Operation Dracula
The operation Dracula made in the Second World War, the conclusion of the Burma campaign . In this enterprise, the British-Indian 14th Army under General Slim occupied the Burmese capital Rangoon, which was still held by Japanese troops, by an amphibious landing operation at the end of April and beginning of May 1945 . There was no major fighting in this attack because the Japanese defenders had already evacuated the city.
Japanese conquest 1941/42
Bilin - Sittang - Pegu - Toungoo - Taukkyan - Yunnan-Burma - Shwedaung - Prome - Yenangyaung
1942/43
Arakan I - The Hump - Chindits
1944
Arakan II ( Ngakyedauk ) - U-gō ( Imphal - Sangshak - Tennis Court - Kohima ) - Myitkyina - Mountain Song
1944/45
Meiktila / Mandalay - Pokoku -
Arakan III ( Kangaw and height 170 - Ramree ) - Operation Dracula ( Elephant Point ) - Sittang
prehistory
After eventful fighting until the summer of 1944, the situation of the Japanese became untenable. On March 20, after street fighting , Mandalay fell into the hands of the Indian 19th Division (Major General TW Rees). The British, thanks to their air superiority, retained the initiative and embarked on a war of movement in which they broke out of their positions and pursued the Japanese forces. On April 28, the advancing troops of the 14th Army cut the road between Pegu and the Sittaung River, cutting off Japanese communications between Rangoon and Moulmein. The Japanese gave up control of the western part of the city of Pegu and destroyed all the bridges over the Pegu River that separated their positions from the eastern part of the urban area. The water basins and flooded fields prevented the 17th Division from carrying out a planned bypass maneuver. On April 29th, the 17th Indian Division (General PT Cowan) occupied Payagyi and took several villages nearby. The advance of the 14th Army over the Sittang resulted in the complete capture of Pegu and Prome on May 2nd and 3rd .
planning
In October 1943, Louis Lord Mountbatten was appointed supreme allied commander of the South East Asia Command (SEAC) as the successor to Archibald Wavell . In the summer of 1944, after the Battle of Kohima, he urged a swift pursuit and received the support of the American command under General Stillwell . The company to recapture Rangoon was christened Operation Dracula and the date of the attack was decided by the Royal Navy under the command of Admiral Arthur Power , who was in charge of the amphibious portion of the attack on Rangon. In planning the operation, a number of problems had to be overcome. One danger was that the amphibious assault could be detected by units of the Imperial Japanese Navy when the landing convoy approached Rangoon. Although General Frank Messervy and some of his commanders considered it possible to conquer Rangoon at the beginning of May, supplies for the 14th Army were not very secure due to the rapid advance and the long distances. The monsoons were imminent and the heavy rains would have made many of the roads impassable and air supply impossible. It was feared that the Japanese would defend Rangoon to the last man before surrendering. Before the order for Operation Dracula was given, the Southeast Asia Command had prepared to occupy the important positions at Victoria Point (Kawthoung), Mergui (Myeik) and the island of Phuket on the border with Malacca , this company was to be codenamed Operation Roger carry.
Operation Dracula planners were concerned that the DropShips carrying the stormtroopers of India's 26th Division would be attacked by the enemy. Air support was seen as critical to the success of the operation, with Japanese aviation activities in the Toungoo area being cleared up prior to the company's days. There was also the problem of defenses in and around the Rangoon River on which the landing craft were supposed to sail. The river itself was heavily mined, a result of Japanese defenses, and it had to be cleared of mines before an amphibious assault could take place. Although the British knew, thanks to the Intelligence Ultra Encryption System , that the headquarters of the Burma Regional Army had left Rangoon on April 24, they could not believe that the field troops had also left. They were therefore of the opinion that the landings would face severe opposition. General Hyotaro Kimura had decided not to defend Rangoon, but to evacuate the city and withdraw to Moulmein in southern Burma. Although he had received orders from Commander in Chief Hisaichi Terauchi , Commander in Chief of Army Group South, to hold Rangoon to the death, he realized that this would lead to the senseless destruction of his last remaining armed forces. Kimura was replaced by his chief of staff , General Shinichi Tanaka , who still gave orders to fortify positions in the city.
According to the modified plan for the operation, the Indian 26th Division, under the command of General Henry M. Chambers , was to build additional bridgeheads on both sides of the Rangon River. Another division would use the beachheads a few days later to launch the main assault on the city. The naval and aircraft vehicles for Operation Dracula were already in place. At the same time, General Leese , Commander in Chief of the ALFSEA, ordered that the 14th Army should take part in the advance south with only four divisions , more could not be supplied from the air if necessary. The XXXIII. Corps (General Stopford ) was to advance the Irrawaddy from the Yenangyaung area down to Prome , while IV Corps (General Messervy ) was supposed to advance parallel across the main road directly to Rangoon.
Two days before the Dracula operation took place, the fleet bombed several ports and airfields and hired a Japanese troop carrier to transport more than a thousand Japanese troops to nearby Moulmein and sunk all ships. The Royal Air Force was made available in the form of two long-range fighters from the United States Army Air Forces, as well as eight B-24 Liberators and four B-25 Mitchell's .
course
The headquarters of the British-Indian XV in the Arakan area . Corps under General Sir Philip Christison had to organize the amphibious operation of the ground forces. India's 26th Division (Lieutenant General Chambers) and other forces sailed aboard six convoys of ships from the islands of Akyab and Ramree between April 27 and 30 . The naval cover consisted of a squadron of four escort carriers, two cruisers and four destroyers, and the 3rd battleship squadron under the command of Vice Admiral Harold Thomas Walker . The huge invasion fleet that gathered near the mouth of the Rangon River consisted of aircraft carriers, cruisers, destroyers and battleships and was covered by the Royal Air Force . To ensure that the amphibious elements remained undisturbed, the 21st Fleet Squadron (Commodore GN Oliver) was used as cover for the landings. The cover squadron consisted of two cruisers and four destroyers. Further out, the 3rd Fleet Squadron supported with two escort carriers (Empress and Shah), two battleships HMS Queen Elizabeth and Richelieu , as well as four cruisers (Cumberland, Suffolk, Ceylon, Tromp) and six destroyers . Another squadron under Captain AL Poland with three destroyers was responsible for the destruction of the most important Japanese evacuation convoy. The Royal Air Force 224 bomber group under Commodore Percy Bernard provided air protection for landings from their airfields at Toungoo and Ramree Island .
Before the landing could take place, the Japanese coastal fortifications on the banks of the river had to be turned off. Of particular concern was the presence of an artillery battery at Elephant Point on the west bank of the river. The typography of the area ensured the battery could not be destroyed by artillery fire or air strikes, and weather conditions prevented an early amphibious assault. So was also decided that a day before the implementation of the amphibious landing a parachute - Battalion depose near Elephant Point with the task of attack and destruction of the battery.
On May 1, at 5:45 a.m., a battalion of Gurkha paratroopers from 38 Dakota transport planes were deposited on the opposite bank of the river. Machines flying over the city saw the inscriptions “Japs Gone” and “Extract Digit” on the roof of the city prison. The commander of the 110th Air Squadron, Major AE Saunders landed with a mosquito at Mingaladon airfield and learned that the Japanese had left the city on April 29th. By May 3, 1945, the entire Indian 26th Division had landed in the port and occupied Rangoon.
Result
The success of Operation Dracula did not mean the immediate end of the war in Burma , but the resistance of the Japanese occupation was broken. Only two divisions of the Sakurai Army were able to make their way east to Sittang and offered resistance until the end of the war. Otherwise, Burma, the Japanese springboard for the advance into India planned in 1942, was finally lost. The Japanese troops, like their opponents, had fought uninterruptedly in harsh conditions for over three years and lost most of the losses in the jungle fight to fever and other diseases.
The Botataung Pagoda of Rangoon, which was destroyed in a failed Allied air raid in November 1943, was soon rebuilt. The city’s main train station, the largest in the country, was also rebuilt, while Rangon Central Prison, with its long wing wings, was demolished. Many of the former capital's colonial buildings, including the famous Secretariat building, were damaged but left intact for the infrastructure it needed. After the fall of Rangoon, Lord Mountbatten said in a daily order: "The liberation of Burma, not only marked by the successful implementation of the first stage of our advance, will also be the springboard for further and greater victories."
literature
- Janusz Piekałkiewicz : The Second World War , Econ Verlag Düsseldorf 1985, p. 1073
- Eddy Bauer: The Hell of Burma , Encyclopedia of the Second World War, Lectureama series, Rotterdam 1978, pp. 141–144
- Peter Young (Ed.): Atlas for the Second World War . Südwest Verlag, Munich 1974, p. 186 f.