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The Battle of the Sittang Bend and the Japanese Breakout across Pegu Yomas were linked Japanese military operations during the Burma Campaign, which took place nearly at the end of World War II. Surviving elements of the Imperial Japanese Army who had been driven into the Pegu Yoma attempted to break out eastwards, to join other Japanese troops retreating from British forces. The break-out was the objective of the Japanese Twenty-Eighth Army with support at first from the Thirty-third Army and later the Fifteenth Army. As a preliminary, the Japanese Thirty-third Army attacked Allied positions in the Sittang Bend, near the mouth of the river, to distract the Allies. However, the British had been alerted to the break-out attempt and it ended in almost complete catastrophe, with heavy losses and some formations being wiped out. Around 14,000 Japanese were lost, with well over half being killed, while British forces suffered only 95 killed and 322 wounded.〔 The break-out attempt and the ensuing battle became the last significant land battle of the Western powers in the Second World War.〔Tucker p 60〕 ==Background== By early 1944, the British forces in India had been reinforced and had expanded their logistic infrastructure, which made it possible for them to contemplate an attack into Burma. The Japanese attempted to forestall them by an invasion of India (Operation U-Go), which led to a heavy Japanese defeat, and other setbacks in Northern Burma.〔Slim, p.368〕 Following a further defeat at the hands of William Slim and the Fourteenth Army at Meiktila and Mandalay and the recapture of Rangoon, the Japanese were further handicapped in their defence of Burma.〔Allen, pp 479–480〕 By this time the Burmese National Army under Aung San had switched sides (becoming the Burma Patriotic Army) and was hunting down Japanese patrols and foraging parties.〔Farquharson pp 298–300〕 During April, the British and Indian IV Corps advanced from Central Burma down the valley of the Sittang River. Japanese rearguards prevented them advancing all the way to Rangoon, the capital and main port of Burma, but on 2 May, Rangoon fell to an Allied amphibious landing (Operation Dracula). On 6 May, the leading troops of 17th Division, leading IV Corps' advance, linked up with the troops who had carried out ''Dracula'' at Hlegu north east of Rangoon. After the fall of Rangoon Fourteenth Army HQ under Slim moved to Ceylon to plan operations to recapture Malaya and Singapore. A new Twelfth Army headquarters under Lieutenant General Montagu Stopford was formed from XXXIII Corps HQ. It took over IV Corps in the Sittang valley〔Allen, p 480〕 and directly commanded some divisions in the Irrawaddy valley. The Japanese Twenty-Eighth Army under Lieutenant General Shōzō Sakurai, after retreating from Arakan and the Irrawaddy valley, had reached the Pegu Yomas, a range of low mountains, hills and uplands between the Irrawaddy and the Sittang River in central Burma.〔Seekins, Donald M. (2006) ''Historical dictionary of Burma (Myanmar)'' Scarecrow Press, Lanham, Maryland, (p 357 ), ISBN 0-8108-5476-7〕 They were joined by Major General Hideji Matsui's 105th Independent Mixed Brigade, also known as "Kani" Force (men of anti-aircraft batteries, airfield construction battalions, naval anchorage units, NCO schools) which had faced IV Corps.〔 The Japanese trapped in the Pegu Yomas prepared a massive break-out operation to rejoin Burma Area Army and escape into Thailand with them. The Sittang was unfordable and was therefore a significant military barrier, as it had been in 1942 during the first Burma campaign.〔Slim 1956, p 18.〕 General Heitarō Kimura, the commander of Burma Area Army, ordered Thirty-Third Army to cover this break-out by a diversionary offensive across the Sittang, although the entire army could muster the strength of barely a brigade. In support Fifteenth Army were to co-ordinate their efforts with Twenty-eighth Army if the operation was failing to meet its objective.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Battle of the Sittang Bend」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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