Historical outcome and winning Reader Solutions to CDG #53, November 2012 issue.
The November 2012 issue of Armchair General® presented the Combat Decision Game “Battle of Kohima, 1944.” This CDG placed readers in the role of Brigadier D.F.W. Warren, commander of the British and Commonwealth troops of 161st Indian Infantry Brigade during World War II. In early April 1944, as the fierce Burma Theater battle between British and Japanese forces raged at Imphal near the India-Burma border,Warren’s mission was to defend Kohima, an isolated British supply center 120 kilometers north. If Warren’s brigade failed to hold Kohima against a powerful Japanese assault, British forces at Imphal would be cut off and defeated. Such a strategic disaster would open the way for the Japanese offensive to advance into India, Britain’s most important colony and the vital Allied base supplying fighting forces in Southeast Asia and China.
The previous month, in March 1944, the Japanese had launched Operation U-Go, a major offensive in which Japan’s Burma Area Army struck northwest across the border aiming to capture India’s Brahmaputra River Valley. If successful, the attack would interdict Allied supply lines to British forces fighting in northeast Burma, neutralize Allied air bases flying war materiel to Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist Chinese armies, and open the way for further Japanese offensives into India. The attack, however, was stalled at Imphal by Lieutenant General William Slim’s British XIV Army.
The fighting at Imphal dragged on throughout March, leading Japanese commanders to devise a strategy to break the impasse. They decided to attack Kohima using the 5,760 soldiers of General Kotoku Sato’s 31st Infantry Division. Seizing the small but important British base at Kohima would cut the tenuous 100-mile-long supply line linking Imphal with Britain’s main logistical base at Dimapur, India. If Kohima fell, Slim’s army at Imphal would be isolated and inevitably defeated.
HISTORICAL OUTCOME
On April 4, 1944, when Slim became aware of the Japanese plans to attack Kohima, he immediately ordered Warren’s 161st Indian Brigade – then near Jotsoma, traveling on the road from Kohima toward Dimapur – to defend Kohima along with the small garrison force at the supply base and to hold it at all costs.
Warren decided to split his brigade into two forces, sending one infantry battalion (West Kents) into Kohima to stiffen the garrison and to hold key hilltops against enemy infantry attacks, while keeping his remaining two infantry battalions and artillery (24th Indian Mountain Artillery Regiment’s two 25-pounder batteries, a total of eight guns) in defensive positions at Jotsoma. This troop disposition placed his superior artillery (well protected by his two remaining infantry battalions) in the best location to provide all-around fire support for Kohima’s infantry defenders, while holding Jotsoma assured continuous logistical support from Dimapur.
Sato’s force, on the other hand, was far from Japanese supply bases, at the end of a long and tortuous jungle route vulnerable to Allied raids and airstrikes. Yet fierce Japanese infantry attacks turned the Kohima battle into a brutal fight for hilltops and surrounding terrain that dragged on until the end of May. The fighting was horrific and often at close quarters as the Japanese infantrymen pressed their attacks in spite of huge casualty numbers. At one point, 161st Brigade’s West Kents infantrymen held only one of Kohima’s key hilltops.
Despite facing great odds, Warren’s brigade held on to Kohima. In mid-April, his unit was relieved of its defense mission when British and Commonwealth reinforcements, including tanks, took over the fighting. Although Kohima was secured near the end of May, Sato’s survivors – many starving and disease ridden – held positions on the Kohima-Imphal road until late June, when they were finally destroyed or forced to retreat.
The British victory at Kohima not only ensured Slim’s July 1944 triumph at Imphal; it also marked the turning point for Allied fortunes in the Burma campaign.
READER SOLUTIONS
ACG judges based their selections for winning Reader Solutions and those receiving honorable mention on submissions that chose COURSE OF ACTION ONE: SPLIT DEFENSE, or those whose explanations demonstrated a solid understanding of the key principles of a World War II defense. COA One capitalized on the two key advantages Warren’s greatly outnumbered infantrymen held over the enemy – artillery and logistics. This plan placed his superior artillery in the best position to provide all-around fire support for Kohima’s defenders and ensured adequate infantry protection for the guns to prevent their capture or destruction by Japanese attackers. The Jotsoma position linked Warren’s brigade to the main supply base at Dimapur to facilitate receiving supplies and troop reinforcements. Meanwhile, Warren’s Japanese opponent, located far from Japan’s Burma bases, faced increasingly dire logistical problems and little hope of receiving reinforcements to replace heavy casualties.
COURSE OF ACTION TWO: CONSOLIDATED DEFENSE put Warren’s entire brigade at risk of being cut off and besieged at Kohima and perhaps eventually overrun by Sato’s superior infantry force, and it virtually guaranteed the encircling Japanese would prevent supplies and reinforcements from getting through to the British. Significantly, it also imposed crippling constraints on Warren’s artillery – restricted fields of fire, targets masked by intervening terrain, technical gunnery problems of firing at extremely short ranges, etc. – and placed the guns at great risk of being overrun or destroyed.
COURSE OF ACTION THREE: BRIGADE COUNTERATTACK was likely the worst possible plan in this tactical situation. Since Warren’s infantrymen were outnumbered 4-to-1, counterattacking would have pitted the British force’s greatest weakness against the enemy force’s greatest advantage. Even if Warren’s men had defeated a portion of Sato’s division, the British brigade likely would have remained heavily outnumbered and could have been forced into jungle fighting – at which the Japanese infantrymen were proven masters.
And now for excerpts from the winning Reader Solutions to “Battle of Kohima, 1944.”*
Deetlefs du Toit, South Africa: “Use road, footpath and airdrops to resupply artillery and troops. Ensure all troops have ample water, ammo and medical supplies. Maintain radio communications and command and control between firebase, headquarters, air support/supply and key defensive positions.”
Major Trent D. Laviano, North Carolina: “Success depends on selecting key terrain features to establish mutually supporting positions with interlocking fields of fire. Use barbed wire, mines and booby traps to limit the enemy’s freedom of maneuver and channel the Japanese into killing areas.”
Dale Malchow,Washington: “Keeping the artillery in Jotsoma will allow the British to provide maximum and accurate fire support. Fire phosphorous incendiary shells and drop incendiary bombs to eliminate areas of concealment. Once the Japanese troops are in the open, planes, artillery and mortars change to high-explosive shells and bombs.”
Thank you to everyone who participated in this CDG. Now turn to page 54 and test your tactical decision-making skills with CDG #55, “Spanish Blue Division in Russia, 1943.” This World War II battle on the Eastern Front places you in the role of Colonel Manuel Sagrado, commander of Regiment 262, Spanish Blue Division, fighting as part of the German army. Your mission is to defend against a powerful Red Army offensive attempting to break the German siege of Leningrad. Use the CDG map and form on pages 59 and 60 to explain your solution and mail, email or fax it to Armchair General by February 22, 2013. Winners will be announced in the July 2013 issue, but those eager to read the historical outcome and analysis can log on to armchairgeneral .com/cdg after February 25, 2013.
*EDITOR’S NOTE: For each Combat Decision Game, Armchair General typically receives numerous Reader Solutions that have selected the course of action that ACG judges have deemed the best COA for that CDG. However, our judges are required to choose winners and honorable mentions from submissions whose explanations, in the judges’ opinion, best reflect an understanding of the principles and key points of the CDG’s tactical situation.
Originally published in the March 2013 issue of Armchair General.
