Chindit: The inside story of one of World War Two's most dramatic behind-the-lines operations

Description

The first personal account of the 1944 operations in Burma to be published, this reprint resurrects the extraordinary story of the Chindits. 1943. Major-General Orde Wingate startles the military world by commanding a daring raid in the heart of Japanese-occupied Burma. But this was just the beginning. In the following year, Wingate spearheaded an even more ambitious operation, flying 10,000 men and 1,000 animals behind Japanese lines to disrupt communications and harass the Japanese forces. With close tactical support from Colonel Philip Cochran, Chindit was the name given to these operations and the men who made them happen. This is their story, told by one man who was at the heart of it all. Cipher officer Richard Rhodes James tells the story of the preparations in central India, the flights deep into enemy territory and the campaign of guerrilla operations that followed. Taking the reader through the remote wilds of the jungle, showing the parching heat and the relentless rain that these men experienced, Rhodes James paints a detailed portrait of a band of brothers fighting for survival.

Rhichard Rhodes James was born in Mandalay, Burma, in 1921, one of five children of an Indian Army officer. After his education in England, he returned to India in 1942 and joined the 3rd Gurkha Rifles. After the Chindit operations, in which he was mentioned in dispatches, he went on the expedition to repossess Malaya from the Japanese, ending the Second World War in Java.