Heres a Question about the Pacific War?

Question

A Japanese soldiers novel;'After the main force had crossed the gorge,they blew the suspension bridge.The thousands who trailed behind were left to die.We were at the end of the line.Soldiers who had sruggled along before us littered both sides of the trail.It was a dreadful sight.Some were already skeletons,it was so hot that they soon rotted.The dead bodies became road markers.I came to feel the Australian Military was very strong indeed.Our reinforced 78 th Regiment had sailed from Pusan with 7,000 men only 67 survived,of my own 261 man company i was the only one to board a transport ship to Japan,I was told that of 170,000 men who went only 10,000 returned home'..........which campaign was this Japanese soldier talking about:(1) Solomon Islands(2)China(3)Burma (4)Okinawa (5)New Guinea(6)Iwo Jima

The only Aussies in the Solomons were local coastwatchers but they provided valuable intelligence and have their name in the hall of fame as they rescued a P.T. boat commander by the name of J.F.K. believe it or not?

Answer 1

Without doing any research just a guess, but as you mention Australian Army, I would say its New Guinea, Australians were not on Iwo Jima, Okinawa and I do not think they were in China, they might have been in Burma as that was a more British Affair.

Whats the name of the book ? and to be honest I have zero sympathy for the japs. You should read what they did to allied prisoners building the railroad through burma

Answer 2

Paddy Range has one of the best answers although there were several I liked.
Certainly it was Papua New Guinea, and most likely the Kokoda Track. This was the first defeat by any nation of the Japanese.
Australians were in Malaya and were the first to repel the Japanese, in any major action, along with some Indian and Gloustershire Regiment troops of the British Army.
Australians fought a large number of battles throughout PNG and were also in the Solomon Islands, Borneo and Timor. There were a very small number of Australians in Burma with the British. General MacArthur restricted the area the Australians fought in as they showed up the lack of training of the US army soldiers.

China only had Chinese and American soldiers, both commanded by the American General (Vinegar) Joe Stillwell who fought a lot in Burma.

Answer 3

Just from reasoning the answer would be New Guinea; it was mostly an Australian Army fight though U.S. Army troops were there also. China had few outside troops there-mostly Chinese with a few others, Burma was primarily British Army and Indian troops and the others listed were primarily U.S. Marines. Google it and you find the 78th was part of the 20th Imperial Japanese Division in New Guinea after being transferred from the 30th in China.

Answer 4

Probably New Guinea. That was the battle which convinced the Japanese that the Aussie Diggers were a fierce foe. Three of the other sites you mention were mostly U.S. operations. Burma was a British operation and didn't involve a lot of troops from commonwealth countries. In the case of China, only air assets from non-Asian countries were involved until nearly the end of the war.

Answer 5

That would have to be New Guinea. A terrible story! I've seen actual military footage of the Burma Road, to add to the previous reply.

Answer 6

Was that Ogawa Masatsugu's book 'the green desert'? The Japanese had a saying"Burma is hell,from New Guinea no one returns alive" so i would say New Guinea, 148,000 Japanese dead or missing( more died from starvation than in actual combat).