“The strength of the Japanese Army lay, not in its higher leadership which once its career of success had been checked became confused, nor in its special aptitude for jungle warfare, but in the spirit of the individual Japanese soldier. He fought and marched till he died. If five hundred Japanese were ordered to hold a position, we had to kill four hundred and ninety-five before it was ours- and then the last five had killed themselves. It was this combination of obedience and ferocity that made the Japanese Army, whatever its condition, so formidable, and which would make any army formidable. It would make a European army invincible.”

—  William Slim, 1st Viscount Slim

Source: Defeat Into Victory (1961), p. 447

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William Slim, 1st Viscount Slim 6
former Governor-General of Australia 1891–1970

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