WW2 in South-East Asia | The Fall of Singapore (1942)
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Published 2019-04-20
Just like her Axis counterparts Japan launched a Blitzkrieg upon the Pacific making huge territorial gains as she strove to develop The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
Singapore, an island at the southern end of the Malay Peninsula, was considered a vital part of the British Empire and supposedly impregnable as a fortress. The British saw it as the "Gibraltar in the Far East".
The surrender of Singapore demonstrated to the world that the Japanese Army was a force to be reckoned with, though the defeat also ushered in three years of appalling treatment for the Commonwealth POW's who were caught in Singapore.
Improvements to Singapore as a British military base had only been completed at great cost in 1938. Singapore represented what the British Empire was all about a strategically vital military base that protected Britain's other Commonwealth possessions in the Far East.
Once the Japanese expanded throughout the region after Pearl Harbour (December 1941), many in Britain and Australia felt that Singapore would become an obvious target for the Japanese. However, the British military command in Singapore was confident that the power they could call on there would make any Japanese attack useless.
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Music:
Video Game Soldiers by Twin Musicom is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution licence (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
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All Comments (21)
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We must remember the Malay regiment for their bravery in defending Singapore, especially at Bukit Chandu, where the troops fought with the quote: death before dishonour
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Lt Adnan and his regiment were great Warriors.
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Imagine ‘kings and generals’ channel doing this documentary
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Percival had a 3 to 1 advantage, on the defense, and still lost. The man had no nerve and no stomach for fighting. This, to me, was Brittan's worst hour and most embarrassing defeat and Percival had no business being in uniform.
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Following is Transcription of how the British surrendered : Yamashita: "Answer me briefly. Do you wish to surrender unconditionally?" Percival: "Yes we do." Yamashita: "Have you any Japanese prisoners of war?" Percival: "None at all." Yamashita: "Have you any Japanese civilians?" Percival: "No. They have all been sent to India." Yamashita: "Very well. You will please sign this document of surrender." Percival read about half of it and then asked: "Would you wait until tomorrow morning?" Yamashita replied angrily: "If you don't sign now we shall go on fighting. All I want to know is Do you surrender unconditionally or not?" Percival went pale and began talking to the interpreter in a low voice, but Yamashita interrupted him, pointed his finger and shouted: "Yes or no!?" Percival glanced towards the interpreter, then said "Yes." Yamashita: "Very well. We shall cease hostilities at 10 pm, Japanese time." That is how the Rabbit surrendered to The Tiger. Source: The Marshall Cavendish Illustrated Encyclopedia of World War II, pg 698.
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“Fun Fact”: Hitler called the fall of Singapore “a dark day for the white race. Even though he was allied with Japan, he felt it bad that an Asian country beat out and liberated a colony held by a white country. Keep that in mind when remembering the motives of each side.
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Great video, thanks for covering battles in the WW2 theatre that are missed out by the major history channels.
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Thank you for your work. I wrote my undergraduate thesis about Singapore. From what I've read, even if Singapore had held out against Yamashita, without Malaya the defense was moot. The naval and air portions of the defense had fallen apart by the time the Japanese reached the Johore Strait, and beyond evacuating the garrison to other parts of the Netherlands East Indies I can't see what holding at Singapore would do. It was easily isolated by the sea once the Japanese gained control of the skies and seas.
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Thank you for sharing this detailed work !
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Never mind the moaners, great series thank you very much for a job well done.
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British command in Malaya and Singapore was incompetent and disorganized at several levels. What is overlooked is Arthur Percival was not a field general but more a political officer. He only attended the Staff College after serving as an intelligence officer in Ireland and being personally associated with instances of torturing prisoners. Combined with the British political concerns with the Malay communist party this indicates, that by putting Percival in charge of ground forces, they thought the main concern would be defending fortress Singapore from political unrest during a prolonged defensive campaign and perhaps semi siege. The British never envisioned a rapid ground advance down the Malay peninsula as being remotely possible.
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When you have a fortified position and outnumber the opponent 3:1 but still lose because you don't use your troops effectively.
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Have you since stopped using the robot voice? As a citizen of SE Asia, would love to hear you using a human voice to produce an updated version of this video. Quite distasteful listening to a robot voice narrating such an important part of our history. My grandfather was nearly killed by the Japanese. Having said that, I am immensely grateful for your efforts on this website, thank you very much and please continue the great work!
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Would you allow the usage of parts of this video for an assignment? Your channel will be duly credited.
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well done good research
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the automated narration is a hoot....took me a moment to figure out what it was saying at times....Per-Civil....Yammita
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use a real human voice. Your views will x10 :D
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extremely great and terrific work
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Can you do a video about Battle of bataan and corregidor?
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Singapore was lost because of its incompetent command of the British. But so was the Malaya campaign. The soldiers fought hard of what they had good job to the Canadians and Indian troops and colonial troops RIP. shameful display to the Japanese Slaughtering their prisoners after the battle.
