Battle of Kohima

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Battle of Kohima
Part of Burma Campaign
Date April 4 - June 22, 1944
Location Kohima, Nagaland, India
Result Decisive British Victory
Combatants
Indian XXXIII Corps Japanese 31st Infantry Division
Commanders
Montagu Stopford Kotoku Sato
Strength
rising to:
2 Infantry Divisions
1 "Chindit" Brigade
1 Motor Brigade		 1 Infantry Division
Casualties
4,604 5,764
Burma Campaign
Chindits – Ngakyedauk – Imphal – Kohima – Central Burma – Dracula
South-East Asian campaign
Malaya – Prince of Wales & Repulse – Thailand – Singapore – Indian Ocean – Andaman Islands – Burma – Malacca Strait

The Battle of Kohima was a critical battle of the Burma Campaign in World War II, fought around the town of Kohima in northeast India from April 4 to June 22, 1944. It marked the limit of the Japanese offensive into India in 1944 and was described as the "Stalingrad of the East".

The battle took place in two stages. From April 3 to April 16, the Japanese attempted to capture Kohima ridge, a feature which dominated the road by which the major British and Indian troops at Imphal were supplied. At this point, the small British force at Kohima was relieved, and from April 18 to June 22, British and Indian reinforcements counter-attacked to drive the Japanese from the positions they had captured. The battle ended on June 22 when British and Indian troops from Kohima and Imphal met at Milestone 109, ending the siege of Imphal.

Contents

[edit] Situation in early 1944

Imphal and Kohima Campaign
Imphal and Kohima Campaign

The battle was fought as a result of the Japanese plan, codenamed U-GO, to invade India. Originally, this operation was intended as a spoiling attack against the Indian IV Corps at Imphal, to disrupt the Allied offensive plans for that year. The commander of the Japanese Fifteenth Army, Lieutenant General Renya Mutaguchi, enlarged the plan to invade India itself and perhaps even overthrow the British Raj. The objections of various superior HQ were eventually overruled by War Minister Hideki Tojo.

Part of the plan involved sending the Japanese 31st Division (which was composed of 58 Regiment, 124 Regiment, 138 Regiment and an Independent Mountain Artillery battalion) to capture Kohima and thus cut off Imphal, and then exploit to Dimapur. The division's commander, Lieutenant General Kotoku Sato was unhappy with his role. He had not been involved in the planning of the offensive, and had grave misgivings about their chances. He had already told his staff that they might all starve to death.

In common with many senior Japanese officers, Sato considered Mutaguchi a "blockhead". He and Mutaguchi had also been on opposite sides during the split between the Toseiha and Kodoha factions within the Japanese Army during the early 1930's, and Sato believed he had reason to distrust Mutaguchi's motives.

[edit] Preliminary moves

Starting on March 15, 1944, the Japanese 31st Division crossed the Chindwin River near Homalin and moved northwest along jungle trails on a front almost 60 miles (100 km) wide. Although the march was arduous, good progress was made. The left wing of the division, 58 Regiment, commanded by the division's Infantry Group commander, Major General Shigesaburo Miyazaki was ahead of the neighbouring formation (Japanese 15th Infantry Division) when they clashed with Indian troops covering the northern approaches to Imphal on March 20.

The Indian troops were the Indian 50 Parachute Brigade under Brigadier Hope-Thompson, at Sangshak. Although they were not Miyazaki's objective, he decided to clear them from his line of advance. The battle continued for six days. The Indian troops were desperately short of drinking water, but Miyazaki was handicapped by lack of artillery. Eventually, as the Japanese 15th Division's troops joined the battle, Hope-Thompson withdrew.

50 Parachute Brigade lost 600 men, Miyazaki about 400. Miyazaki also captured some of the food dropped by the RAF to the defenders of Sangshak. However, his troops, who had the shortest and easiest route to Kohima, were delayed by a week.

Meanwhile, the commander of the British Fourteenth Army, Lieutenant General Slim, had belatedly realised the strength of the force moving on Kohima. (It had originally been thought that the Japanese would move only a regiment across the forbidding terrain). Kohima had few fighting troops; the vital base of Dimapur thirty miles to the north had none.

As part of the hasty reinforcement of the Imphal front, the Indian 5th Infantry Division were flown from the Arakan front, where they had just participated in the defeat of a subsidiary Japanese offensive at the Battle of the Admin Box. While the main body of the division went to Imphal, Indian 161st Infantry Brigade (with 24 Mountain Artillery Regiment IA), were flown to Dimapur. The British 2nd Division, 23 Long Range Penetration Brigade (originally part of the Chindit force), and Indian XXXIII Corps HQ under Lieutenant General Montagu Stopford were also ordered to move there by road and rail.

[edit] The siege

Kohima Ridge
Kohima Ridge

Kohima ridge runs roughly north and south. The road from Dimapur to Imphal climbs to its northern end and runs along its eastern face. North of the ridge lay the densely inhabited area of Naga Village, crowned by Treasury Hill and Church Knoll. (Baptist and other Christian missionaries had been active in Nagaland over the preceding half century). South and west of Kohima Ridge were GPT Ridge and the jungle-covered Aradura Spur.

In 1944, Kohima was the administrative centre of Nagaland. The Deputy Commissioner was Charles Pawsey. His bungalow and its gardens and tennis court stood on the hillside at a bend in the road.

The various British and Indian service troop encampments in the area gave their names to the features which were to be important in the battle e.g. "Field Supply Depot" became FSD Hill or merely FSD. The Japanese assigned their own codenames to the features; for example, Garrison Hill was known as Inu (dog) and Kuki Piquet as Saru (monkey). These were frequently-used names, and not generally as memorable as the British names which are used in most histories.

Before 161 Brigade arrived, the only fighting troops in the area were the newly raised Assam Regiment and some of the paramilitary Assam Rifles. Late in March, 161 Brigade deployed in Kohima, but were then ordered back to Dimapur. Meanwhile, the Assam Regiment fought delaying actions to the east of Kohima from April 1. Miyazaki's troops were probing Kohima on April 3. 161 Brigade had been ordered forward again, but only one battalion, 4/The Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment (now part of the Queen's Regiment) arrived in Kohima before the Japanese cut the road west of the ridge.

The siege began on April 6. The garrison was remorselessly shelled and mortared and slowly driven into a small perimeter on Garrison Hill. They had artillery support from the rest of 161 Brigade, themselves cut off two miles away at Jotsoma, but, as at Sangshak, they were very short of drinking water. The dressing stations were exposed to Japanese fire, and wounded men were hit again as they waited for treatment. Some of the heaviest fighting took place around the DC's bungalow and tennis court, in what became known as the battle of the Tennis Court. By the night of April 17, the defenders' situation was desperate.

[edit] The relief

The British 2nd Division had begun to arrive at Dimapur in early April, having moved from Southern India where they had been training for amphibious landings. Their leading troops relieved 161 Brigade at Jotsoma on April 15, and 161 Brigade in turn broke through to Kohima on April 18. By now, Kohima resembled a battlefield from the first World War, with trees smashed and the ground covered in craters.

300 wounded were evacuated, followed by the various service corps personnel and the West Kents. The British 6th Infantry Brigade took over their positions. Miyazaki continued to try to capture Garrison Hill, and there was heavy fighting for this position for several more nights, with heavy casualties on both sides.

[edit] The counter-offensive

Meanwhile, the other two brigades of 2nd Division tried to outflank both ends of the Japanese position in Naga Village and on GPT Ridge. The monsoon had by now broken, and the steep slopes were covered in mud, making movement and supply very difficult. After promising starts, both moves failed because of the terrain and the weather, and from May 4, the Division concentrated on the Japanese centre along Kohima Ridge. The Japanese had reorganised their forces for defence. Their Left Force under Miyazaki held Kohima Ridge with four battalions; the Centre Force under Sato himself held Naga Village with another four battalions. The much smaller Right Force held villages to the north and east.

To support their attack on the ridge, the British had now amassed 38 3.7 inch mountain howitzers, 48 25-pounder field guns and 2 5.5 inch medium guns. The RAF also bombed and strafed the Japanese positions. The Japanese could oppose them with only 17 light mountain guns, with very little ammunition.

Nevertheless, progress was slow: tanks could not be used, and the Japanese were very deeply dug in, their positions well-concealed and mutually supporting. Japanese posts on the reverse slope of GPT Ridge repeatedly caught British troops attacking Jail Hill in the flank, inflicting heavy casualties, and prevented them capturing the hill for a week. Two successive commanders of British 4th Infantry Brigade were killed in the close-range fighting on GPT. However, the various positions were slowly taken. The last was the DC's bungalow. On May 13, the British finally bulldozed a track to the position up which a tank could be dragged. A Lee tank crashed down onto the tennis court and destroyed the Japanese trenches and bunkers, thus finally clearing Kohima Ridge.

The terrain had been reduced to a fly- and rat-infested wilderness, with half-buried human remains everywhere. The conditions under which the Japanese troops had lived and fought were described by several British sources as "unspeakable".

Yet more Allied reinforcements had arrived. 33 Brigade (part of Indian 7th Division) had been fighting since May 4. 114 Brigade joined them on May 12, and the Indian 7th Division (with 161 Brigade) concentrated on capturing Naga Village from the north. 268 Indian Motor Brigade was used to relieve the brigades of British 2nd Division and allow them to rest, before they resumed their drive southward along the Imphal Road.

Yet when the Allies launched another attack on May 16, the Japanese continued to defend Naga Village and Aradura Spur tenaciously.

[edit] The Japanese retreat

The decisive factor was the Japanese lack of supplies. Since the offensive started, they had had to make do with meager captured stocks and what they could forage in increasingly hostile local villages. This was partly due to the British 23 LRP Brigade, which had been operating behind the Japanese 31st Division. They had cut the Japanese supply lines and prevented them foraging in the Naga Hills to the east of Kohima. The Japanese had mounted one resupply mission, using 17 captured jeeps to carry supplies forward from the Chindwin, but they brought mainly artillery and anti-tank ammunition rather than food.

By the middle of May, Sato's troops were starving. He considered that the HQ of Japanese 15th Army were neither taking any notice of his situation (as they had issued several confusing and contradictory orders to him during April) nor exerting themselves to move supplies to his division. He began pulling his troops back to conserve their strength, thus allowing the British to capture Kohima Ridge. On May 25, he notified 15th Army that he would withdraw on June 1 unless he was supplied. (For a divisional commander to retreat without orders or permission from his superior was unheard-of in the Japanese Army.) Finally on May 31, he abandoned Naga Village and other positions north of the road, in spite of orders from Mutaguchi to hang on to his position.

Miyazaki's detachment continued to fight rearguard actions and demolish bridges along the road to Imphal, but were eventually driven off the road and forced to retreat eastwards. The remainder of the division retreated painfully south, but found very little to eat: most of what few supplies had been brought forward across the Chindwin had been consumed by other Japanese units, who were as desperately hungry as Sato's men. Many of the 31st Division were too enfeebled to drag themselves further south than Ukhrul, where hospitals had been set up, but with no medicines, medical staff or food.

Indian XXXIII Corps pushed southwards along the road. On June 22, the leading troops of British 2nd Division met the main body of Indian 5th Infantry Division advancing north from Imphal at Milestone 109, thirty miles south of Kohima. The siege of Imphal was over.

[edit] Aftermath

The British and Indian forces had lost around 4,000 men, dead, missing and wounded. The Japanese had lost more than 5,000 men in the Kohima area fighting.

After ignoring army orders for several weeks, Sato was removed from command of Japanese 31st Division early in July. The entire Imphal offensive was broken off at the same time. Slim had always derided Sato as the most unenterprising of his opponents, but Japanese sources blame his superior, Mutaguchi, for both the weaknesses of the original plan, and the antipathy between himself and Sato which led to Sato concentrating on saving his division rather than driving on distant objectives.

This battle was ultimately to prove the turning point of the Burma Campaign. Earl Louis Mountbatten described it as "probably one of the greatest battles in history... in effect the Battle of Burma... naked unparalleled heroism... the British/Indian Thermopylae".

[edit] RAF supply

At both Kohima and Imphal, the army relied entirely on supply by the Royal Air Force (RAF) until the road from Dimapur was cleared. At Kohima the main problem was dropping of air delivered logistics accurately on to the narrow ridgelines.

By the end of the battle the RAF had flown 19,000 tons of supplies and 12,000 men into Kohima and Imphal, and flown out 13,000 casualties and 43,000 non-combatants.

The increasing dominance of the RAF by this stage of the Burma Campaign was a major contributor in helping the Allies turn the tide of the war in this theatre.

[edit] Victoria Cross

Two Victoria Crosses were awarded during the battle:

[edit] War memorial

Inscribed on the Commonwealth cemetery war memorial at Kohima, which is near the tennis court, is the well known epitaph.

When You Go Home, Tell Them Of Us And Say,
For Your Tomorrow, We Gave Our Today

This is a controversial epitaph for many in India because Indians fought on both sides during the battle. British Indian soldiers fought for the Allies and Indian soldiers of the Indian National Army under the command of Subash Chandra Bose unsuccessfully fought with the Japanese and the Burma National Army led by Ba Maw for the liberation of India from the British.

[edit] Sources

[edit] External links

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