September 24, 1941 was a day of double blows to the Allied forces in Southeast Asia, the defeat in the Battle of Java seriously affected the fighting on the ground, and the Japanese 16th Army launched a landing operation on the island of Java with a force of one and a half divisions under the command of the corps commander Lieutenant General Jun Imamura at the same time as the Battle of Java.

Since the strength of the army was only one and a half divisions, it was impossible to organize a large-scale offensive, and it was only carried out in two stages, and according to the strategic deployment of Lieutenant General Jun Imamura, the 16th Army with the 2nd Division, the 56th Mixed Brigade and the Kawaguchi Detachment first landed on Java Island, cleared the perimeter, and then stormed the hinterland of Java Island.

At the same time, a request for additional troops was made to the Japanese base camp, mainly because the battles in Hong Kong, Manila and Singapore had ended, and the Japanese army could send more troops to participate in the war against the Dutch East Indies.

On the Allied side, the Dutch East Indies was a Dutch colony, with 65,000 Dutch and Indian troops and 16,000 American and Australian troops, but most of the junior officers and soldiers of the Dutch and Indian troops were Indonesian locals, and there were deep contradictions with the middle- and upper-level Dutch officers, and they were poorly equipped and poorly trained; the American and Australian troops were defeated troops that had just withdrawn from the Philippines and their morale was low.

Under the command of Lieutenant General Jun Imamura, the Japanese army was divided into three directions: western, central, and eastern, and began landing operations. The main forces on the western route were the Kawaguchi Detachment and the 38th Division, which was the 124th Infantry Wing under the command of Major General Kiyoken Kawaguchi, commander of the 35th Brigade, reinforced by marines and engineers. The unit landed at Miri and then advanced in two directions deep into Borneo.

Subsequently, the 1st Airborne Brigade under the command of Seiichi Kume landed parachute next to Pakistan on the island of Sumatra. After a fierce battle, it captured the border of Pakistan. Then, the advance troops of the 38th Division rushed to cooperate with the airborne troops to consolidate the Palinpan, and soon the main force of the 38th Division also arrived at the Balinpan and completely captured the Balimpan oil field.

In the middle route, the Sakaguchi detachment was the main force, and the Sakaguchi detachment was under the command of Major General Yasuo Sakaguchi, the commander of the 56th mixed wing, reinforced with artillery and engineering units. Responsible for the capture of Tarakan, Balikpapan and Machen in southeastern Borneo. After the landing in Talagan, the unit encountered stubborn resistance from the Dutch and Indian troops, and it was slow to break through.

The Eastern Detachment of the 38th Division and the Marine Corps were formed by the Japanese Army on the Eastern Road, and the Eastern Detachment captured Ambon and Timor after landing. This was followed by the capture of Manado, Kendari, Makassar and Bali. So far. The eastern, northern, and western areas of Java were captured by the Japanese army, and the first phase of the operation was declared over.

Just a few hours before the completion of the first phase of the Japanese assault on the island of Java, about 2,000 miles to the north, the last train of British troops left Rangoon by mid-morning. After the demolition experts completely destroyed the port facilities. The last ships left the port. Then. The vanguard of the Japanese 33rd Division had already entered the outskirts of Rangoon.

Because the Australian Prime Minister refused to reinforce Myanmar, which played a pivotal role in deciding the fate of Myanmar. Rangoon was doomed to fall because of the critical moment when the Japanese army was attacking Burma. However, there was a disagreement within the British and Burmese forces, and General Smith, the field commander of the British front, asked the command to retreat forty miles in a week to the other side of the railway bridge on the Sidtang River to block the Japanese army.

But the British commander, General Hutton, refused to give the field troops at the front a week, and instead insisted that General Smith resist by virtue of the Billing; On the map of the command, this is clearly a line of defense. But, as Smith discovered, the river is just a wet gully in the middle of a dense forest during the dry season that anyone can jump over.

The Japanese did jump over the ditch and put both flanks of the British under gunpoint. When Smith was finally allowed to retreat, it was no longer possible to guarantee an orderly retreat. The British were most outraged by the bombing of their own planes, because the Royal Air Force Command in Rangoon made a big mistake by ordering the pilots to attack the Allied column that was marching on the road leading to the bridge over the Sidan River.

Exhausted, the British officers scrambled the convoy carrying Indian and Gurkha soldiers through the narrow iron bridge that night. But at this moment, a strong Japanese vanguard came through the forest and cut off most of the Indian division.

At half past five o'clock in the morning of the 25th, the bridge of the Sitang River Bridge was blown up by the British in a series of deafening explosions, and the Indian division, which could be relied on to defend Rangoon, had been cut off by the Japanese and the fast-flowing river.

General Wavell was as calm as usual when he heard the news of the crushing defeat at the Sidaunt River. Obviously, this important port had been lost, as it was now impossible for the British 7th Armoured Brigade and a new Indian division to rush to Rangoon in time to save the city.

Lieutenant General Iida held a victory march in the city of Yangon, abandoned by the Allies, and since Yangon had fallen into Japanese hands, the Japanese Fifteenth Army now controlled the gateway to Burma. The road to the north to cut off the strategic overland lines of communication to China has been opened, and the Nationalist government is urgently sending two troops from Chongqing to Burma to defend this vital highway.

Wavell had returned to his old command in New Delhi, India, and now he had a more realistic view of the military might of the Japanese. Realizing that neither the Chinese troops that were coming, nor the newly arrived British 7th Panzer Division and Indian recruits, could hold Burma.

When all of Southeast Asia was about to fall into the hands of the Japanese, the only fortress to hold out against the Japanese was in the Philippines. Of course, the main islands of the Philippines have fallen, and it is Bataan Island between Singapore and the Philippines that is still resisting. The American troops stationed on the island have been compressed by the Japanese army into an area of only a few square kilometers, although the defenders have suffered heavy casualties, ammunition and other supplies are desperately short, but the American soldiers who have seen the madness and brutality of the Japanese are still engaged in bloody battles, because they know very well that they are facing an extremely cruel devil army, even if they lay down their arms and surrender, they may not be able to escape with their lives, it is better to fight to the death.

On the rocks of Corregidor Island, MacArthur commanded the Philippine guerrillas to resist, so that the enemy was still unable to occupy Mindanao and the southern islands. Admiral Nimitz's attack on a Japanese base in the Pacific Ocean made headline news in American newspapers. The pilots of the USS Lexington, on 21 February, repelled a heavy air attack by enemy aircraft on Rabaul, and three days later Halsey's USS Enterprise aircraft carrier task force bombed Wake Island, but these were merely containments, and the attention of the American public was focused on the officers and men besieged in the Philippines, who were now completely isolated by the victory of the Japanese forces in the Dutch East Indies.

Exaggerated headlines in the newspapers still give Americans the impression that MacArthur's forces in the Philippines were striking at the enemy and that it was only a matter of time before reinforcements broke through the blockade and arrived in the Philippines.

How much of what was in the newspapers could be trusted, Roosevelt and his aides were well aware that they knew this was not true. Some members of Congress also knew that this was not true, and they began to press for General MacArthur to be repatriated and appointed Supreme Commander of the U.S. Army.

MacArthur himself was now completely hopeless about the reinforcements, but he decided to resist to the end with his officers and soldiers, because he fled when the Japanese attacked Luzon, which was a shame in MacArthur's eyes, he was a soldier, and he had a reason and responsibility to be with his own soldiers and his own positions. When the Philippine U.S. Governor General and President Quezon left Corregidor Island by submarine, MacArthur's wife refused to take the opportunity to leave with her young son. MacArthur symbolically returned a box containing his medals, papers, and a will.

MacArthur was determined to die, and he wanted to wash away his shame with the highest military etiquette. But President Roosevelt knew that MacArthur, a hero of the United States, could not be sacrificed politically. With the collapse of the Allied Command in the United States, Britain, the Netherlands, and Australia threatened, and the Canberra government panicked, Marshall and Roosevelt agreed on the need to appoint a new Allied Supreme Commander, an appointment that became even more urgent after the British retreated to concentrate on defending India.

The Prime Minister and military leaders of Australia have had to rely increasingly on the United States, and relations between London and Canberra have been somewhat strained by the refusal of Britain's request to transfer Australian troops to defend Burma, and relations between the two countries have not improved when Prime Minister Curtin threatened to recall the remaining divisions from Egypt.

Both the U.S. and British governments believe that the candidate for Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in the South Pacific should be led by Douglas. General MacArthur assumed the position, and soon this order was issued by Washington to the Bataan front, signed jointly by the president, Marshall, and the Secretary of the Army, ordering MacArthur to immediately leave for Mindanao, from where he would be transferred to Melbourne and take command of all American troops to stop the Japanese.

MacArthur was not impressed by Washington's order, and at first the general was adamant that he would not abandon his officers and soldiers, and even offered to resign or re-enlist "as a mere volunteer." He was in great anguish and feared that he would lose face and conscience by failing to fulfill his promise to die with the soldiers.

However, the news that the U.S. government transferred MacArthur to Australia was leaked at this time, and the Japanese army immediately increased a company to Corregidor Island, and at the same time sent a large number of warships to intercept it, because the Japanese and Americans also understood that MacArthur's life and death were very important to this war, as the youngest principal of the United States Military Academy at West Point since its establishment, MacArthur was the god of war in the U.S. military, and was synonymous with victory, if he died in battle or was captured, It will be a major blow for the United States.

It was a painful day for the Allies, who not only lost the last remaining naval fleet in the South Pacific, but also Java and Rangoon, and more importantly, MacArthur, the most famous American general, was besieged and in danger. (To be continued......)