Battle Story Read online

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Acknowledgements

  List of Illustrations

  Introduction

  Timeline

  Historical Background

  The Armies

  The British Defence

  The Japanese Army

  The Days Before Battle

  The Battlefield: What Actually Happened?

  A Desperate Situation

  First Action

  A Force Divided

  A Stout Defence

  Retreats

  Relentless

  Last Stand

  Surrender

  After the Battle

  Fruits of Victory?

  Prisoners of War

  Occupation

  Final Effects

  The Legacy

  Orders of Battle

  Further Reading

  Copyright

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I have been interested in this battle since I was a boy living in Singapore in the mid-1960s when the campaign was still very fresh in the collective consciousness of the community. The events had occurred only twenty years previously. Although that seemed very distant to a child of 7 or 8, most of the adult population had lived through the Japanese occupation and the memory was regularly refreshed by the frequent discoveries of bodies when new building projects were breaking ground. This book does not aim to provide the reader with a definitive, detailed blow-by-blow account of the battles that occurred in February 1942; that would require a volume of several hundred pages. The intention is to provide an outline of the historical, economic and military environment surrounding the campaign.

  As ever, writing this book would have been impossible without the support and encouragement of my wife, Pat, and my son, Robert, who has saved me from several computer disasters. I would also like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to my parents, Revd Peter and Mrs Margaret Brown, to Robert and Rosina Walker of Dunfermline for their kindness, generosity and general interest in my well-being when I was a teenager, and to Jo de Vries of The History Press for her remarkable patience.

  LIST OF

  ILLUSTRATIONS

  1. Scottish company of the Federated Malay States Volunteers. (Malayan Volunteers Association)

  2. Wartime medical pannier, possibly issued to the Federated Malay States Volunteers. (Author’s collection)

  3. A pre-war elevated bungalow in the Singapore naval base. (Author’s collection)

  4. Lt Gen. Percival with war correspondents shortly before capitulation in Singapore, late January 1942.

  5. Lt Gen. Percival on arrival in Singapore as the new GOC Malaya.

  6. HMS Prince of Wales.

  7. Lt Gen. Sir Lewis Heath.

  8. Indian mountain gunners in training.

  9. Battlefield Archaeology. A Cambridgeshire Regiment cap badge recovered by Glasgow University’s Adam Park Project. (Jon Cooper)

  10. Battlefield Archaeology. Glasgow University is conducting The Adam Park Project (TAPP) excavating an area where the Cambridgeshire Regiment was in action. (Jon Cooper)

  11. Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders in training.

  12. Lt Gen. Percival and Maj. Gen. Bennett.

  13. The Vickers machine gun was the standard for all Commonwealth countries. This one in use in Malaya, December 1941.

  14. A Bren light machine gun on a tripod mount; a rare configuration. (Joost J. Bakker)

  15. Japanese anti-tank rifle. Developed in the First World War, anti- tank rifles were largely obsolete before 1941, but were capable of penetrating the light armour of the few Allied armoured cars in Malaya. (Author’s collection)

  16. Battlefield Archaeology. An example of the Japanese anti-tank rifle in illustration 15. The tropical climate means that most material degrades very quickly. (Author’s collection)

  17. 25-pounder field guns at Sentosa, Singapore. (Author’s collection)

  18. Rubber plantation. The endless rows of trees had a depressing effect on many troops. (Author’s collection)

  19. A speeding Ha-Go Type 95 tank.

  20. Pre-war concrete emplacement for a 9.2in gun. (Author’s collection)

  21. Waxwork effigy of a Japanese soldier with an Arisaka rifle at the Siloso Fort Museum, Singapore.

  22. Japanese machine-gun crew.

  23. Riflemen with the Arisaka rifle.

  24. The Japanese knee mortar grenade launcher.

  25. Making gas masks in Singapore.

  26. Hawker Hurricane Mk IIC. (Ad Meskens)

  27. A long-wrecked Japanese Zero fighter plane of the Second World War. (Bartosz Cieslak)

  28. The rescue of Force Z survivors, 10 December 1941.

  29. An Imperial Japanese Navy Mitsubishi G4M ‘Betty’ bomber.

  30. Yamashita and Percival discussing surrender, 15 February 1942.

  31. Coastal gun emplacement, Sentosa, Singapore. (Author’s collection)

  32. British optical range finder as issued to coastal artillery positions for identifying hostile ships, but for when the threat would come overland rather than from the sea. (Author’s collection)

  33. A 15in coastal gun on Singapore.

  34. Japanese infantry storm into Johore Bahru.

  35. Typical pre-war ‘atap’ house of the kind found in kampongs (villages) the length and breadth of Malaya and Singapore. (Author’s collection)

  36. Typical pre-war shop-houses of the kind found throughout Malaya and Singapore. (Author’s collection)

  37. Restored 6in gun position at the excellent Siloso Fort Museum, Sentosa, Singapore. (Author’s collection)

  38. Forest and mountain terrain in eastern Malaya. (Author’s collection)

  39. A jungle creek. Although few Japanese soldiers had received any jungle-warfare training, they proved adept at infiltrating Allied positions by following small streams like this one in western Singapore. (Author’s collection)

  40. Gen. Wavell in Singapore inspecting coastal guns, November 1941.

  41. The Japanese victory parade in Fullerton Square, Singapore, 17 February 1942.

  42. Lt Gen. Percival and party en route to surrender Singapore to the Japanese.

  43. Rice country in eastern Malaya. Far from being covered by ‘impenetrable jungle’, a great deal of 1940s Malaya was agricultural land. (Author’s collection)

  44. One British pre-war banknote and three Japanese ‘Occupation’ currency banknotes. The Japanese banknotes lost their value very quickly during the occupation years. (Author’s collection)

  Maps

  Malaya/Singapore Island. Location of military formations, airfields and air force units, 8 December 1941.

  Withdrawal to Singapore.

  Singapore Island dispositions.

  Assault on Singapore.

  Operations of 10 February 1942.

  Operations of 11 February 1942.

  Singapore town.

  INTRODUCTION

  The campaign in Malaya and the resulting fall of Singapore in February 1942 was not simply a product of the outbreak of the Second World War. A rising population and a stagnating economic base undermined the credibility of the imperial government and made war a possible means of ensuring stability at home and enhancing the status of Japan abroad, but Japan’s road to war was not simply a matter of seizing an opportunity; it was also a product of being brought into the industrial age.

  In 1549 Portuguese explorers landed at Tanegashima and were followed six years later by a Jesuit mission. Catholicism proved to be popular, but eventually the missions were seen as a troublesome influence and a threat to Japanese culture. By the 1620s Catholicism had been completely suppressed and for the next 200 years and more Japan maintained a policy of virtual isolation from the rest of the world. The period of Sakoku (
exclusion) lasted until 1853, when an American naval force under Commodore Perry entered Yokohama. Throughout the 1850s Japan was forced to accept unequal treaties with the United States and various European powers. If Japan was to be able to protect herself from foreign pressure and interference, she needed to develop a strong national government and a powerful navy.

  The first major modern warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy was the Jo Sho Maru. She was designed by Thomas Blake Glover, built at Aberdeen and delivered on 8 May 1870. This was the beginning of a long naval relationship between Britain and Japan; indeed an imperial decree of 1870 stipulated that the Royal Navy should be the model for the future development of the Imperial Navy. Japan flirted with the creation of a major navy throughout the 1870s, mounting expeditions to Taiwan and Korea.

  Her naval development stalled due to a series of internal conflicts, but by the 1880s she had acquired several British- and French-built warships. The rise of Japan as maritime power in East Asia allowed her to force her will on China and Korea, and to make Taiwan a colony. In 1904 Japan went to war with Russia, decisively winning the great naval battle of Tsushima and confirming her status as a rising power at sea. Six years later Japan formally annexed Korea, an action that drew some criticism but no action from the rest of the world. Strange as it may seem now, this was not so very remarkable in 1910. European powers had already carved out colonies in Africa and Asia; why should Japan not do the same?

  In August 1914 Britain sought Japanese aid against German commerce raiders operating around the coast of China, and Japan formally declared war on Germany on 23 August. Through the course of the war Japan extended her influence in China and undertook several operations against German possessions, forcing the surrender of Tsingtao and launching the first ever aerial bombardment from ships.

  From a Japanese perspective, supporting the Entente Allies (Britain, France and America) in the First World War had not brought them either respect or power. Japanese industry flourished in the war years, but her market share dwindled thereafter. The ensuing recession was to become a major factor in promoting a form of ultra-nationalist militarism and driving an ambition to form an empire in Asia which could provide her with raw materials and a captive market. The terms of the Washington Conference on arms limitation struck a blow at national self-respect by limiting Japanese warship construction, which in turn impaired the viability of her shipbuilding industry. This caused unemployment that was blamed on the Washington Conference powers, though in fact Japan was struggling economically anyway.

  The expansion of the Japanese Empire took a further step in September 1931 with the invasion of Manchuria. In due course a puppet state – Manchukuo – was erected, headed by the last Emperor of China, Pu-Yi. Unlike the invasion of Korea in 1910, the Manchurian campaign provoked some reaction around the world and prompted the League of Nations to send a commission of inquiry. Reports of atrocities against civilians and prisoners, though dismissed as fabrications by Japan, were widely accepted elsewhere, and in February 1933 Japan resigned from the League of Nations in protest against criticism of her actions in Manchuria.

  At the start of the Second World War Britain, France, the Netherlands and the United States controlled the majority of South East Asia; even Portugal retained colonies at Macau and East Timor.

  The German conquest of France and the Netherlands in 1940 made their colonies in what are now Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Indonesia very vulnerable since there was no longer any prospect of support from the home country. The perilous situation of Britain had similar implications for Malaya, Singapore, Hong Kong and Burma. The weakness of the colonial powers was an important factor in deciding the direction and timing of Japan’s incredibly daring series of offensives in December 1941, but in fact she was already at war in China. In a sense, she was simply opening several new fronts at once.

  Initially, the emphasis had been on the annexation of Manchuria; the provocative actions that sparked expansion into China were manufactured by the Imperial Army as what we might call ‘private enterprise’, though at the time the military was the dominant force in all aspects of Japanese political life.

  International reaction to the Sino-Japanese war was both a direct and indirect factor in taking Japan to war with the colonial powers. Various trade sanctions, most significantly in relation to oil and scrap metal from America, had a detrimental effect on the economy and were perceived, perhaps understandably, as insulting since no European power would have been treated in the same way. At the same time, it further separated Japan from the wider political and diplomatic community. Even so, whilst all of the issues that arose in the 1920s and 1930s contributed to the invasions of 1941, the real foundations of what Japanese historians call the Great East Asian War or the Pacific War had been laid long before.

  TIMELINE

  1933 Japan annexes Manchuria and leaves the League of Nations.

  1934 Japan disregards the existing disarmament treaties.

  1935 Japan withdraws from the London Naval Conference to pursue developing a larger navy than that allowed by the Washington Conference.

  1937 Japan invades China and seizes Nanking, where Japanese troops commit widespread atrocities on the inhabitants.

  1939 Completion of the Singapore naval base at Sembawang.

  1940 Japan forces the pro-Vichy government of French Indo-China to accept Japanese troops and airfields.

  1941

  2 December Japanese naval units ordered to move to their positions for the attacks on Hawaii, Malaya, Thailand and Hong Kong.

  6 December Japanese transport ships are seen approaching Malaya.

  7 December The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor sinks or damages eight US battleships and destroys nearly 200 aircraft.

  7/8 December At night, Singapore subjected to air raids killing 200 people and damaging the RAF airfields at Tengah and Seletar.

  8 December Hong Kong attacked overland through the ‘New Territories’ and Japanese landing takes place to the north of Kota Bahru in north-east Malaya.

  10 December HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse sunk by Japanese torpedo bombers operating from French Indo-China (modern-day Vietnam); Albert ‘Duff’ Cooper appointed as Resident Minister for Far Eastern Affairs.

  11/12 December British and Indian troops are defeated at Jitra in northern Malaya.

  14/15 December British and Indian troops are defeated at Gurun, forcing the evacuation of the state of Kedah.

  16/17 December Penang evacuated.

  25 December Hong Kong falls to the Japanese.

  1942

  3 January Arrival of 45th Indian Brigade in Singapore, the first body of reinforcements since the start of the campaign.

  7 January British and Indian forces are defeated at Slim River.

  11 January Kuala Lumpur falls to the Japanese.

  15 January General Wavell assumes command of the ABDA (American, British, Dutch and Australian) forces in the south-west Pacific.

  26 January General Heath issues instructions for the withdrawal of III Corps from Johore to Singapore Island through the night of 31 January/1 February.

  27 January Percival receives permission to withdraw all Malaya Command troops to Singapore at his discretion.

  31 January/1 February Withdrawal to Singapore completed and part of the causeway destroyed.

  7/8 February Japanese troops seize Pulau Ubin in the Johore Strait.

  8 February First Japanese troops land on Singapore Island.

  15 February Percival holds his final conference at Fort Canning and decides to surrender.

  HISTORICAL

  BACKGROUND

  As one of the Allies during the First World War, Japan had some right to feel that she had not benefitted from the spoils of victory. Other than a few marginal gains from the defunct German Empire, Japan had little to show for her involvement in the greatest war of all time. Although her direct participation had been much less of a burden than that of France, Britain or the United States, Japan’
s contribution was not marginal. Her extensive naval assets had been deployed throughout the Pacific, the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean. They had thus relieved the British and the French – and to a lesser extent the Americans – from the task of protecting Far Eastern trade routes from German commerce raiders and therefore allowed production and export to continue with little interruption.

  The diplomatic arrangements that emerged after 1919 did nothing to assuage Japanese sentiment. The arms control policies agreed at the Washington Conference put severe constraints on the construction of major warships, particularly battleships, which were still seen as the prime weapon at sea. Events would show that the nature of naval warfare had changed, and that the future of naval warfare really lay with the bombs and torpedoes that could be deployed from an aircraft carrier rather than the massive guns of battleships, but this was not yet apparent in the 1920s. Even so, the fact that under the Washington Conference agreement Japan was limited to having only a proportion of the number of major warships allowed to either Britain, France or the United States was, understandably, seen as insulting. Although the other Allies could reasonably argue that they had commitments all round the world whereas Japan’s interests were largely focused on the Pacific, there was a clear implication that the Western Allies had combined to ensure that Japan was to be restricted to being a second-tier maritime power.

  ABDA

  ABDA stood for America, British, Dutch and Australian Command and was an attempt to unify and co-ordinate the war efforts of the various Allies against the Japanese Empire. The ABDA project was abandoned once it became evident that denying Malaya and the Dutch East Indies to the Japanese was beyond the capabilities of the forces available.

  This was particularly galling in relation to Britain and France, since a significant part of their justification for having large fleets was their need to protect their colonial and imperial interests, some of which – and a commercially significant proportion at that – lay in South Asia. Like Japan, France and Britain were primarily manufacturing economies with banking and insurance sectors that were built on their overseas trade. That trade, in turn, depended on the position of enterprises that could enjoy a preferential position on the markets of British and French colonies. Imperialist expansion gave Britain, France and the Netherlands a stranglehold on the exports of South Asia, but also gave them a more or less captive market. Japanese expansion in Korea and Manchuria was more focused on acquiring raw materials that could be consumed at home or be turned into finished products for export around the world than on building markets within the imperial domain, but the emperor’s government saw no good reason why Japan should not enjoy the power, privileges and prestige of acquiring a network of colonial possessions. If it was good enough for the British, the French and the Dutch, it was good enough for Japan. The role of the United States in South Asia might seem a little different superficially, since there was no intention to retain the Philippines as a permanent, formal colony, but that probably seemed to be a distinction without a difference in Tokyo.