Ring of Fire - Australian Guerrilla Operations against the Japanese in World War II

The author was a member of the Special Commando Forces on Timor. This is the story of the 2/2nd and 2/4th Independent Companies who fought the Japanese in Timor, inflicting casualties far in excess of their number, and showing the usefulness of guerrilla forces against a numerically superior enemy. While all other forces in Asia had been destroyed by the Japanese, the Australian Commandos were the sole Allied unit to remain undefeated. In February 1942, They formed part of Sparrow force which was over run by the Japanese invasion of Timor. Sparrow Force then conducted a guerilla war from the Timor mountains . The Japanese landed 6000 experienced troops ( elements of the 48th and 5th Divisions) in Portuguese Timor, only 600 kilometres north of Darwin. They were opposed by 300 civilian-soldier Australians comprising the 2/2 Independent Company who fought a guerrila war in the mountains and at a crucial time in the war for the Allies, immobilized over 30,000 Japenese troops.