The invasion began on 8 December 1941, one hour and 20 minutes before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, and so it was the first major battle of the Pacific war.
Not knowing the scope of your own ignorance is part of the human condition. The problem with it is we see it in other people, and we don't see it in ourselves.
The arrogant overconfident British were sure the Japanese would attack from the sea, and weren't keeping watch on the land, they turned to face the ocean and focus on that... and were taken by surprise. In fact, the British had blindly de-prioritized Malay strength, bungled communications, and lacked counter-intelligence. The Dunning-Kruger effect possibly, before that term was ever invented
On the 15th of February 1942, Lt General Arthur Percival signed the largest surrender in British history at Singapore. The city was supposed to be a fortress, but his force of 85,000 men had been defeated by just 35,000 Japanese troops.
Little over 2 months earlier Japanese forces had invaded Northern Malaya. Thanks to their advanced tactics and training, the Japanese advanced with incredible speed pushing the unprepared British back to Singapore in a so-called 'bicycle blitzkrieg'. When they crossed the Johore straights and captured the Bukit Timah heights above Singapore itself, Percival was forced to surrender.
Little over 2 months earlier Japanese forces had invaded Northern Malaya. Thanks to their advanced tactics and training, the Japanese advanced with incredible speed pushing the unprepared British back to Singapore in a so-called 'bicycle blitzkrieg'. When they crossed the Johore straights and captured the Bukit Timah heights above Singapore itself, Percival was forced to surrender.
The sound of a single squeaky chain, a rubbing brake pad, or a wheel rolling on the rims is bad enough. But by the dozens and the hundreds, they sounded to the beleaguered, undermanned British troops like the lightweight Japanese tanks. Time and again, Japanese bicycle infantry advanced past abandoned British defensive points. Broken-down bicycles were an unexpected psychological weapon.
The British sloppily sabotaged supply depots, roads and bridges in advance (instead of when bicycles were on them) to stop assault, and the Japanese went through or around anyway. When conditions were blamed for flat tires, it was the impatient brutality of Japanese leadership that meant soldiers were expected to ride only rims.
The Malay peninsula was in fact defined by British laying down a paved road system that meant bicycles on the invading warpath didn’t need rubber to ride.
“Curiously enough, throughout all these years of bickering and indecision, it had occurred to barely anyone that Malay had over 1,000 miles of coastline, half of it exposed to Japanese attack,” writes author Arthur Swinson in Defeat in Malaya: Fall of Singapore. “It had occurred to no one either that the defence of the naval base on Singapore island was bound up with the defence of the whole Malayan Peninsula.” Or, as Churchill recalled, the possibility that the fortress would have no landward defenses “no more entered into my mind than that of a battleship being launched without a bottom.”
The British War Cabinet (believing tanks wouldn’t serve hills and jungle, let alone have the parts and crews to maintain them) transferred hundreds away from Malaya to Russia in a diplomatic lift that likely helped defend Moscow. If that sounds like France surprised when Nazis drove tanks around the Maginot line through the Forest of Ardennes, or Rome surprised when Hannibal Barca crossed the Alps for that matter… the British should have known better.
The Malaya Campaign and the Fall of Singapore
Commander Mark Hess, USN Faculty, Department of Strategy and Policy
"Under normal conditions, retreating armies move faster than their pursuers because the invaders are slowed down by destroyed infrastructure such as blown-up bridges or obstructed roads. But this time, Japanese soldiers on light bicycles were able to use narrow roads, hidden paths and improvised log bridges. Even when bridges were missing, soldiers waded across the rivers carrying their bicycles on their shoulders.
The bicycles also proved to be an excellent help in the transportation of equipment. While the British soldiers carried up to 18 kilograms while marching through the jungle, their Japanese enemies could carry twice as much, benefiting from the distribution of weight onto two wheels. “Even the long-legged Englishmen could not escape our bicycles”, remembered Colonel Masanobu Tsuji. “This is the reason they were continually driven off the roads and into the jungle where, with their retreat cut off, they were forced to surrender”"
"Under normal conditions, retreating armies move faster than their pursuers because the invaders are slowed down by destroyed infrastructure such as blown-up bridges or obstructed roads. But this time, Japanese soldiers on light bicycles were able to use narrow roads, hidden paths and improvised log bridges. Even when bridges were missing, soldiers waded across the rivers carrying their bicycles on their shoulders.
The bicycles also proved to be an excellent help in the transportation of equipment. While the British soldiers carried up to 18 kilograms while marching through the jungle, their Japanese enemies could carry twice as much, benefiting from the distribution of weight onto two wheels. “Even the long-legged Englishmen could not escape our bicycles”, remembered Colonel Masanobu Tsuji. “This is the reason they were continually driven off the roads and into the jungle where, with their retreat cut off, they were forced to surrender”"
The first rule of the Dunning–Kruger club is you don't know you're a member of the Dunning–Kruger club.
David Dunning
