Aerial photo of bombing raid on Surabaya, Eastern Java, April 1944. (Photo: US Navy, National Archives, Washington, DC.) The mouth of the Kali Mas canalised river is visbile at the right-hand side. The ill-fated 49 Indian Infantry Brigade disembarked on the North side of the inner harbour in October 1945 . They would lose 427 men in three days in ferocious, last-man-stands with Indonesian nationalists in what was the 'first' Battle of Surabaya, making it the first post-Second World War defeat for British forces (as portrayed in Merdeka Rising, part two of Black Sun Red Moon: A Novel of Java). Britain retaliated on 10 November with air strikes and a naval bombardment of the city prior to a landing by 5 Indian Division, which took the city after three weeks of fighting in a 'second' Battle of Surabaya. Surabayans celebrate the defence of their city on 10 November as Hari Pahlawan or Heroes' Day. Gun-camera (16m) footage of this (or a similar) raid can be seen on YouTube (see '1944 Air Raid on Soerabaja, Java'. (All official US Navy WWII photographs and film footage is in the Public Domain.)