An outline of the campaign in Burma from the abortive Japanese 'March on Delhi' offensive of 1944 to the Allies' recapture of Mandalay and Rangoon in May 1945.

The visual material is compatible with (rather than an accurate illustration of) the commentary, and relies heavily on the use of maps for its account of strategic situations and developments. Themes are: the 1944 situation; terrain and supply problems in Burma; the vital role of the Allied centre front; the Japanese assault on Imphal and Kohima; held back and then repulsed; the Allied counteroffensive, continuing against precedent through the Monsoon; the importance of control of the air which, in Allied hands, was used to shatter Japanese communications and supply the advancing Allied troops; the advance South over the Chindwin and Irrawaddy to Mandalay and Rangoon. "3 Japanese armies, the largest Japanese land force yet encountered in the Far East, had been met and decisively defeated."

Notes

Credits: photographic credit reads "AFPS"; material was filmed by No 9 AFPS, the Far Eastern section of the Army Film Unit.

Remarks: presumably an interim measure, put together soon after the fall of Rangoon, then withdrawn as events and other films (BURMA VICTORY) overtook it. As such the film suffices, though it scarcely has permanent value.

Technical: after the loss through decomposition in 1992 of the only copy with a complete soundtrack, this film now only survives in a version with music and effects but no commentary.