As a matter of fact, the United States did not have a clear understanding of Britain's idea of defending India, and Britain actually devoted a lot of enthusiasm and effort to defending India. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

After the remnants of the 10th Army, led by Admiral Henry Maitland Wilson, retreated from Iran into India, the British quickly reorganized India's forces, and the whole army was divided into three armies: southern, eastern, and northwestern:

The Eastern Army, which served as the main force and had been deployed on the Indo-Burma line for a long time, was reorganized into the 14th Army, with Lieutenant General Owen as its commander, with the 15th Army (5th and 7th Indian Divisions, 81st West African Division), 4th Army (17th, 20th, 23rd, 26th Indian Infantry Divisions and 254th Indian Tank Brigade), and 33rd Army (2nd British and 36th Indian Infantry Divisions), with a total strength of more than 200,000 troops;

The 10th Army is still called the 10th Army after being combined with the original troops stationed in India, but the strength of the group army is weak, with a total of 6 divisions in name, of which 3 units that have retreated from the Iranian battlefield have been replenished, and the full strength rate is still less than 70%;

The main force in the south, also known as the 12th Army, was under the unified command of the Army Command in Ceylon, and was originally to be organized together with the 14th Army as the 11th Army Group, but Japan cut off the Indian Ocean's external contacts, and the British side realized the importance of Ceylon's position, and set up the group army separately, in addition to the 3rd Indian Division and the 2nd African Division in southern India, the strength on Ceylon Island mainly included the 19th and 25th Indian Divisions, the 50th Tank Brigade and the 99th Indian Infantry Brigade.

Overall, the British ground forces in the Indian direction include a total of 17 divisional numbers, 8 brigade numbers, and then add the Royal Air Force troops in India, the Chinese Army in India, the US Army Air Force in India, etc., with a total strength of more than 400,000.

Originally, Britain still stationed the Eastern Fleet in India, but the First Battle of Ceylon was ravaged by the mobile fleet commanded by Nagumo, and later was almost completely wiped out by Hori Yoshichi in the Indian Ocean Campaign, so the Royal Navy in India except for 2 auxiliary cruisers, 4 destroyers and more than 10 offshore patrol gunboats or supply ships, there is almost no strength, but there are some coastal defense, air defense, and marine forces in Mumbai, Kolkata, Colombo, Trincomalee and other places, All the personnel under the command of the Navy can be cobbled together, and more than 10,000 people can probably be gathered.

Combined, there were almost 120,000 British troops and 250,000 Indian troops (with British officers). Among the 250,000 Indian troops, there are several pure Sikhs and Gurks composed of troops, with a total strength of about 20,000, and their combat effectiveness is very strong, even stronger than that of pure British troops, while the remaining more than 200,000 Indian troops are not worth mentioning, but the level is still a little higher than the Burmese Independence Army and the Royal Army of Siam.

Judging from the books, the number of equipment of the troops stationed in India is also quite large, with more than 500 tanks of various types and more than 400 aircraft, but all of them are mainly old models. Taking tanks as an example, most of them are the Crusaders and Valentines produced in Britain, as well as the Grant Lee that was aided by the United States in the early days, and less than 100 of them are relatively new Shermans, and the new Churchills and Fireflies produced in Britain are not related to the Indian army; Most of the planes are also old models, most of the fighters are Hurricanes, and there are only more than 40 Spitfires, not the latest Spitfire 14, but only Spitfire 8.

During the period from the defeat of the 10th Army in India to the occupation of the island of Madagascar by the Germans, Britain actually transported a lot of military supplies, equipment and personnel to India through South Africa, but the scale was far from being comparable with the previous time when it had sea supremacy, and most of the time it was carried out in the form of 1-2 merchant ships secretly transporting, which was inaction in the eyes of the Americans.

However, this small-scale smuggling was not bad, and it was thanks to such efforts that the 10th Army, which had retreated from the Middle East, barely recovered. Moreover, the Royal Navy judged the situation very accurately, although the Combined Fleet issued a statement to blockade the northern Indian Ocean, but in fact the main force of the fleet has been participating in the operation, it is impossible to really block such a large piece of the ocean, large fleets may have losses, and there is no need to be afraid of small-scale transportation.

Later, it was discovered that after the main forces of the combined fleet were put into North America and Panama to fight, their control over the Indian Ocean became weaker, except for the Arabian Sea, which is close to the Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa, which had an absolute advantage, the rest were completely unable to monitor it, and the personnel and commodity exchanges between India and South Africa still maintained a medium-scale pattern, but they had to go around in a large circle, not along the East African line, and had to make a detour around the periphery of the island of Madagascar. It was not until the loss of the island in May that the passage was finally cut off, but the flow of goods between India and Australia continued, and most of the supplies allocated to the Hump route were transferred from Australia.

The biggest dissatisfaction of the United States with the Indians lies in the chaotic overall thinking and military logic of the British: Except for the ostensible establishment of the Southeast Asian Theater of Operations, of which Mountbatten is the commander-in-chief, and the management of the China-India-Burma Theater, nothing else will pass through the China-India-Burma Theater. Not only did Britain not report to the Allies its thinking on the overall defense of India, nor did it explain its plans and intentions for the next step, but it was even more unwilling to bring all its troops under the unified management of the China-India-Burma theater. So much so that on the land of India, the British army, the American army, and the Chinese army stationed in India all went their own way, provoking Stilwell to often get angry, and in his opinion, the British were more difficult to deal with than the Chinese.

This kind of complaint and "confusion" reached Roosevelt's ears, and he mistakenly believed that Churchill did not want to defend India.

In fact, the British had a deeper level of consideration, they regarded India as their own forbidden territory, and they did not want to let the Americans intervene before India was obviously threatened, whether it was the troops stationed in India or the American air force, they were all temporary deployments that were hurriedly deployed when Japan launched an offensive in Burma, and according to the British side's thinking, once the war in Burma is over and India has no particularly serious threat, these troops should be cleared out.

Although the British Empire could not cede India to Japan, it could not tolerate the United States and China reaching out to India, which is the reason why Mountbatten and Britain have always been lukewarm and weird towards Stilwell. In the eyes of the British, relying on the existing forces, it was more than enough to deal with the 15th Army deployed by Japan in Burma - the other side had only 100,000 troops in total, less than 100 aircraft, and Japan's best 97 tanks were not worth mentioning at all in the eyes of the British.

Therefore, the British side was reluctant to allow the Chinese army to intervene in the Indian side, and only agreed to allow the Indian troops to be trained in India to prepare for a future counterattack on Burma.

The focal point of the tripartite conflict is the counteroffensive against Burma. Stilwell pushed for this, ****** considered that the opening of the Yunnan-Burma Highway would facilitate the delivery of supplies, but the Indian side refused to send ground troops to participate, at most the air force was to send the air force, and even believed that the ultimate goal of the Chinese army in India was to assist the British in recovering Burma - China sent troops to defeat Japan and then let the British take over Burma. This made Chiang extremely dissatisfied, he thought that if the Chinese army attacked the 100,000 Japanese army, without the participation of 300,000 people, paying 10-150,000 casualties, it would never be able to take it, even if this force was deployed in the Yunnan direction, could the British watch the Chinese shed blood and sacrifice, fight with the Japanese and then take away the fruits of victory in the end?

He also did not want the U.S. Army to take advantage of the British's anger for the British, and the plan to counterattack Burma continued to drag on until Lieutenant General Mutaguchi Ryoya of the Japanese 15th Army reported to Tokyo asking for an initiative to attack India.

The plan of operations caused controversy within the Japanese forces in Burma, and the chief of staff, Major General Nobuyyoshi Obata, firmly opposed it, believing that the troops were insufficient and the supplies were inadequate, and the entire plan was very wishful thinking, "completely ignoring the resistance of the enemy forces." Mutaguchi Lian also forcibly demanded to promote, and later sent a telegram to Tokyo asking for the removal of his chief of staff, but the final result surprised everyone: Mutaguchi Lian, who advocated the attack, was also transferred back to the country from the base camp and transferred to the reserve, which is not the most shocking, the most inexplicable thing is that Lieutenant General Masaharu Honma, who was originally the commander of the 14th Army and has been transferred to the reserve, was reactivated and planned to serve as the commander of the 15th Army of Burma.

The appointment caused a strong shock in the staff headquarters, and everyone did not understand why Ishihara Waner did this, although everyone felt that Mutaguchi Lian might not be very competent, but he was completely more capable than Honma Masaharu, and he did not have a better candidate at hand - Itagaki Seishiro, who served as a military counselor and had a deep relationship with Ishihara Waner, hinted that he was willing to submit to the position of commander of the 15th Army with the rank of general, just to be able to lead troops to the front-line troops, and he also declined for Ishihara Waner.

Even Ishihara's backstage, King Minoru Higashikurenomiya was very surprised, on the surface he signed and let go without hesitation, but privately asked Ishihara why he chose a famous coward like Masaharu Honma as the commander?

He fought badly in the Philippine campaign, complaining about inaccurate intelligence, chaotic logistics, lack of manpower, completing the mission four months later than the base camp requires, and letting MacArthur go...... Why re-enable such people? ”

"Your Highness, do you think you can win the battle of Burma?"

King Minoru of the Higashikure Palace shook his head first and nodded again: "The difficulty is very great, not as optimistic as Mutaguchi Lian also said, but if there are capable generals, we can fight a battle." ”

"I don't see it that way, it is completely disadvantageous to fight India from Burma, we have no advantage in troops, we are very lacking in logistics, and we do not have naval support, so it will be very difficult to take every step forward." Ishihara explained, "Honma Masaharu is relatively timid, but being timid has the advantage of being timid, and he won't be impulsive. As for Itagaki, I'm afraid he'll end up in a stalemate in the direction of India......" (To be continued. )