The Jungle War

Gerald Astor

Description

Praise for Gerald Astor

"No one does oral history better than Gerald Astor. . . . Great reading."
-Stephen Ambrose on The Mighty Eighth

"Gerald Astor has proven himself a master. Here, World War II is brought to life through the hammer blows of their airborne triumphs and fears."
-J. Robert Moskin, author of Mr. Truman's War, on The Mighty Eighth

"Astor captures the fire and passion of those tens of thousands of U.S. airmen who flew through the inferno that was the bomber war over Europe."
-Stephen Coonts on The Mighty Eighth

"Oral history at its finest."
-The Washington Post on Operation Iceberg

"Quick and well-paced, this will please even the most jaded of readers."
-Army magazine on Battling Buzzards

"A stout volume by a distinguished historian of the modern military makes a major contribution on its subject."
-Booklist on The Right to Fight (starred Editor's Choice)

"Today, as we lose the veterans of World War II at an alarming rate, we must not lose sight of their sacrifices or of the leaders who took them into battle. Astor, an acclaimed military historian, provides an in-depth look at one of the war's most successful division combat commanders, Maj. Gen. Terry Allen. . . . This well-written portrait makes for enjoyable reading."
-Library Journal on Terrible Terry Allen

Sujets

• Histoire
• WW2
• U.S. Air Force
• Segunda Guerra Mundial
• Military
• World War II
• History
• United States Air Force
• Seconde Guerre mondiale

Informations

• Publié par: Turner Publishing Company
• Date de parution: 01 juillet 2004
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780470251843
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

The Jungle War
Mavericks, Marauders, and Madmen in the China-Burma-India Theater of World War II
Gerald Astor




John Wiley Sons, Inc.
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Copyright 2004 by Gerald Astor. All rights reserved
Published by John Wiley Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey
Published simultaneously in Canada
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Astor, Gerald, date.
Jungle war : mavericks, marauders, and madmen in the China-Burma-India theater of World War II / Gerald Astor.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN: 978-0-471-27393-6
1. World War, 1939-1945-Campaigns-China. 2. World War, 1939-1945-Campaigns-Burma. 3. World War, 1939-1945-Campaigns-India. 4. World War, 1939-1945-Jungle warfare. I. Title.

D767.6 .A85 2004
940.54 25-dc22
2003022629
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2
Advancing from Thailand, the Japanese Fifteenth Army, although outnumbered by the Allied forces, swept across Burma, capturing Akyab and Maungdaw on the Bay of Bengal and marching north beyond Myitkyina and Kamaing, leaving only Ledo, near the India border, still in Allied hands. (U.S. National Archives)
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1 The Venues and Opening Shots
2 The Japanese Enlarge Their War
3 First Strikes
4 War Comes to Burma
5 Further Additions to the Cast
6 We Got a Hell of a Beating
7 CBI Doldrums
8 Enter the Chindits
9 Detachment 101, the Burma Road, and the Hump
10 Offensive Preparations
11 Long-Range Penetrations and Arakan Revisited
12 Marauders and Thursday
13 Chindits and Imphal
14 The Northern Burma Campaign
15 Imphal and Kohima Besieged, Chindits Beset, Marauders Perturbed
16 Myitkyina Morass
17 Finales for Marauders and Chindits
18 Matterhorn
19 The Prisoners of War
20 The Tide Turns
21 Death Throes of an Army
22 Final Bloody Days
23 After-Action Report
Bibliography
Index
The bulk of the Chindits in Operation Thursday flew from Hailakandi and Lalaghat to Broadway and Chowringhee after Piccadilly was found unusable. One brigade traveled on foot from Ledo. Subsequently the long-range penetration established bases and strongholds at Aberdeen, White City, and Blackpool. (From Fire in the Night, 1999 by John Bierman and Colin Smith. Used by permission of Random House, Inc.)
Acknowledgments
I am indebted to David Quaid, Ray Lyons, and Werner Katz from the Merrill s Marauders Association, Inc., for their help in locating material dealing with the Marauders. David Richardson, a photographer and correspondent for Yank magazine during World War II, gave me good counsel about sources and photographs. Dr. Simon Robbins, the Trustees, and others at the Imperial War Museum in London enabled me to find memoirs of those who fought in CBI. As I found with previous books, Dr. Richard Sommers at the U.S. Army Military History Library in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, directed me to valuable materials at that institution. Through Dr. Ronald E. Marcello of the Oral History Program of the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas, I obtained transcripts of oral histories from a number of CBI veterans. Mrs. Lynn Gamma at the U.S. Air Force Library, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, supplied me, through the good offices of my local Greenburgh Library, with some relevant oral histories. Denny P. Pidhayny of the 58th Bomb Wing Association provided me with documents dealing with that organization s efforts.
I also want to formally thank my son Ted Astor for his work in copying photographs and maps that illustrate this book.
Permission to quote from The Papers of Color-Sergeant Tommy Atkins received from copyright holder, T. Atkins, collection held in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum. Permission to quote from The Papers of Trooper N. P. Aylen received from copyright holder, Joyce Aylen, collection held in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum. Permission to quote from The Papers of Captain John Durant received from copyright holder, Margaret Durant, collection held in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum. Permission to quote from The Papers of Brigadier A. D. Firth received from copyright holder, Robyn Firth, collection held in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum. Permission to quote from The Papers of Lieutenant Colonel H. N. F. Patterson received from copyright holder, Mark Cardew, collection held in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum.
Permission to quote from The Papers of Major David C. Rissik received from copyright holder, David C. Rissik, collection held in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum. Permission to quote from The Papers of Lieutenant Colonel I. C. G. Scott received from copyright holder, Alan Scott, collection held in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum.
Permission to reprint map of Chindit Operations from Fire in the Night by John Bierman and Colin Smith, 1999, granted by Random House.
Introduction
In late 1943, Philip Flip Cochran, after sixty-one missions in North Africa, credited with four enemy planes destroyed, holding the Silver Star, the Distinguished Flying Cross with two oak leaf clusters, the Air Medal with three clusters, the Croix de Guerre with star and palm, and celebrated as the swashbuckling model for a famous comic strip character of the day, Colonel Flip Corkin, returned to the United States to sell war bonds.
Cochran was eager to employ his talent and experience in Europe, where the invasion of France neared. He was summoned by Lieutenant General Henry Hap Arnold, Army Air Corps chief and, in Cochran s words, he was right next to God, the grandest thing that ever came along and the rankingest person I ever would get to see. Arnold announced that instead of the assignment to the big show in Europe, Cochran would be posted to the China-Burma-India (CBI) Theater.
Cochran balked. He ignored protocol to rant, I believe I have more combat experience than any fighter pilot in your air force. I m going to be brash enough to tell you that I think I know more about the practical side of fighter aviation than anybody in the air force. I ve done it the hard way and here you are sending me to some doggone offshoot, side-alley fight over in some jungle in Burma that doesn t mean a damn thing. The big show is in England. I think I can contribute a helluva lot more with what I know and have been studying for seven years.
Side-alley fight indeed-that was the status, particularly in the United States, of CBI throughout World War II. It was the most distant theater for Americans and on the outskirts of the British Empire. Ethnic heritage connected Europe to the United States, and the conflict in the South Pacific got the nation s attention because of the attack on Hawaii and the history with the Philippine Islands. Out of sight and mind, perhaps, but CBI became a site for savage, murderous, brutal, terrifying combat among men against a backdrop of nature at its most primeval-thickly encrusted jungle; steep hills and mountains; canyons; gorges; swift, wide streams; monsoon torrents; blistering sun; infernal pestilence; starvation; and dehydration. Overhead flew the latest in combat aircraft, technological marvels when compared to the first contraption that lifted off at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, only forty years earlier. But on the ground, while tanks and trucks worked some areas, the combatants often relied on the prehistoric wagons drawn by bullocks or pack mules, or else manhandled the cumbersome gear of modern war up the mountains, through jungles, and over streams.
Although an estimated 2 million men eventually fought in Burma alone, it remained a sideshow of the battleground because neither the United States, nor Great Britain, nor even China, most immediately affected, for their own reasons wanted to heavily commit their resources. Yet all of them eventually anted up enough to generate some of World War II s fiercest fighting. It was a war fought on the cheap, except for those who actually waged it.
Many involved in CBI were proper military types, graduates of the service schools or from regular-service, prewar duty and imbued with the knowledge of how World War I was fought in the French tre