There, he developed an interest in guerrilla tactics and personally found them to be preferable to being part of infantry assaults. By early 1945, Hilsman was considered, as Detachment 101 commander William R. Peers later stated, to be one of a number of the guerillas' "good... junior officers, every one outstanding and experienced." Hilsman's group made hit-and-run attacks on Japanese forces and kept a Japanese regiment ten times its size occupied far from the front lines, all while waging its own battle with the ever-present leeches and other insects and various diseases. In one particular engagement in May 1945, Hilsman led a mixed company of Kachins, Burmese, and Karens in staging successful raids in the area between Lawksawk and Taunggyi that culminated in a carefully-orchestrated ambush that caused a hundred casualties among the Japanese at no cost to the guerillas. Hilsman wanted to deploy his unit farther south into the Inle Lake area but was constrained by orders to help hold the road between Taunggyi and Kengtung.