From 3 to 16 April, the Japanese attempted to capture Kohima ridge, a feature which dominated the road by which the besieged British and Indian troops of IV Corps at Imphal were supplied.

The commander of the Japanese Fifteenth Army, Lieutenant General Renya Mutaguchi, enlarged the plan to invade India itself and perhaps even overthrow the British Raj.

[8][Note 1] If the Japanese were able to gain a strong foothold in India they would demonstrate the weakness of the British Empire and provide encouragement to Indian nationalists in their decolonization efforts.

Mutaguchi wished to exploit the capture of Kohima by pushing the 31st Division on to Dimapur, the vital railhead and logistic base in the Brahmaputra River valley.

[16] Starting on 15 March 1944, the Japanese 31st Division crossed the Chindwin River[17] near Homalin and moved north-west along jungle trails on a front almost 60 miles (97 km) wide.

The parachute brigade's troops were desperately short of drinking water,[20] but Miyazaki was handicapped by lack of artillery until near the end of the battle.

[1][23][Note 3] Slim knew that there were few fighting troops, as opposed to soldiers in line-of-communication units and supporting services, in Kohima and none at all at the vital base of Dimapur 30 miles (48 km) to the north.

[30] Early in March, the 23rd Long Range Penetration Brigade was removed from Major General Orde Wingate's Chindit force, and was dispatched by rail from around Lalaghat to Jorhat, 50 miles (80 km) north of Dimapur, where they could threaten the flank of any Japanese attack on the base.

[1] North of the ridge lay the densely inhabited area of Naga Village, crowned by Treasury Hill,[1] and Church Knoll (Baptist and other Christian missionaries had been active in Nagaland over the preceding half century).

[25] Slim also feared that the Japanese might leave only a detachment to contain the garrison of Kohima while the main body of the 31st Division moved by tracks to the east to attack Dimapur.

Satō unwillingly dispatched a battalion of the 138th Regiment but a few hours later Mutaguchi's superior, Lieutenant General Masakasu Kawabe commanding Burma Area Army, vetoed the move.

)[43] As the right wing and centre of the Japanese 31st Division approached Jessami, over 80 miles (130 km) by road to the east of Kohima, elements of the Assam Regiment fought delaying actions against them commencing on 1 April.

They had artillery support from the main body of 161st Brigade, who were themselves cut off 2 miles (3.2 km) away at Jotsoma, but, as at Sangshak, they were very short of drinking water.

The tennis court became a no man's land, with the Japanese and the defenders of Kohima dug in on opposite sides, so close to each other that grenades were thrown between the trenches.

After a day's heavy fighting, the leading troops of the Brigade (1st Battalion, 1st Punjab Regiment) broke through and started to relieve the Kohima garrison.

[52] By this point, Kohima resembled a battlefield from the First World War, with smashed trees, ruined buildings and the ground covered in craters.

[54] 6th Brigade observers were taken aback by the condition of the garrison; one battle hardened officer commented: "They looked like aged, bloodstained scarecrows, dropping with fatigue; the only clean thing about them was their weapons, and they smelt of blood, sweat and death.

"[55] Miyazaki continued to try to capture Garrison Hill, and there was heavy fighting for this position for several more nights, with high casualties on both sides.

[56] On the other flank of Garrison Hill, on the night of 26/27 April, a British attack recaptured the clubhouse above the Deputy Commissioner's bungalow, which overlooked most of the Japanese centre.

[67] Both outflanking moves having failed because of the terrain and the weather, the British 2nd Division concentrated on attacking the Japanese positions along Kohima Ridge from 4 May onwards.

[72] The 7th Indian Infantry Division, commanded by Major General Frank Messervy, was arriving piecemeal by road and rail from the Arakan.

The Japanese had mounted two resupply missions, using captured jeeps to carry supplies forward from the Chindwin to 31st Division, but they brought mainly artillery and anti-tank ammunition, rather than food.

He considered that Mutaguchi and the HQ of Japanese Fifteenth Army were taking little notice of his situation, as they had issued several confusing and contradictory orders to him during April.

Satō considered that Fifteenth Army headquarters were issuing unrealistic orders to his division without proper planning or consideration for the conditions.

[87] After Satō was removed from command, he refused an invitation to commit seppuku and demanded a court martial to clear his name and make his complaints about Fifteenth Army HQ public.

[90] The huge losses the Japanese suffered in the Battles of Imphal and Kohima (mainly through starvation and disease) crippled their defence of Burma against Allied attacks during the following year.

[96] The aerial resupply of Kohima was part of an effort that, at its height, delivered around 500 tons of supplies per day to Allied forces in the theatre.

[97] At the sieges of both Kohima and Imphal, the Allies relied entirely on resupply from the air by British and American aircraft[98] flying from India until the road from the railhead at Dimapur was cleared.

At Kohima, due to the narrow ridgelines, accuracy in the dropping of air delivered logistics proved to be a considerable problem and as the fighting intensified and the defended area decreased, the task became harder and more dangerous.

It reads:[111][112] When you go home, tell them of us and say,For your tomorrow, we gave our todayThe verse is attributed to John Maxwell Edmonds (1875–1958), and is thought to have been inspired by the epitaph written by Simonides to honour the Spartans who fell at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC.