We saw in Chapter 1 how the defeats of 1942 reminded the British that they had to be able to dominate the countryside surrounding their defensive positions in considerable depth if they were to defeat Japanese outflanking tactics. If defences were cut off, they had to be sustained for possibly prolonged periods, while reserves counterattacked to break the encirclement, destroying the enemy in the process. Static, linear defence relying on fixed LofC was a hopeless invitation to being cut off and destroyed. Subsequent operations on the Arakan coast over the winter of 1942–3 confirmed that lesson once again and demonstrated also that frontal attacks on Japanese fortifications were most unlikely to succeed. The Japanese proved to be extremely skilled and tenacious in defence. Their positions were usually sited on reverse slopes, where they were protected from observation and direct fire from the front whilst being able to engage attacking troops from the side or rear when they had passed out of sight of their own direct covering fire. They were placed to give mutual support so that no single emplacement could be assaulted without the enemy coming under fire from other positions. They were invariably well camouflaged and strongly built, with up to three feet of logs and soil for overhead cover to protect their occupants from artillery or air attack. If over-run, the Japanese would call artillery or mortar fire onto their own positions to kill the attackers in the open, while the defenders were protected by their earthworks. They invariably had quick counter-attack plans worked out in advance. Unless they could be overwhelmed from the front by sheer weight of numbers and firepower, which was a rare occurrence, such well-defended positions had to be outflanked and attacked from the rear. Alternatively, or in addition, the Japanese LofC had to be severed so that they would have to withdraw or counter-attack the road block, hopefully in disadvantageous circumstances. That, of course, was precisely how the Japanese had overcome British defences in 1942 but the Japanese eventually proved to be just as vulnerable to such methods when the British finally mastered them. These encircling manoeuvres, however, involved long cross-country marches, sometimes in the order of 100 miles or more, without motor transport or overland LofC.