Today’s leaders have much to learn from the Forgotten Army’s victory
‘The war in Europe always took priority so that they were invariably sidelined in the minds of those at home’
The recent commemorations of the two World Wars have provided the opportunity to remember and honour those who gave their lives for us to have a better future, and this is particularly the case with VJ Day. The sense of sacrifice is encapsulated in the epitaph inscribed on the memorial of the decisive battles of Imphal and Kohima: “When you go home, tell them of us and say, for your tomorrow, we gave our today.”
We should never forget that they had to fight a particularly tenacious and ruthless opponent far from home, in appalling conditions, in malariaridden jungle.
And the war in Europe always took priority for both resources and for news so that they were invariably sidelined in the contemporary press and the minds of those at home. Hence the 14th Army was known as “the Forgotten Army” – a title that became a source of pride and motivation for what became a formidable army of nearly a million men, drawn from Britain and all the dominions. Commemorations are also an opportunity to learn from those who fought.
Their success was underpinned by their courage and by the inspiring leadership of their commander, Gen Bill Slim. Of all the Second World War generals, Sir Bill has always been a hero of mine. To me he is the embodiment of Rudyard Kipling’s poem If. And there is much that today’s leaders should learn from his integrity, his vision and above all his humility. When faced with each challenge he demanded of himself not what was smart or expedient, but what was right. He was a downwardly looking leader who put his men first and worried less about what others thought – least of all his superiors.
His training regime was tough and relentless, and he gave his men the confidence to believe they would prevail. His military skill was founded on deep insight and understanding of his Japanese opponent. He had fought them for more than three years. He was able to dissect their strategy and tactics and identify their weaknesses.
And he used this most successfully in the decisive victories at Imphal and Kohima where he drew them forward, overextended them, and then counterattacked. The result was 60,000 casualties and a resounding victory that created the conditions for the Japanese to be pushed back to Malaya.
He was inherently suspicious of special forces, believing that they consumed a disproportionate amount of resource in relation to conventional forces. However, he had the vision to recognise the value that Orde Wingate’s Chindits brought in inspiring others – by penetrating deep into Japanese territory and proving they could live and fight in the jungle they shattered the image of Japanese invincibility.
And Sir Bill built on their experimental raids to build a technique of air-land supply that revolutionised the campaign in Burma. Constant adaptation, integration and experimentation are vital features of the way we will modernise our Armed Forces today.
And it is no coincidence that the British Army’s 77 Brigade was named after the Chindits, as it is designed to be innovative, and at the cutting edge of information warfare. As Sir Bill himself noted about the first Chindits operation: “As a military operation the raid had been an expensive failure. It gave little tangible return for the losses it had suffered and the resources it had absorbed … but skilfully handled, the press of the Allied world took up the tale and everywhere the story ran that we had beaten the Japanese at their own game...”
When we think of the war against the Japanese, we tend to think of the 14th Army and of Burma. But this campaign was part of a much larger campaign fought throughout the Indo-pacific. And as we increasingly turn our attention to the economic opportunities that the Indo-pacific region offers we might reflect on the way the war ended in Asia.
Unlike Europe, there was never a comprehensive set of mutually agreed treaties leading to robust institutions within the region, such as Nato and the European Economic Community, or the Warsaw Pact and Comecon. Even the official end of the war in Asia was not mutually agreed between the major actors.
When the US and Japan formally brought hostilities to a close through the signing of a treaty in 1951, the Chinese were not present because the US recognised the government of the Republic of China on Taiwan.
The US presence in Asia stems from the sacrifices the US made in defeating Japan.
But this sacrifice was of course shared. It is not well known that some 15million or so Chinese died during the eight years of the war against Japan, and nearly 100million became refugees. Without that sacrifice, China and the rest of Asia might have fallen to Japanese imperialism as early as 1938.
Territorial disagreements over history are increasingly significant in the Indo-pacific, and the value of understanding the legacy of the Second World War in Asia will become ever more important.