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The U Go offensive, or Operation C (, U Gō sakusen), was the Japanese offensive launched in March 1944 against forces of the British Empire in the northeast Indian regions of Manipur and the Naga Hills (then administered as part of Assam). Aimed at the Brahmaputra Valley, through the towns of Imphal and Kohima, the offensive along with the overlapping Ha Go offensive was one of the last Japanese offensives during the Second World War. The offensive culminated in the Battles of Imphal and Kohima, where the Japanese and their allies were first held and then pushed back.
During the year and a half which followed, the Allies reconstructed the lines of communication to Assam, in north-east India. The United States Army (with large numbers of Indian labourers) constructed several airbases in Assam from which supplies were flown to the Nationalist Chinese government under Chiang Kai-shek and American airbases in China. This air route, which crossed several mountain ranges, was known as the Hump. The Americans also began constructing the Ledo Road, to be a land link from Assam to China. In mid-1943, the Japanese command in Burma had been reorganised. General Iida was posted back to Japan and a new headquarters, Burma Area Army, was created under Lieutenant-General Masakasu Kawabe. One of its subordinate formations, responsible for the central part of the front facing Imphal and Assam, was the Fifteenth Army, whose new commander was Lieutenant-General Renya Mutaguchi.
From the moment he took command, Mutaguchi forcefully advocated an invasion of India. Rather than seeking a mere tactical victory, he planned to exploit the capture of Imphal by advancing to the Brahmaputra Valley, thereby cutting the Allied supply lines to their front in northern Burma, and to the airfields supplying the Nationalist Chinese. His motives for doing so appear to be complex. In late 1942, when he was consulted by Lieutenant General Iida about the advisability of continuing the Japanese advance, he had been particularly vocal in his opposition, as the terrain appeared to be too difficult and the logistic problems seemed impossible to overcome. He had thought at the time that this plan originated at a local level, but was ashamed of his earlier caution when he found that Imperial Army HQ had originally advocated it.Allen (1984), pp. 152–153
Mutaguchi had played an important part in several Japanese victories, ever since the Marco Polo Bridge incident in 1937. He believed it was his destiny to win the decisive battle of the war for Japan. Mutaguchi was also goaded by the first Chindit long-range penetration expedition launched by the British under Orde Wingate early in 1943. Wingate's troops had traversed terrain which Mutaguchi had earlier claimed would be impassable to the 18th Division which he commanded at the time. The Allies had widely publicised the successful aspects of Wingate's expedition while concealing their losses to disease and exhaustion, misleading Mutaguchi and some of his staff as to the difficulties they would later face.
At subsequent exercises at Fifteenth Army's headquarters in Maymyo and at Southern Expeditionary Army Group's headquarters in Singapore, Lieutenant General Naka appeared to have been won over to Mutaguchi's ideas. Lieutenant General Inada was still opposed, but put forward to Kunomura and Major Iwaichi Fujiwara (one of Mutaguchi's staff officers) the apparently frivolous idea of attacking into the Chinese province of Yunnan instead. However, Inada was removed from Southern Expeditionary Army on 11 October 1943, after being made the scapegoat for failures to comply with an agreement to cede territories to Thailand which, under Field Marshal Plaek Pibulsonggram, was allied to Japan.Allen (1984), pp. 164–165
After another map exercise in Singapore on 23 December 1943, Field Marshal Hisaichi Terauchi (Commander in Chief of Southern Expeditionary Army Group) approved the plan. Inada's replacement, Lieutenant General Kitsuju Ayabe, was despatched to Imperial Army HQ to gain approval. Prime Minister Hideki Tōjō gave final sanction after questioning a staff officer over aspects of the plan from his bath.Allen (1984), p. 166 Once this decision was taken, neither Lieutenant General Kawabe nor Field Marshal Terauchi were given any opportunity to call off Mutaguchi's attack, codenamed U-GO or Operation C (ウ号作戦), nor to exercise much control over it once it was launched.
Bose was eager for the INA to participate in any invasion of India, and persuaded several Japanese that a victory such as Mutaguchi anticipated would lead to the collapse of British rule in India. The idea that their western boundary would be controlled by a more friendly government was attractive to the Japanese. It would also have been consistent with the idea that Japanese expansion into Asia was part of an effort to support Asian government of Asia and counter western colonialism.Syonan Sinbun, 26 January 1943Lebra, 1977, p. 20
The Japanese planned that a division from the Twenty-Eighth Army would launch a diversionary attack in the Arakan, codenamed Ha Go, in the first week of February. This would attract Allied reserves from Assam, and also create the impression that the Japanese intended to attack Bengal through Chittagong.
In the centre, Mutaguchi's Fifteenth Army would launch the main attack into Manipur in the first week in March, aiming to capture Imphal and Kohima, scattering British forces and forestalling any offensive movements against Burma. In detail, the Fifteenth Army plans were:
At the insistence of Bose, two brigades from the Indian National Army were also assigned to the attacks on Imphal from the south and east. The Japanese had originally intended using the INA as auxiliaries to their forces only, for reconnaissance and propaganda.Allen (1984), p. 170
The staff at Burma Area Army had originally thought this plan too risky. They believed it was unwise to separate the attacking forces so widely, but several officers who were vocal in their opposition were transferred.Allen, (1984), pp. 159–162 Mutaguchi's divisional commanders were also pessimistic. They thought that Mutaguchi was gambling too heavily on gaining early success to solve supply problems. Some of them thought him a "blockhead", or reckless.
From various intelligence sources, Slim and Lieutenant General Geoffry Scoones (commanding Indian IV Corps) had learned of the general intentions of the Japanese to launch an offensive, although they did not have specific information on the Japanese objectives and were to be surprised several times when the Japanese did launch their attacks. Rather than anticipate the Japanese by attacking across the Chindwin, or trying to defend the line of the river itself, Slim intended to exploit known Japanese logistical weaknesses by withdrawing into Imphal to fight a defensive battle where the Japanese would be unable to supply their troops.Allen (1984), p. 155
During April, the Japanese attacks against the defences at the edge of the Imphal plain were all held. In May, IV Corps began a counter-offensive, pushing northward to link up with a relieving force fighting its way southward from Kohima. Although the Allied progress was slow, the Japanese 15th Division was forced to withdraw through lack of supply, and the Allies reopened the Kohima–Imphal road on 22 June, ending the siege (although the Japanese continued to mount attacks from the south and east of Imphal).
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