MacArthur's division fought its way twenty miles up the railway through entrenched Filipino lines to Malolos, the capital of the First Philippine Republic. Aguinaldo's government evacuated north rather than be trapped; retreating troops set the presidential quarters ablaze. The Americans marched into a burning, nearly empty city on March 31.
The fall of the Republic's capital was meant to end the war at a stroke. Instead it proved the pattern of the whole conventional phase: the Americans could take any position they attacked, but the Republic's government and army simply withdrew deeper into Luzon.
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In one of the war's most celebrated Biafran tactical victories, a column of Nigerian federal forces advancing along the Onitsha-Enugu road was ambushed by Biafran forces using the locally-invented 'Ogbunigwe' directional mine — a weapon improvised by Biafran engineers from scrap metal and explosives. The lead vehicle was destroyed, and the ambush detonated fuel trucks, causing a catastrophic chain reaction that destroyed the entire column. Hundreds of Nigerian soldiers were killed.
Abagana demonstrated Biafran ingenuity in the face of crushing material disadvantage. The Ogbunigwe mine — invented by Biafran scientists working in improvised laboratories — was a remarkable technical achievement. The battle's fame also boosted Biafran morale at a moment when the military situation was otherwise dire, and became a symbol of Igbo scientific ingenuity under siege.
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