[dropcap]E[/dropcap]very Hornbill Festival there is a car rally to commemorate the Battle of Kohima. This is in addition to the various functions like International Rock Contest, King chilli eating contest and various other events. Plus
According to Admiral Lord Mountbatten the Battle of Kohima will probably go down as “one of the greatest battles in history.” According to Field Marshall Wavell “when the history of this war comes to be written, the fight here will be put down as one of the turning points of the war….when the Japanese were routed and their downfall really began.”Kohima as a battlefield has not been forgotten but it has not acquired the fame of comparable battles, such as Alamein or Casino. The reasons for this are many but, probably the most important is that the battle was fought over terrain so extraordinary that its tactical pattern was difficult to grasp.
Even the Allied Chiefs of Staff at that time were mystified by the battle while it was going on and asked why the fighting was characterized by “so many Company and Platoon actions.” What had eluded them was the paradox of then Assam (read North-East region and of which our present day Nagaland is a part) as a theatre of war; that while the country is so large that it rapidly absorbs vast number of troops, it denies the deployment of formations Brigades, Divisions and Corps, operating en masse.
One should not imagine though that because an action in this battle was small it was necessarily unimportant. Assam is a country where a platoon (average of 36 officer and men) well dug in can hold up a Division (of about 15,000 strength), and a Company can hold up an Army Corps; a country therefore where the success or failure of Battalion (about 1,000 strength) attack may have momentous results.
Besides, tanks were used in terrain where no one, not even the tank commanders and the sappers, had believed they could penetrate. Major R.J. Pakenham Walsh in his History of the Royal Engineers pays special tribute to these efforts. Another reason why battle of Kohima may be relatively unknown was that no full account of it had yet appeared until recently. Two narratives of fourteen days out of the sixty, and after it was over there came the long and bitter action to clear Kohima ridge and open the road to Imphal.
In 1966, Arthur Swinson wrote and published “Kohima,” an account of the Battle of Kohima which was fought from April to June, 1944 and in which he was a participant as an officer. The preface states that Field Marshal William Slim directed Swinson to ensure that Kohima and Imphal are described as twin battles fought under Slim’s 14th Army. This Swinson does. Ultimately, however, the book focuses on the experience of the British 2nd Infantry Division—a monument to it is there in the War Cemetery at Kohima. The book is a good adjunct to Slim’s “Defeat Into Victory” and John Masters’ “Road Past Mandalay.”
In May 1942, the Japanese had contemptuously swept the weak British forces out of Burma, but did not pursue them into Manipur, the small State that acts as a buffer between Burma and India. For various reasons—one of was the lengthening of line of communication, the difficulty of campaigning in the monsoon, or their official reason which was to avoid arousing ill-feeling among the Indian masses. Whatever the reason the lull was fortunate for the British, as only one Division now remained to protect the N-E frontier of India.
To Field Marshal Slim and his commanders initially it was not perfectly clear that if Allied armies were to launch offensive against the Japanese and clear them out of Burma, Imphal must be the springboard.
The Japanese Army was also little prepared. However, staff officer Lieutenant Colonel Hayashi was already arguing that that it was imperative that Imphal should be captured at once, before the British could carry out their plans. His arguments found favour in High Command Tokyo, but the Division Commanders in Burma wanted to pause and consolidate….and Slim got his respite.
The sacrifice of the soldiers is etched on the stone monolith at the base of the Kohima War Cemetery;
WHEN YOU GO HOME
TELL THEN OF US AND SAY
FOR YOUR TOMORROW
WE GAVE OUR TODAY.
From these words, the car rally for peace becomes all the more relevant and reminder for us to seek and live in peace. The quest for peace is an enduring effort and aims to be free from war and all the attendant problems. From peace all other aspects for civilized life and people will follow.
