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Burma Campaign, 1942 — historical photograph 22.0°N 96.0°E Southeast Asia
1942 · 22.0°N 96.0°E

Burma Campaign

Burma & India · campaign · Southeast Asia

Briefing

Fought across some of the worst terrain on earth, the war in Burma ran from Japan's 1942 conquest — the longest retreat in British history — to Slim's Fourteenth Army destroying two Japanese armies at Imphal, Kohima, and the Irrawaddy. It remains the Forgotten War: monsoon, jungle, disease, and a multinational army of British, Indian, African, American, and Chinese troops.

Books Covering This Event (6)

Memoir

Defeat Into Victory cover
Defeat Into Victory Field Marshal William Slim · 1956

The commander of the Fourteenth Army tells how a beaten force was rebuilt to destroy the Japanese in Burma.

Intermediate
Quartered Safe Out Here cover
Quartered Safe Out Here George MacDonald Fraser · 1992

The Flashman author's memoir of fighting in Burma as a nineteen-year-old private in the Border Regiment.

Accessible
The Forgotten Highlander cover
The Forgotten Highlander Alistair Urquhart · 2010

A Gordon Highlander survives Singapore, the Death Railway, a torpedoed hell ship, and the Nagasaki blast — and stays silent for sixty years.

Accessible

Historical Fiction

The Bridge on the River Kwai cover
The Bridge on the River Kwai Pierre Boulle · 1952

British POWs are forced to build a railway bridge for their Japanese captors — and their colonel builds it too well.

Accessible
King Rat cover
King Rat James Clavell · 1962

An American corporal thrives by trading in Changi POW camp, where officers starve and rank means nothing.

Intermediate

Popular History

Ship of Ghosts cover
Ship of Ghosts James Hornfischer · 2006

The USS Houston's last stand and her crew's three years as slaves on the Burma-Thailand Death Railway.

Intermediate

Timeline Position

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