line of resistance, the British troops ran up against strong points as tough as any seen in this war. Though they bravely charged them, they found pillboxes buttoned up tight, gun slits carefully closed. While they sought entrance, Japanese mortars blew them to bits.

The Lesson taught by the second campaign in Burma documented Winston Churchill's arguments (see p. 29) against the clamor in the U.S. for quick action in the Far East. The major effort to reconquer Burma will have to be made by sea, with landings on the western and southern coast. And between Allied India and that coast is a Japanese fleet in being, which, unless checkmated, could murder landing troops.

By land the almost impassable mountains running north and south between India and Burma effectively bar the way to all but diversionary forces. This the British learned in their five months' campaign. They also learned that to reconquer Burma a new line of tactical thinking is needed.

Wingate's Raiders. The British were frank in admitting that the Burmese campaign was bad. But the whole ledger was not written in red ink. An action reported last week was a hopeful note for the future.

Out of the tangled jungle across the saw-toothed range on the Indian frontier came a ragged band of men who for three months had fought the Japs on their own terms and come back alive. Led by small, unorthodox Brigadier Orde Charles Wingate,* they had shown on a small scale that the ordinary British and Indian soldier can learn jungle fighting:

Supplied by plane and what they found to eat in the jungle, these British raiders operated over 10,000 square miles of Burma at a time, cutting Jap lines of communication, raiding Jap outposts, throwing the enemy into confusion far behind the front lines. Troops used were not specially picked men, but they were highly trained; for six months Brigadier Wingate had worked them in the Assam jungles.

> There was tall Major Bernard Ferguson, who left a lieutenant colonelcy on Field Marshal Sir Archibald Wavell's staff to lead a column of raiders. When he watched the Bonchaung railway bridge rise in a cloud of smoke and then settle into the gorge, the Major said softly: "Now I know that all my life I've wanted to blow up bridges."

> In a later patrol Major Ferguson wiped out four Japs, his servant Peter Dorren seven. They came into a village at dawn and saw four men sitting around a fire as though playing bridge. The Major walked over and said hello. When one of them turned, he saw they were Japs. "From that moment," he said, "I lost all fear of the Japanese. There was stark terror in their faces. I fumbled for the pin of my grenade, tossed it into the fire and ducked. Peter's work was more complicated, but as effective."

> On the difficult return journey some men went without food for long stretches. They ate bamboo shoots, mule steaks cut from their pack animals, elephant meat, boiled python, boiled grass. When they returned to the Indian frontier they were ravenous. Brigadier Wingate ate as much as his men, was asked by a solicitous general if he was not eating too heavily. Said he: "I find it quite impossible to overeat. During the march I read Xenophon and Plato's dialogues with Socrates. Now I find that moderation has become my guiding thought--wonderfully soothing."

*Who in 1940, with Brigadier Daniel Sandford, took charge of the revolt in Ethiopia, raised a force of 1,000 Sudanese and 2,000 Ethiopians which disposed of 40,000 Italians.

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