Rise of the Phoenix:
the 14th Army in the Burma Campaign, 1942-1945
Professor Daniel Patrick Marston, Johns Hopkins University
Date and Venue
Wednesday
27 Nov 2024
1700 hrs
Massey 7
Abstract
The Indian Army had achieved a new level of professionalism by the final phase of the Burma Campaign in 1945; it was a fully modern, properly trained army, capable of dealing with almost any tactical situation with which it might be presented. As Brigadier M.R. Roberts stated: ‘From Arakan to the mist-shrouded mountains at Kohima and Ukhrul, through the mighty forests of the Indo-Burma border to the beautiful but treacherous Chindwin, down the malaria-ridden Kabaw valley to the bare dusty plains of the Middle Irrawaddy, a side step into the eastern foothills of the Arakan Yomas then back to the Pegu Yomas, is 1500 miles - a long and terribly arduous road to victory and it was a clear victory.’ This was an army that never rested on its laurels even with victory—it constantly assessed and challenged itself. The victory in Burma was the high-water mark of the British Indian Army. It demonstrated the success of an innovative, wide-ranging program of reform and made a significant contribution to the Allied victory.