{"id":69468,"date":"2023-09-24T10:45:39","date_gmt":"2023-09-24T15:45:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/?p=69468"},"modified":"2023-09-24T05:40:57","modified_gmt":"2023-09-24T10:40:57","slug":"know-your-ww2-history-william-slim-a-soldiers-general","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/2023\/09\/24\/know-your-ww2-history-william-slim-a-soldiers-general\/","title":{"rendered":"Know Your WW2 History: William Slim – A Soldier’s General"},"content":{"rendered":"

Via: Fix Bayonets<\/a><\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

Here is, perhaps, World War II\u2019s greatest general, and hardly anyone today knows his name.<\/h3>\n

Field Marshal William Slim is best known for commanding Fourteenth Army in Burma during the Second World War (1939-45).\u00a0 In taking command, he inherited a disastrous situation in which, with practical skill and quiet charisma, he turned into victory.<\/h3>\n

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Early career<\/h3>\n

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Born in Bristol, England, in 1891, he was the son of John Slim and Charlotte Tucker.\u00a0 John\u2019s vocation was that of an iron wholesaler.\u00a0 After completing his primary education at St. Bonaventure in Bristol, William enrolled at St. Brendan\u2019s College to complete his secondary education until his father relocated the family to Birmingham.\u00a0 His family, only moderately middle class, could not afford to send more than one son to university, and that opportunity went to William\u2019s older brother.\u00a0 After finishing his college work, William taught school and worked as a clerk at a company called Stewarts & Lloyds.<\/h3>\n

Despite his inability to attend university, Slim joined the Reserve Officer Training Corps at the University of Birmingham in 1912.\u00a0 This decision led him to apply for an officer\u2019s commission at the beginning of World War I (1914).\u00a0 The government offered him a temporary commission as Second Lieutenant and assigned him to the Royal Warwickshire Regiment of Foot in August.\u00a0 Given his middle-class upbringing and calm, unpretentious manner, many assumed that Slim had \u201ccome up through the ranks\u201d to commissioned officer status.<\/h3>\n

In 1915, while serving at Gallipoli \u2014 an eleven-month battle that ended in defeat, Lieutenant Slim was severely wounded and required medical evacuation.\u00a0 Upon his recovery, in October 1916, Slim returned to his regiment, which was then serving in Mesopotamia.\u00a0 While serving as a temporary captain, he was wounded again in 1917 and evacuated to India.\u00a0 During his recovery, his earlier battlefield gallantry earned him the Military Cross, Britain\u2019s third-highest medal for displaying courage under fire.\u00a0 After his return to full duty, the Army promoted him to temporary major and assigned him to the 6th Gurkha Rifles in November 1918.\u00a0 At the war\u2019s end, he reverted to captain and joined the British-Indian Army in 1919.\u00a0 In 1921, he returned to the 6th Gurkha Rifles as a regimental adjutant.<\/h3>\n

In 1926, Captain William Slim married Aileen, the daughter of Rev. John Anderson Robertson of Edinburgh, Scotland.\u00a0 Eventually, the couple would raise a son and a daughter, but soon after their marriage, the Army ordered Slim to the Officer\u2019s Staff College in Quetta.<\/h3>\n

In 1930, while serving as a staff officer, the Army promoted Slim to Brevet Major, advancing to substantial major three years later.\u00a0 In 1934, the Army assigned Slim as an instructor at the staff college in Camberley, England, where he taught through 1937.[1]<\/a>\u00a0 He afterward attended the Imperial Defense College, after which the Army promoted him to lieutenant colonel.\u00a0 After his promotion, he returned to the Gurkha Rifles, where he assumed command of the 2nd battalion, 7th Gurkha Regiment.\u00a0 In 1939, Slim advanced to regular colonel in the Indian Army, with a temporary promotion to Brigadier.\u00a0 In June, he was appointed to head the Senior Officers School in Belgaum, India.<\/h3>\n

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Second World War<\/h3>\n

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At the outbreak of World War II, the Army appointed Brigadier Slim to command the Tenth Indian Infantry Brigade of the 5th Indian Infantry Division.\u00a0 During the East African campaign, Slim led his brigade in Sudan \u2014 in operations intended to liberate Ethiopia from fascist Italians.\u00a0 While fighting near Eritrea, Slim received his third combat wound during an assault on enemy positions at Agordat.<\/h3>\n

Although successfully treated for his wound, his injury prevented him from additional field service, so the Army assigned him to the General Staff in Delhi, India.\u00a0 There, he performed operational planning and logistics duties in preparation for operations in Iraq.\u00a0 In May 1941, the Army promoted Slim to Brigadier General Staff.\u00a0 In the following month, Major General William Fraser, commanding the Indian Tenth Infantry Division, fell ill.\u00a0 Slim was appointed to take his place with the acting rank of major general.<\/h3>\n

General Slim led the Division as part of the British \u201cIraq Force\u201d throughout the Syria-Lebanon campaign and the invasion of Persia.\u00a0 In 1941 alone, Slim was \u201cmentioned in dispatches\u201d twice.[2]<\/a><\/h3>\n

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In Burma<\/h3>\n

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In March 1942, Indian Army HQ promoted Slim to temporary lieutenant general and assigned him command of the Burma Corps \u2014 which included the 17th Indian Infantry Division and 1st Burma Infantry Division.\u00a0 At the time, the Corps was under heavy assault from the Imperial Japanese Army and found wanting in battlefield mobility and military technology.\u00a0 Initially, Slim had no choice but to withdraw the force from Burma into India, where he would refit and retrain for subsequent action.\u00a0 During this period, Slim took command of the XV Corps of the Eastern Army, responsible for the coastal approaches from Burma to India east of Chittagong.<\/h3>\n

Soon after, Slim had a substantial difference of opinion with his senior officer, General Noel Irwin, Commander of the Eastern Army.\u00a0 In essence, relieving Slim of his command, Irwin took personal charge of the XV Corps\u2019 advance into the Arakan Peninsula, which ended in a complete disaster for the British forces.\u00a0 Higher headquarters restored Slim to his command and removed Irwin from his.\u00a0 At this time, the British HQ decided to reshape the Burma Force.<\/h3>\n

The newly created Fourteenth Army included IV Corps (United Kingdom), XV Corps (Arakan), and XXXIII Corps (Reserve Force), and General Slim assumed command in January 1943.\u00a0 According to the analysis of two American historians, General Slim was a hardened field officer whose skill in training and troop leading was unsurpassed in the East Asian theater.\u00a0 He had a solid grasp of soldiering in a jungle environment and knew his enemy well enough to defeat him.\u00a0 Beyond his professional skills, Slim was judged as an introspective officer honest enough to anticipate inadequacies and fix them before they became debilitating problems.<\/h3>\n

One of his best moves as the Fourteenth Army commander was his decision to build the Division around his Gurkha Rifles division, as there could be no better example of combat readiness and aggressiveness than the Gurkhas.<\/h3>\n

Slim quickly got on with training his new Army to take the fight to the enemy.\u00a0 The General\u2019s basic premise was that off-road mobility was his biggest challenge.\u00a0 Realizing that he could not rely on heavy equipment in low-lying marshy areas or thick jungles, he exchanged land-based equipment for mules and air transportation.\u00a0 Slim kept the number of motorized vehicles to a bare minimum.<\/h3>\n

To facilitate combat resupply of forward units, General Slim revised his force operational template so that each unit operating on the forward edge of the battle area did so within an imaginary rectangular area.\u00a0 Within these areas, Slim\u2019s aerial logistics effort could drop supplies with reduced chances of air-dropping rations, munitions, petroleum, or equipment into the enemy\u2019s hands.\u00a0 These rectangular operating areas (tactical areas of responsibility (TAOR)) would also help to isolate the enemy should the Japanese attempt to cut the Army\u2019s lines of communication. It was also effective against the Japanese-favored infiltration strategy.<\/h3>\n

Additionally, General Slim increased offensive patrolling, night-time operations, and low-altitude air insertion. He also taught the men to hold positions whenever the Japanese attempted to outflank Allied movements. In time, Slim\u2019s troops overcame their belief that the Japanese were a superior army and their fear of the jungle.<\/h3>\n

The Chin Hills region formed a natural defensive barrier to Burma.\u00a0 General Slim would have preferred to avoid this area, if possible.\u00a0 Ideally, he would have preferred to conduct an amphibious landing further down the Burmese coast, but since there were no amphibious ready groups available, Slim had no choice but to make an overland thrust into Burma.<\/h3>\n

Complicating General Slim\u2019s offensive planning was that his enemy, the Japanese 15th Army, had grown from four divisions at the beginning of 1943 to eight divisions before the year\u2019s end.\u00a0 Also, by the end of 1943, the Japanese had completed their Burma Railway, allowing the Japanese to quickly reinforce their Burmese area army.[3]<\/a><\/h3>\n

As Slim began training his men for the rigors of jungle warfare, he clashed with British Brigadier Orde Wingate, who took away some of Slim\u2019s best-trained Gurkha, British, and African field units for his Chindit commando group.\u00a0 Wingate\u2019s argument was sound, however, especially given his task of creating a commando force that, once inserted by air, could not be quickly withdrawn.<\/h3>\n

Eventually, Slim approved Wingate\u2019s plan to aid and employ the Burmese hill tribes against the Japanese.\u00a0 Because of the suffering imposed on the Burmese people by the Japanese forces, most of these tribal groups remained loyal to the British.[4]<\/a>\u00a0 By using the hill tribes against the Japanese, the 15th Army would have to divert troops away from Slim\u2019s Army to deal with them.<\/h3>\n

During the Second Arakan Offensive in January 1944, Japanese forces quickly surrounded the Indian 7th Infantry Division, along with parts of the 5th Indian Division and 81st West African Infantry Division.\u00a0 The 7th Division based its defense on what was then called the \u201cadministrative box,\u201d a defense formed mainly of logistical and administrative personnel (supply, clerical, cooks, mechanics, etc.).\u00a0 It was an effective strategy for \u201cholding the line\u201d against counter-attacking Japanese, but it did not allow the 7th Division commander to push through his assault on the Japanese opposition.<\/h3>\n

At the start of 1944, William Slim held the official rank of colonel with a war-time rank of major-general and the temporary rank of lieutenant general, an appropriate rank for commanding a field army.<\/h3>\n

Just after the new year, Japanese Prime Minister General Hideki Tojo approved a plan for victory in Asia, calling it Operation U-Go[5]<\/a>\u00a0and code-naming the invasion of India Operation Ichi-Go, intending to defeat China once and for all through its back door.[6]<\/a>\u00a0 These two operations (in India and China) were closely linked because American air forces regularly flew supplies over the Himalayan Mountains to China.\u00a0 For this reason, the Japanese wanted to close American air bases in India.\u00a0 South Asia and Southeast Asia were so important to the Japanese that they dedicated two million troops to these operations.[7]<\/a><\/h3>\n

Japan\u2019s senior Burma-Area officer, General Renya Mutaguchi, launched his invasion of India on 12 March 1944, boasting that it was Japan\u2019s road to Delhi.[8]<\/a>\u00a0 General Slim knew of Mutaguchi\u2019s attack plan from early March through the efforts of signal intelligence, but there was nothing Slim could do about it but to meet it head-on with what he had.\u00a0 Given Slim\u2019s force levels, he could not invade Burma and defend against Mutaguchi simultaneously.\u00a0 The principle of economy of force strongly suggested that Slim\u2019s best course of action was to fight a defensive strategy.[9]<\/a><\/h3>\n

By fighting the Japanese from defensive positions, Slim would require the Mutaguchi to expend his human resources while preserving his own.\u00a0 Slim\u2019s advantage in defense was his superior tank, well-developed logistical system, and air power.\u00a0 General Slim reasoned that he could proceed with his invasion plan after he had destroyed Mutaguchi\u2019s combat force.<\/h3>\n

What caught Slim unaware was the rapidity of General Mutaguchi\u2019s movement over Burma\u2019s muddy and washed-out roads into India.\u00a0 The situation forced General Slim to disengage the Japanese at Arakan, move two entire divisions to the north, and re-engage the Japanese defensively at the new location.\u00a0 He could not have accomplished this without the exceptional support of the R.A.F. and U.S.A.A.C. that relocated these combat forces, resupplied them, evacuated the wounded and dead from the battlefield, and flew combat sorties against Mutaguchi\u2019s forces.<\/h3>\n

What made General Slim stand out from other British commanders was his devotion to his men \u2014 and the degree to which his men reciprocated. General Slim ordered his men to hold their ground, forbade any retreat, and kept them informed about the battleground\u2019s true nature. Slim\u2019s troops trusted his judgment and his word.\u00a0 No one retreated.<\/h3>\n

(To be Continued…)<\/em><\/h3>\n

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Sources:<\/h3>\n
    \n
  1. \n

    Croke, V.\u00a0\u00a0Elephant Company: The Inspiring Story of an Unlikely Hero and the Animals Who Helped Him Save Lives in World War II.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>Random House Publishers, 2015.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  2. \n

    Dower, J.\u00a0\u00a0War Without Mercy: Race & Power in the Pacific War.<\/em>\u00a0 New York Pantheon, 1986.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  3. \n

    Fraser, G. M.\u00a0\u00a0Quartered Safe Out Here: a recollection of the war in Burma.<\/em>\u00a0 Harper Collins, 1995.<\/strong><\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  4. \n

    Hastings, M.\u00a0\u00a0Retribution.<\/em>\u00a0 Knopf Publishers, 2008.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  5. \n

    Hayashi, S.\u00a0 and A. D. Cox.\u00a0\u00a0Kogun: The Japanese Army in the Pacific War.<\/em>\u00a0 Marine Corps Association, 1959.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  6. \n

    Louis, A.\u00a0\u00a0Burma: The Longest War.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>Dent Publishing Company, 1959.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  7. \n

    McLynn, F.\u00a0\u00a0The Burma Campaign.<\/em>\u00a0 Vintage Publishing, 2011.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  8. \n

    Worrall, S.\u00a0\u00a0How Burmese Elephants Helped Defeat the Japanese in World War II.<\/em>\u00a0 National Geographic Magazine online, 28 September 2014.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Endnotes:<\/h3>\n

    [1]<\/a>\u00a0Between 1934 \u2013 1937, Slim wrote short stories and novels under the pen name Anthony Mills.\u00a0 Writing supplemented his meager income as a military officer.<\/h3>\n

    [2]<\/a>\u00a0In the British forces, the term\u00a0mentioned in dispatches\u00a0<\/em>means that a serviceman\u2019s performance in battle was such that it deserved special mention to higher headquarters.\u00a0 It usually reflects well on an individual\u2019s gallantry or courage in combat.<\/h3>\n

    [3]<\/a>\u00a0The Japanese achieved the construction of the Burma Railway through the labors of thousands of Allied prisoners of War \u2014 a story fictionalized in a novel by Pierre Boulle and a film by David Lean starring William Holden, Alec Guinness, and Jack Hawkins titled\u00a0Bridge over the River Kwai.<\/em><\/h3>\n

    [4]<\/a>\u00a0These hill people numbered around 7 million of Burma\u2019s 17 million total population.<\/h3>\n

    [5]<\/a>\u00a0Launched in early March 1944, the operation was directed against British forces in the northeast Indian regions of Manipur and the Naga Hills (then part of Assam) but targeting the Brahmaputra Valley.<\/h3>\n

    [6]<\/a>\u00a0Translated, \u201cOperation Number One\u201d involved a series of campaigns between Japan and the National Revolutionary Army of the Republic of China (fought between April \u2013 December 1944, targeting Henan, Hunan, and Guangxi, China.<\/h3>\n

    [7]<\/a>\u00a0The Japanese knew that they lacked the logistical capability to sustain an invasion of India, so one of their assumptions was that the British Fourteenth Army would collapse, allowing the Japanese 15th Army to capture enough food to prevent its men from starving to death.\u00a0 By enlisting the support of Indian nationalist Subhas Chandra Bose, the Japanese expected the British Indian Army to mutiny, kill all of its British officers, and lay down their arms to a superior Japanese race \u2014 in this way, Japan could conquer all of India.<\/h3>\n

    [8]<\/a>\u00a0Scholars characterize Renya Mutaguchi as a reckless eccentric and certified fanatic.\u00a0 His stubborn decision to limit his troops to twenty days of rations over a four-month-long campaign resulted in the starvation death of 55,000 of his 90,000-man Imperial Army.\u00a0 Further note: Of Japan\u2019s 5.5 million men serving in uniform during World War II, roughly 2 million served in the region of Indochina.<\/h3>\n

    [9]<\/a>\u00a0Carl von Clausewitz developed nine principles of war.\u00a0 One of those was the economy of force: employing all available combat power in the most effective way possible, in an attempt to allocate a minimum of essential combat power to and secondary effort.<\/h3>\n

     <\/p>\n

    {**Please support the Fix Bayonets Blog<\/a> by Subscribing and Sharing. This blog is one of my Top 5 History blogs and it never disappoints!}<\/strong><\/em><\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Via: Fix Bayonets     Here is, perhaps, World War II\u2019s greatest general, and hardly anyone today knows his name. Field Marshal William Slim is best known for commanding Fourteenth Army in Burma during the Second World War (1939-45).\u00a0 In taking command, he inherited a disastrous situation in which, with practical skill and quiet charisma,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[5523,7697,4076,14200,2004,5944,6096,1286,5662,1898,1899],"tags":[16486,16542,16541,6087,7666,763,12072,16543,8123,1902],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69468"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69468"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":69479,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69468\/revisions\/69479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}