FAILURE IN MALAYA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26704, 25 February 1948, Page 6

FAILURE IN MALAYA

FAST-MOVING ENEMY

INSUFFICIENT TIME FOR REGROUPING

LORD WAVELL'S DESPATCHES

N.Z.P.A.—Copyright. LONDON, Feb. 24,

The main .reason for the British failure in Malaya was that our enemies moved too quickly on a simple effective plan and never gave us time to collect the forces necessary to remedy our initial weakness,” said Lord Wavell in a despatch published by His Majesty’s Stationery Office to-day as a booklet, in which he tells of 41 days six years ago when he was Supreme Commander of the A.B.D.A. (American, British, Dutch, Australian area in the South-west Pacific).

Written in August, 1942—six months after Lord Wavell's command ended-r the despatch is now published two days before the date set for publication of the despatch by Lieutenant-general A. E. Percival on the Malayan campaign. Lord Wavell said the air was a vital factor, though the effect of enemy superiority on land operations, apart from the moral effect, was greatly exaggerated. As the result of a number of factors the Allied air force, instead of increasing in strength, “ wasted with gradually increasing intensity and was finally completely destroyed.” Land reinforcements arrived too late to save the situation. Lord Wavell was the final arbiter of strategy for the Malayan campaign from the date his headquarters began to operate on January 15 until Singapore fell exactly a month later. It is clear that he gave his instructions to General Percival to fight on as long as it was physically possible so as to gain time for his own plans, which included a counter-stroke in Malaya as soon as he could muster sufficient resources. Role for Australians

The despatches say the Australian Corps, comprising the Sixth and Seventh Divisions, was intended when brought back from the Middle East early in 1942 to go immediately into action in a counter-offensive against the Japanese in Malaya. Later roles proposed for it were as reinforcements for Java and Burma.

Lord Wavell hoped to ddlay the Japanese on the Malayan mainland so that the Australian Corps could be landed at Singapore and prepared for a counter offensive from Johore. The rapid Japanese advance, however, prevented this being done. Lord Wavell hoped that Major-general Gordon Bennett and the Eighth Australian Division might be able to prevent further advance of the enemy till the arrival of the Eighteenth (British) Division towards the end of January, and that with this reinforcement they might be able to hold the enemy till the arrival of the Australian Corps in February enabled him to deliver a counter stroke.

The despatch continues: “Before more than Australian advance parties could arrive, Southern Sumatra had been captured by the enemy and Java was so closely threatened that it would have been impossible to land any large number of troops. The Australian Corps was diverted to Australia and Ceylon after the Australian Government had refused to consent to its being used to reinforce Burma.”

Aircraft Diverted The despatch makes it clear that Lord Wavell had a tug-of-war with the Australian Government on the destination of the Australian Corps. It was evidently not his only one. He records, for instance, that while he was anxiously awaiting promised air reinforcements the Australian Government “ succeeded in getting a number of United States aircraft intended for A.B.D.A diverted to the defence of Australia."

The Chiefs of Staff instructed Lord Wavell that Java should be defended to the last by all combatant troops then in the island, but that he should withdraw A.B.D.A. headquarters from Java. Lord Wavell as an alternative recommended (that headquarters should be dissolved, and that Dutch commanders should take over. His views were accepted and A.B.D.A. ceased to exist on February 25. Insufficient Air Support A total of 11,500 British (including 6000 R.A.F., mainly unarmed and without aircraft), 3000 Australians, and 500 Americans were left to assist the Dutch. Lord Wavell’s original object, he says, was the maintenance of a line of bases —Darwin, Timor, Java, Southern Sumatra, Singapore—on which he could build up, above all, an air force capable of securing local air superiority, and thereby checking the Japanese advance southward. The despatch admits that these hopes proved over-optimistic, but, added Lord Wavell, “if all the aircraft promised to A.B.D.A. Command (including 1000 from the United States) had arrived safely and up to time, and had we succeeded in establishing sufficiently wellprotected aerodromes and ground organisation, all would have been well. We had no time to assemble sufficient, forces or to create favourable conditions for them to operate.”