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6. Events on Singapore Island, 31st January - 15th February, 1942
In the light of information now available it would appear that hopes of holding Singapore after withdrawal across the Causeway were based on too optimistic an appreciation.
The numbers available - until these were scrutinised and scaled down to their true value - were certainly impressive. They have been put at between 70.000 and 80.000. but they included some thousands - it is impossible to calculate the number even approximately - belonging to the ancillary services. There were many non-combatants.
In addition to A.A. and the very powerful coast batteries there were six Field Regiments R.A. and two anti-Tank Regiments. There was a very complete system of defences designed to prevent landings on the North-east, South-east, and South-easterly beaches.
As against these could be counted a formidable array of factors, of which the significance is only now apparent. Firstly, there was the question of time - time to reorganise the defence so as to be able to throw back any landing parties before they could form a bridgehead. As the enemy had air superiority, command of the sea and possessed the necessary landing craft, he was in a position to choose his point of invasion, while the disparity between the length of perimeter and numbers available to hold it, meant shallow defence on the shores. All the more important then, not only to keep in hand an adequate reserve but to organise immediate counter-attack to meet any of the possible landings open to the enemy. The problem of ensuring sufficient artillery support for these alternative counter-attacks was complicated by the difficulty of finding suitable gun positions, by a shortage of necessary instruments and telephone wire, owing to losses on the mainland, and of course, complete absence of aerial observation. Finally, it was to be expected that enemy could make his attempt under cover.
In the face of these difficulties it was obvious that every hour would have to he utilised to the utmost if the forces on the Island were to have any reasonable chance of holding out against an enemy who had proved conclusively on the mainland his talent for speed in operations. It could be presumed that he fully appreciated the importance of making his attempt on the Island before we had time to reorganise, rest and re-equip.
The majority of the troops who withdrew onto the Island were very tired. The 11th Indian Division in particular had been in action almost continuously from the battle of Jitra in the extreme North to the southern end of the peninsula. They had fought what amounted to rearguard actions for a distance of 400 miles. They had suffered heavily, but their spirit was good and even a short rest would have made them again a first-rate fighting formation; but rest, unfortunately, they were not to have, for they had been allotted a sector of the North and North-eastern shore, including the Naval Base area, where no defences had been prepared, and the men, immediately they crossed the Island, were set to work digging and wiring. Both Commanders and men, after the strain of seven weeks fighting, had expected to find at least some positions prepared in what was commonly, and erroneously, known as the "Fortress" of Singapore. That they prepared their sector effectively is proved by the speedy destruction of two attempts at landing in their sector, though these admittedly were not made in strength. In one case a tow of landing craft was entirely destroyed by artillery before reaching the shores; in the other, the tug and a proportion of the barges were sunk.
Like the 11th Division, Major-General Gordon Bennett's Australians were strong in their criticism of what they regarded as criminal negligence on the part of the Malaya Command in not preparing defences in the West and North-West of the Island. Though little is known of the extent of preparation made in this sector between the 31st and the Japanese on the night 8th / 9th February, wire was apparently erected and M.Gs. sited some way back from the shore, while trenches were dug in the rubber plantations still further from the sea.
As the behaviour of some at least of the Australian troops in the area has been the occasion of strong comment and as recrimination is likely to have unfortunate repercussions, besides playing into the hands of the enemy, it is necessary to set out plainly the facts of the case so far as they are known.
The A.I.F. had displayed in North Jahore a refreshingly offensive spirit at a period when this was sorely needed to counter the effects on morale of constant withdrawal and defeat. They brought off some highly successful ambushes over ground they had the opportunity of studying during the time they had occupied the area; but against the enemy´s superiority in numbers, and his ability to outflank by landings on the West coast, notably at Parit Sulong and about Batu Pahat and Muar. Therefore a rapid decline must have set in, because signs of a break in morale were noticeable even before the Japanese landing in their sector. Large numbers of A.I.F. stragglers were seen in the town; many undoubtedly took the opportunity to desert in boats to Sumatra. Finally, the events of the night 8th / 9th February seem to have destroyed almost completely their discipline and morale.
In justice, however, it must be recorded that they were subjected on that night to a bombardment which, judged by the standard of any theatre of war, can only be described as very heavy; in addition, they had been under an only slightly less heavy pounding for at least twenty-four hours.
The 18 Division from Home, except for the 53rd Brigade, which proceeded them by a fortnight and fought in Johore, had not been in action. They were fresh and their morale was excellent, but they were acclimatiser and ignorant of jungle ways. Their experience, when they went into action for the first time, was that of all the reinforcements and formations which arrived in Malaya after the outbreak of hostilities, namely, being rushed into action, soft and untrained, with the result that many a fine battalion was soon reduced to a collection of footsore, tired and depressed men. It was unfortunate, but the situation demanded it. In being broken up (53rd Brigade to Johore in advance, the detachment of Thomforce, the formation of massyforce), the 18th Division was also sharing the experience of every formation which fought in Malaya. Shortage of men, lack of advance information as to reinforcements and a succession of highly critical situations, were the reasons for a policy which was very strongly criticised by every commander in the force. In conjunction with this type of warfare, the splitting up of formations and their committal to battle untrained, led to a speedier loss of fighting efficiency than in any previous campaign in which Imperial forces have been engaged.
The 9th Indian Division, originally comprising only the 8th and 22nd Brigades, lost the latter entirely in the course of withdrawal to the Island from the East coast.
From the 1st February to the landing on the night 8th / 9th Japanese activity was confined to intermittent shelling, bombing - still on a moderate scale - and aerial reconnaissance. On about the 4th February they commenced taking an interest in Pulau Ubin, which guards the eastern entrance to Johore Strait. This Island is 4 miles long, extending from Changi to Serangoon village on the mainland and distant from 1 to 1.5 miles from the Singapore shore. On the Johore side of the Island the channel narrows in places to 800 yards.
There is little doubt that their movements on Pulau Ubin were a feint, partly successful, to divert our attention from the large-scale landing in preparation at the western end of the strait. Their activity consisted in sending parties on to the Island, where our patrols from the 18th Division and from the Gordons at Changi met and exchanged shots with them. The use of Seletar aerodrome was denied us from now on by fire across the Strait.
Up till now there had been an ominous absence of news from the western end of the Strait, where the passage is a little more than half a mile wide at one point. A.I.F. units in this Western sector (between the Sungei Jurong and Sungei Kranji) appeared to be taking little interest in the opposite shore, in spite of requests from Malaya Command that patrols should be ferried over under cover of darkness. Inactivity of the commanders in this sector is the more inexplicable in that sounds of hammering had been heard at night across the water. Eventually, on the evening the 8th / 9th February, an officer's patrol was carried across and he reported large concentrations of Japanese in areas bordering the far shore and discovered that work on rafts was in progress. This information reached Command Headquarters only when the landing was in progress. It is difficult, to understand why the significance of the bombardment which commenced at least twenty-four hours before the invasion was not fully appreciated. The fire from guns and mortars has been estimated as a medium, heavy or very heavy bombardment and reaching a crescendo between 8 and midnight on the 8th. Inside the plantations, where most of the trenches were sited, the rubber trees split and fell about the men. On the shore, among the mangroves, at least a company of Chinese guerillas, their British officers in touch with the Australians, were watching. Beach and searchlights had been installed, but they were under the control of the local infantry Commander, and he had forbidden their exposure without a personal order. The order was never given.
Once ashore, the first Japanese parties estimated at about a thousand, were soon working their way inland, for there was so very little opposition near the beaches that the Chinese guerrillas found themselves entirely unsupported among the mangroves. Similarly, next morning the left flank of llth Division round Woodlands was exposed, and they were obliged to put in two counter attacks to retake an important feature near the main road.
The next phase was a steady drive, though not in strength, towards the South-East, with the bulk of the A.l.F. retiring into the area west of the line Bakit Timah - Bukit Panjang. To meet this situation a portion of the 18th Division was detached, moved to the vicinity of Bukit Timah village and placed under command of Major-General Gordon Bennett.
A counter attack had been staged for the morning of the 11th February to drive the enemy back from the line of the Sungei Jurong - Sungei Kranji. General Gordon Bennett had issued his orders, but the attack had never materialised, though one Indian Brigade, at the southern end of the line, reached their objective almost unopposed, but withdrew on finding themselves unsupported. This fiasco marked the beginning of the end. It was plain now that there were neither the numbers nor the will to throw the enemy back into the sea. Apart from this, the detachment of 18th Division known as Thomforce, fresh and full of fight, had made two gallant attempts to retake Bukit Timah and Bukit Panjang villages, but the enemy strength was growing rapidly, and he had landed Tanks on the Island. Thomforce was obliged to move for the night to the Race Course, East of the starting line. Meanwhile, the remainder of the 18th Division, moved from their sector between Seletar and Changi, were preparing a new position about Adam Road. This was occupied on the 13th, the line being continued to the sea at Pasir Panjang by the remnants of the A.I.F., British units and the Malay Regiment. To the north and west, 11th Division, Fortress troops and the depleted 9th Division were drawn in, in conformity with the new adjustment now completed on the west. The whole force, with the exception of the Coast Artillery on Blaking Mati Island and the garrison of the isolated hill fort of Pengerang on the mainland, was now on a restricted perimeter round the town of Singapore. As petrol was fired and ammunition dumps blown up (with those “last rounds”) the feeling grew that surrender could only be a matter of days at most.
Meanwhile the enemy had not neglected the civilian, whom he had bombed with ever increasing severity since 10th February. Shell fire had finally broken down the stoicism of the Chinese - up till now the most steadfast of the Asiatics. As to water, ammunition and food, there is a conflict of evidence. Half of the McRitchie Reservoir, including the distributing plant within the Adam Road position, certainly remained in our hands, and there were in addition other unexploited sources available, but even taking the most optimistic view, it would seem that the existing chaos within the town, added to damage from bombing, must soon have caused a serious shortage. For the troops there were said to be only a fortnights rations owing to heavy losses sustained in the dumps on the mainland. The civil authorities announced, within a few days of the capitulation, that food supplies were ample for the population of Singapore, but when the inevitable damage from bombing is taken into account, so favourable an estimate is hardly to be accepted.
Three-quarters of a million panic stricken Asiatics in a ravaged and blazing town, a pall of black smoke visible for 40 miles and a ring of tired and dispirited troops; such is the picture when the "All Clear" sounded on the evening of 15th February.
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