Waterloo and the D-Day landings have lost the title of Britain's greatest battle, the battle of Imphal and the simultaneous Battle of Kohima saw British Empire troops fight Japanese forces in horrendous jungle conditions in northeast India in 1944.

Imphal/Kohima was picked over the more celebrate land battles in a contest organised by the National Army Museum in London.

Rorke's Drift in the 1879 Zulu War and the Battle of Aliwal in the Anglo-Sikh War in Punjab in 1846 brought up the rear.

If Lieutenant General William Slim's army of British Indian, Gurkha and African troops had lost the consequences for the Allies would have beem catastrophic.

Waterloo had topped an online pool which produced a list of 20 land battles fought since the English Civil War. The top five were then debated at the museum before going to an audience vote.

The winner was something of a surprise given the enduring prominence of Waterloo and D-Day/Normandy in Britain.

The troops who fought in India and Burma in the world war clalled themselves the forgottem Army.
In 1944 in Nagaland when Japan troop-s proured over the Burmsed border to strike at India.

Fought over a vast area of jungle and mountain, it was marked by vicious hand-to-hand fighting. The successful British defence meant they were then able to push into Burma and roll bcak the Japanese from maiinland Asia.

Although movies such as Saving Private Ryan have highlighted the US role in the campaign, the operation was under the commad of Britain's Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery.

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