On 15th February 1942, Singapore, the bastion of the British Empire in the Far East, had fallen. It was the blackest day in the records of British military history. The Malayan Campaign that lasted 70 days of struggle without respite was also the only war that took place in Malaya. Fifty thousand Indian, twenty seven thousand British and eighteen thousand Australian soldiers became prisoners of war [1] .
Within five months from the outbreak of war in the Far East, Japan had overrun the South East Asia countries, half of New Guinea, the Marshall and Solomon groups, all the minor isles of the Dutch East Indies and the Andaman. The Japanese had defeated the British and American navies in the naval battles off Malaya and Pearl Harbour. Japan controlled the strategic islands of Hong Kong, Wake and Guam and she was in a position to directly threaten Australia and India. If not because of the Atomic bombing in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Japanese might have extended their invasion towards Australia and West Asia. These were brilliant achievements on the part of Japan, and correspondingly heavy losses for Britain, America and Holland. The Malayan Campaign makes it a thought provoking study by military professionals and the like, in terms of strategies and tactics adopted.
The paper seeks to provide a critical analysis on the conduct of the Malayan Campaign leading to the fall of Singapore.
In analysing the conduct of the Malayan Campaign, three areas will be covered; the preparation, the conduct and the post conflict strategic implications on both sides of the conflicting and warring parties. The focus of this paper will be in the following areas:
a. The causes of the conflict and the strategic options available prior to the conduct of the campaign from both sides.
b. The strategic level decision-making process from both sides. The British defence and the Japanese offence preparations.
c. The execution of strategies adopted and the reasons for failures or successes from both sides.
The role of the leadership in influencing the political, social, economic and military factors that affect the campaign from both sides.
The applicability of such military action and strategic principle in today’s military affairs studies.
The influence of political, social, economic and military factors on the outcome of the campaign where applicable and conclusion.
Prior to World War II, Japan produced only ten percent of her oil requirements and the embargoes on Japanese trade had cut off three-quarters of her overseas trade and 90 percent of her oil imports. These circumstances created the strategic imperative for Japan to secure essential raw materials in the Far East. Meanwhile, the Japanese Army had also stood for a course of expansion. When they gained predominant position in the political life of the nation in 1936, they began to prepare for war [2] .
The defence of Singapore was entirely based on the geographical terrain of Malaya given the restricting narrow jungle roads, thick jungles and highly mountainous areas in the northern part of the peninsular and hence would be impregnable to attacks from the north. Therefore, the British assumed that should the attack be launched from the north, it would be impossible for the Japanese to generate sufficient combat forces and the British Army [3] would be able to halt any such advance. The British defence planners further deduced that the greatest threat to Singapore was from sea borne invasion, in the form of a surprise attack by a coup-de-main force on Singapore or a landing in southern Malaya [4] . These assumptions have led to the fortification of naval base in Singapore and in the event of a conflict, a British squadron of capital ships would sail to Singapore immediately to impede and destroy the enemy. The main immediate objective was then to defence Singapore and the naval bases until the arrival of such fleet.
However, the British were heavily committed with the war in Europe and a great chunk of its resources were deployed in the Mediterranean and Atlantic. Given that resource constraint, the defence of Malaya and Singapore would have to rely on air power. This strategy entails the use of aircrafts to repulse the landing force whilst at sea in order to disrupt any attempts at landings and subsequently attacking enemy forces that manage to get ashore [5] . To achieve the defence through air power, an estimated 582 first line modern combat aircrafts were required [6] . The strategy of massive utilization of air power strategy was essentially derived from the British experience in Europe. The strategy further entailed that if ground offensive is avoidable, the army would be tasked to protect airfields throughout Malaya and not in the defence of a ground attack on the mainland.
Australia had committed the 8th division whose troops were mostly untrained and ill equipped to the defence of Malaya and Singapore. The equipping and training of the troops was expected to take place in Malaya as the Australians acclimatised to the tropics. The Australians played a significant role in slowing the speedy advance of the Japanese down the Malayan Peninsula in December 1941 and early 1942, even though they had little time for training. There was however a general breakdown among the remaining British forces in Malaya, who retreated back to Singapore.
The plan for the defence of Malaya was codenamed ‘Plan Matador’. The plan was for the Allied troops to seize the port and the aerodromes at Singora and Patani in order to engage the Japanese when they conduct an amphibious landing in the area. This plan calls for an offensive strike into Thailand. However, although Plan Matador appeared logical but it was far from ideal as the Line of Communication was too extensive for the Allied forces and it was further compounded by the bureaucracy from London that made its execution conditional. The restriction from London was however lifted on 5th December 1941. Nevertheless, due to London’s policy of avoiding war with Japan, the operation remains only on paper till the day of the invasion.
Despite convincing intelligence of the Japanese movements prior to the invasion, it was nevertheless wrongly assumed that Japan would not chance a war with Britain, Holland or the US, and that Russia would still be Japan’s target [7] . This assumption has led to complacency in the Allied Forces readiness to confront the Japanese. In this regards, the British truly underestimated the Japanese commitment in the campaign. However, as a form of deterrence, Churchill dispatched the battleship, HMS Prince of Wales, battle cruiser Repulse and an aircraft carrier, Indomitable to the Far East. Unfortunately, the Indomitable had been damaged and was rendered unserviceable and hence the fleet had sailed without adequate air cover. The fate of this task force, code named ‘Z Force’ was determined on 10th December 1941. The Allied forces had no armour, inadequate anti-armour weapons and very limited supplies of artillery ammunition. In the air, facing numerical superiority, the lumbering Brewster Buffaloes were no match for the Japanese Zeros. These weaknesses were due to lack of the strategic commitments by the British Higher Command.
British were engaged not only with the Malayan campaign but also with other theatres of war. This naturally put a heavy strain and drains on her manpower and resources. Although the British troops outnumbered the Japanese, they were ill equipped for the war. There was also a lack of adequate air support as illustrated by the sinking of the “Prince of Whales” and the “Repulse” off Kuantan which had left Singapore in the hope of intercepting the invading Japanese forces, but without air cover, proved easy target for the Japanese bombers. In the case of Singapore, the British had expected a sea-warded invasion and were not prepared for the Japanese conquest through the northern shore of Singapore. The British underestimated Japanese air power while overestimating the RAF in the wake of the Battle of Britain: a combination of intelligence failures, over-confidence and racism. The Singapore strategy was born out of British reluctance to accept second-power status after the First World War. It survived for a generation on a diet of wishful thinking, naïveté, shady diplomacy and a fair dose of “cultural draw back”.
The Japanese overall campaign plan was finalized by the end of October 1941. Phase 1 would begin with the attack on Pearl Harbour to destroy the U.S. Pacific Fleet, followed almost immediately by landings on the Isthmus of Kra in Thailand and in Northern Malaya in preparation for an offensive on Singapore. Also in Phase 1 were to be the invasion of Hong Kong; air attacks on Guam, Wake and Luzon to cut off U.S. communications, followed by the invasions of Mindanao and Luzon, and subsequently the seizure of Borneo’s oilfields. All of these were scheduled for completion by D+50 [10] . Phase 2 consisted of the annexation of the Bismarck Archipelago, the capture of the entire Malayan peninsula and the naval base in Singapore, the occupation of the South Burmese airfields, and moves into the Malacca Passage and Straits of Macassar in preparation for an invasion into the Netherlands East Indies. This phase was to be accomplished by D+100 [11] . The final portion was Phase 3, which included the capture of Sumatra and Java and the occupation of Burma, scheduled for completion by D+150 [12] . As it turned out, the Japanese took only 70 days to capture the Malayan Peninsula and Singapore, 30 days ahead of schedule.
Japan’s ultimate success in this campaign was directly attributable to its anticipation of the political and military requirements necessary to accomplish its strategic and operational objectives. They were aware of their own strengths and weaknesses, and they worked hard to understand those of the British. Strategically, they realized they could not win a war against a combination of all the major powers in the Far East. They had to find a way to eliminate the ability of one or more of these powers to join a war against them in the Pacific. They eliminated the Soviet Union from any coalition against them through a neutrality treaty in April 1941 [13] . That treaty allowed the Japanese to focus on the Southern Region without worrying the threat of the Soviets opening a second front against them in Manchuria or Korea. They also anticipated that the United States might join a coalition of colonial powers to defeat Japan in the Pacific, therefore they considered the U.S. naval and naval-based air power in the Pacific as a vital threat and hence the Japanese attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor.
To ensure a superb intelligence collection in preparation for the Malaya Campaign, the Japanese created the Doro Nawa Unit, known as the “Taiwan Army Research Section.” The 30-member team was tasked to collect all conceivable data connected with tropical warfare in the six months before the commencement of the attack. The area of responsibility was the entire Pacific war region with the budget of 20,000 yen (about 400 $US) [14] . The Doro Nawa received open source information from the Southward Association, who had been collecting information about countries in the tropics to effect better trade. Information was also gained from sea captains, mining companies, banking officials, university professors, and private individuals. Open source collection included a secret chart of Indonesia from a captain of a merchant ship who made many voyages to the South Pacific. In another example, a Japanese resident of Malaya gave Doro Nawa aerial photos of Singapore [15] .
Thus, the strategy of anticipation had allowed the Japanese to accomplish preliminary actions that set the conditions for success, and enabled them to consistently remaining one step ahead than the Allied Forces.
The Japanese had identified their naval force as its operational COG because it was crucial to their ability to project power ashore. The deployment of the Japanese naval expeditionary force, embarked on two convoys from Hainan Island to the seaports of Singora and Kota Bharu [16] was the first significant operational decisive point. Therefore, to protect the naval convoys, the lines of communication, and the deployment of forces ashore, and to gain air and naval superiority, they attacked the American fleet at Peal Harbour, and later sank the British battle cruiser Repulse and the new battleship Prince of Wales, and eventually destroyed most of the British air forces with bombing raids against British airfields in the region.
Synergy and leverage are the foundation of warfare. They provide the commander the ability to achieve the greatest effect from all available forces, and integrate and employ force to exploit advantages in combat power across all dimensions. In the Malaya Campaign, the Japanese did a superb job of integrating their air, land, and naval forces to overwhelm the British. This strategy was exemplified during the landings on Kota Bharu, the attack on Parit Buntar, and the assault down the Malaya Peninsula in which the element of total cooperation between the services were highly visible. Once air superiority was gained, the Japanese used their reconnaissance planes and dive bombers to strafe British ground troops and supply columns while using their heavy bombers for long-range attacks on bridges and other objectives.
Thus, the synergy and leverage of air, land, and sea forces allowed the Japanese to gain, maintain, and exploit the advantage against an enemy defending in a subtropical jungle, unimaginable to the British.
Operational reach is the ability to support operations over some distance. This strategy allows the joint force commander to establish the operational approach, lines of operations, and sequencing operations in a campaign. In this regard, the Japanese clearly demonstrated the operational reach of their forces by effectively reduced its extended L of C as well as limited sea-based aircraft and poor road and rail networks in Malaya to enable the successful landings at Singora, Patani and Kota Bharu despite the constraint of the monsoon.
The strategy of simultaneity and depth is designed to bring the appropriate elements of the force to bear simultaneously against the opponent’s entire structure to the depth of the theatre in order to multiply the combined effects and increase synergy. [17] The initial Japanese landings in Thailand and Malaya, accompanied by air attacks against British air bases in Malaya, are some of the best examples of this strategy been employed successfully by the Japanese in the campaign
The principle of balance refers to the joint force’s posture in that while the forces are committed and held in reserve, they could be decisively engaged and capable of accepting mission changes. The Japanese had decisively applied this principle during the advance throughout the Malayan Peninsula. The technique of massive strikes from unexpected directions had managed to disrupt the British resolve and enabled the Japanese to decimate the defending forces and forced them to retreat.
One of the best examples on the use of the strategy of timing and tempo was during the initial Japanese attack on the Malayan Peninsula. The attack was so swift and well concealed that the initial landings in Thailand and Northern Malaya were conducted before the British had time to execute Operation Matador. Within a few hours of the start of hostilities, the Japanese had over 26,000 men ashore [18] .
Culmination is the physical or psychological point at which a military force “no longer has the capability to continue its form of operations, offence or defence” [19] . It is usually directly attributable to a physical constraint like logistics or adequate available combat forces, but on occasion can be attributed to vital intangible factors such as morale or the will to fight. In this campaign, the Japanese had expertly applied and exploited nearly all the fundamental elements of operational art although the concept of culmination was less artful. The Japanese planned quick strikes with the intent that all operations would be successfully concluded before British reinforcements could arrive.
In any campaign, the leadership role is significant in determining the eventual outcome. The Malayan Campaign is no difference in that the personalities of the military commanders from both warring parties had indeed influenced the strategy and the morale of the troops significantly.
He was appointed to command the equivalent of an army in Singapore. When Japanese army marched all the way down from the north, Lt Gen Percival was supposed to hold the invasion for as long as he could until the arrival of British reinforcement. His conduct of the campaign was such that he failed to take the only two actions that might have given him the time he required to hold back the invasion. First, he failed to concentrate his ground forces in vital areas to meet the main enemy thrust as his forces were at the outbreak of the war, scattered all over Malaya in the defence of airfields. Second, he failed to make every effort to construct field and anti-tank defence at bottlenecks on the north-south lines of communication and to ensure that adequate defences covered the three approaches to Johore Bahru. In addition, Major Gen H.G. Bennet, the commander of 8th Australian Division, did not adequately support him.
Yamashita was a curious and complex man yet highly strung, and immensely talented but often misguided, ruthless and ambitious. Most importantly, he was shackled to the past of the samurai myth, which explained his psyche. [20] Yamashita was an able strategist and tactician and was responsible for training the Imperial Army in the arcane arts of jungle warfare and helped to conceive the invasion of Malaya in December 1941. As a strategist and tactician, Yamashita had a good foresight and this was proven in his effective appreciation of the campaign plan for the invasion of Malaya. He anticipated the importance of engineer assets in view of the large number of bridges along the roads linking north and south Malaya. Yamashita ensured that each of his three divisions was supported by their own engineer units and that they were thoroughly trained in bridge building. He effectively made full use of his experience of the campaign fought in China and chose to use only three divisions instead of the five that were offered. This later was to be proven prudent when logistic supplies were running low as the campaign dragged on. Certainly he was regarded both by the Japanese public and by most of the Japanese military as the country’s most gifted commander.
Based on the strength and weaknesses of the warring parties in the Malayan Campaign, their applicability in today’s military affairs studies can be analysed as follows:
Good intelligence work was one of the chief causes of Japanese success in the initial stage of the war in the Far East. The tentacle of the Japanese secret service began to spread all over the East from the time of the Washington Conference. The Japanese are an intensely patriotic people. Every Japanese businessman was an agent of the Japanese Government. Japan knew the British strength in Malaya. She knew all troop movements in Malaya. She knew all about the military camps. She knew the British supply, ammunition and petrol dumps.
The smooth success of Japanese armies in the Far East clearly shows that all the campaigns in the Far East had been carefully planned. The Japanese General Staff had paid attention to the smallest details of the different campaigns. They paid special attention to jungle warfare.
The Japanese tactics of infiltration found full scope in the Malayan jungles. As the British do not have planes, they could know very little about the Japanese troop movement. The Japanese on the other hand, knew their disposition. They then sent their troops through the jungle to infilter through the British lines. The Japanese soldiers were specially trained for jungle warfare and were soon adapting themselves to the jungle conditions and turned the jungle into their best ally.
Another secret of Japanese success was the devolution of command. In a typical jungle country like Malaya, advances are made along rail tracks, road, paths and plantations. There are large gaps between formations. The Japanese had realized this peculiarity. They then took recourse to the devolution of command. Larger formation was given set objectives and the commander is given the initiatives to achieve his objectives, usually by taking recourse to infiltration. After the achievement of the objectives, the formation was re-formed and new objectives set. The Japanese soldiers showed remarkable resourcefulness by fending for themselves and this necessarily gave birth to initiative.
After the sinking of the Prince of Wales and Repulse, the Japanese were undisputed masters in Malayan waters. They exploited this mastery to the fullest. After the fall of Penang the Japanese began to land troops on the coast behind the British lines and threatened the rear and flanks. These tactics forced the British to gave up their lines and withdraw southward to avoid being caught between two Japanese lines. This precipitated their debacle.
Both Britain and the U.S. made the blunder of underestimating the strength of Japan. They ignored the fact that Japan had been on a total war footing from 1937.The acquisition of Manchuria had greatly helped the expansion of Japanese industries. The growing industries and increasing population made it imperative for Japan to possess secure markets for her goods and sources of raw materials to feed her industries. She needed petrol, tin and rubber and was bound to look for these things in Burma, Malaya and Borneo.
Japan was a regimented country and there was conscript. The Japanese were fanatics. They believed that the highest honour Japanese could get was to die for his Emperor. The Western mind finds it difficult to believe in the existence of such a mentality.
Japan’s air strength was also greatly underestimated. It was also believed that Japanese planes would be far inferior to the British. The Japanese had secretly designed new planes and also borrowed designs from the Luftwaffe. In Malaya, the Japanese used over 600 planes. The British had none to counteract the Japanese.
The main cause of the British debacle in the Far East was the lack of air superiority. From the first minute of the outbreak of hostilities, Japan established undisputed air superiority. The British maintained a very small air force in Malaya. This small force was outnumbered and out manoeuvred by the Japanese from the outbreak of the war.
The fate of any campaign in the Far East must necessarily depend on sea and air superiority. Communications in this area must be sea-communications, because islands and peninsulas must be supplied with men, munitions and material by sea. The Japanese attacks on Malaya were sea-borne. The debacle at Pearl Harbour established Japanese naval superiority from Burma to the Solomon. Her sea communications became safe and she could land troops and supplies all over East Asia.
The boldness and relentless commitment of Yamashita are eternal virtues that are also relevant not only in todays but also future wars. Yamashita displayed good foresight and sound tactics by taking every opportunity to make full use of the existing conditions to prevail. As a professional soldier, the overall mission must take precedence over personal grudges and rivalry as evidenced by Yamashita’s conduct during the Malayan Campaign. These virtues enabled Yamashita to succeed in his mission then and similarly it could be applied in todays and future wars.
The weakness of Major Gen Bennett should be taken as an example that ought not to be repeated. First, being part of the Allied forces under the command of Lt General Percival, a British, Bennett should give his fullest co-operation but instead adopt a confrontational attitude. After all, it is the overall mission of the Allied forces that was central to determine the success of the defence of Malaya. Second, Bennett’s lack of charisma and tact in dealing with his subordinates and staff marked his failure in commanding effectively the Australian 8th Division. Thirdly and possibly the most vital aspect was Bennett’s inability to correctly appreciate the Japanese capabilities and tactics that led to h
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