Japanese forces invaded Malaya on 8 December 1941 and British forces surrendered in Singapore 70 days later. Japan would rule the territory for the next 3½ years. Early efforts to maintain pre-war standards of comfort gave way to a grim struggle for survival as the vibrant economy ground to a halt and residents struggled to deal with unemployment, shortages of consumer goods, sharp price rises, a thriving black market and widespread corruption. People were hungry, dressed in rags, and falling victim to treatable diseases for which medicines were unavailable, and there was little reason to hope for better in the future. Using surviving administrative papers, oral materials, intelligence reports and post-war accounts by Japanese officers, this book presents a picture of life in occupied Malaya and Singapore. It shows the impact of war and occupation on a non-belligerent population, and creates a new understanding of the changes and the continuities that underlay the post-war economy and society. The book was first published in 1998 and is now re-issued in new edition that incorporates information from newly translated Japanese documents and other recent discoveries.

Information on the Japanese Occupation of Malaya and Singapore is sparse, and Japanese-language materials are particularly difficult to find because the Japanese military systematically destroyed war-related documents when the war ended. The contributors to this volume participated in a Forum that spent four years locating surviving materials relating to the Occupation of Malaya. The group has three objectives: to collect primary sources, to interview Japanese military and civilian officials who took part in the military administration and people in Malaysia and Singapore who experienced the period, and to publish the results of the studies. Based on interviews with Japanese, Malaysians and Singaporeans who lived through the war years and materials gathered from archives and libraries in Britain, Malaysia, Singapore, USA, Australia, and India, the Forum has produced a number of Japanese-language publications. This book makes available some of their research findings in English. Topics covered include the Watanabe Military Administration, Japanese research activities in Malaya, Japan's Economic Policies, Malayan Communist Party Leaders and the Anti-Japanese Resistance, the Massacre of Chinese in Singapore, Railway Transportation during the Japanese Occupation Period, The Singapore internment Camp for Allied Civilian Women, and the Japanese Surrender. This volume is a revised version of Akashi Yoji, ed., Nippon Senryoka no Eiryo Maraya/Shingaporu (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten Publishers, 2001). Book jacket.

Japan attacked British-ruled Malaya on 8 December 1941 as part of a wave of military actions that toppled the British, Dutch and American colonial regimes in Southeast Asia. Within seventy days, the conquest of Malaya was complete, and British forces in Singapore surrendered on 15 February 1942. The three and a half years of Japanese rule are generally considered to mark a profound transition in the history of the Malay peninsula, but little is known about this period. This book uses the limited administrative papers that survived in Malaya, oral sources, and accounts written by Japanese officers involved in the Malayan campaign to flesh out the story.

This is an account of the fall of Singapore and Japan's 1941 military campaign in Malaya through the eys of Japanese soldiers who took part, based on interviews, memoirs, war diaries and other Japanese-language sources.

Shortly after midnight on 8 December 1941, two divisions of crack troops of the Imperial Japanese Army began a seaborne invasion of southern Thailand and northern Malaya. Their assault developed into a full-blown advance towards Singapore, the main defensive position of the British Empire in the Far East. The defending British, Indian, Australian and Malayan forces were outmanoeuvred on the ground, overwhelmed in the air and scattered on the sea. By the end of January 1942, British Empire forces were driven back onto the island of Singapore Itself, cut off from further outside help. When the Japanese stormed the island with an an-out assault, the defenders were quickly pushed back into a corner from which there was no escape. Singapore’s defenders finally capitulated on 15 February, to prevent the wholesale pillage of the city itself. Their rapid and total defeat was nothing less than military humiliation and political disaster. Based on the most extensive use yet of primary documents in Britain, Japan, Australia and Singapore, Brian Farrell provides the fullest picture of how and why Singapore fell and its real significance to the outcome of the Second World War.

“This photo essay produces a very effective picture of the defeat of British forces in Malaya and Singapore by the Japanese . . . Highly recommended.”—Firetrench In just 10 weeks from 8 December 1941 to mid-February 1942, British and Imperial forces were utterly defeated by the numerically inferior Japanese under General Yamashita. British units fought hard on the Malayan mainland, but the Japanese showed greater mobility, cunning and tactical superiority. Morale was badly affected by the loss of HMS Prince of Wales and Repulse to Japanese aircraft on 19 December as they sought out enemy shipping. Panic set in as military and civilians withdrew south to Singapore. Thought to be an impregnable fortress, its defenses against land attacks were shockingly deficient. General Percival’s leadership was at best uninspired and at worst incompetent. Once the Allied troops withdrew to Singapore it was only a matter of time before surrender became inevitable. To make matters worse reinforcements arrived but only in time to be made POWs. The whole catastrophe is brilliantly described in this highly illustrated book. “The powerful story of a tragedy illustrated with many previously unpublished photographs, this is a highly enlightening text on the Forgotten War.”—The Bulletin of The Military Historical Society “Contains an interesting set of well captioned archive photos showing a period that was among the darkest days for the British Commonwealth during WW2.”—Military Modelling