The Forgotten Highlander: An Incredible WWII Story of Survival in the Pacific

"This book is a real page-turner and brings the visceral human cost of the war in the Far East to the fore. As I said, the way I got into the history was by reading memoirs and personal stories. I saw an interview with Alistair on TV, years and years ago and I remember thinking, ‘Wow, what an incredible man.’ Urquhart survived the sinking of the ship he was on, worked on the Thai-Burma Railway , and ended up as a prisoner of war near Nagasaki. All these key events in the war against Japan—and this man was there. His descriptions are very harrowing in parts, but not in a gratuitous way. It’s just an honest man talking about what he experienced. For me, it really clarified that the war in Southeast Asia was not a sideshow. It covered a vast area. In my opinion, it was the most brutal theatre of the war Britain fought in because of the Japanese ideology. For the Japanese, to be taken prisoner of war was a fate worse than death, so they treated any prisoners that they took with contempt. Alistair’s writing and his recollections really underline that. It helps me to understand why the Japanese army fought the way it did. And the title, The Forgotten Highlander, links back to what we were discussing, about the men of the 14th Army feeling completely overshadowed by the troops who fought in Europe. It’s amazing. It’s a survival story. One thing that sticks in my mind from the book is when he talks about coming home to Scotland . He found sitting down and having meals with his family incredibly difficult. He was so pleased to be home but had this feeling of, ‘I can’t possibly explain what I’ve seen, what I’ve been through. We’re sitting here having a Sunday dinner and talking about the weather, but I’m still living with these horrors.’ That’s something that is true of all warfare—whether it’s Burma or Afghanistan . So the human story is the reason I picked this as one of the books that people should read if they want to understand more about the war in Asia."