Embracing the value of sea power

When you think of the part sea power served in defending Singapore during the Second World War, it is likely that the failure of the Royal Navy's Force Z warships will spring to mind.

The tragic loss of the British battleship, HMS Prince of Wales, and the battlecruiser, HMS Repulse, to Japanese air power has a little-known prologue: some naval assets that defended British interests in the Mediterranean came from Singapore.

These include the aircraft carrier HMS Eagle, which was based in the Far East, an entire flotilla of Singapore-based submarines and a shallow draft 15" gun monitor, HMS Terror, which lived up to its name harassing the Italian Army in the Libyan Desert.[Terror Camp in Sembawang is named after this monitor and not after the attitude of Naval Diving Unit instructors who lord over their tadpoles.)

Had these warships stayed in Singapore, the fate of Force Z may have been very different. This blast from the past underlines the importance of a balanced fleet and shows the telling effect that sea power, when ably led by aggressive commanders, can serve in a theatre of war.

Those who ask why these precious assets set sail from Singapore would do well to remember that Europe had been at war for nearly two years and three months while people in the Far East watched as bystanders.

In a war of survival, the Royal Navy needed every war machine at its disposal. Warships recalled from Singapore robbed defence planners here of naval aviation and submarines that would have complemented the weight of fire from capital ships.

A 64-page booklet published during WW2 by His Majesty's Stationery Office (HMSO), titled simply His Majesty's Submarines, noted: "As diplomatic relations with Italy grew steadily worse, all submarines east of Suez, including the 4th Flotilla at Singapore and the 8th Flotilla at Colombo, were sailed for Alexandria to form the 1st Flotilla. Half of this force went to Malta; and when the war with Italy began, there were six British submarines there (two of them refitting) and six at Alexandria."

The withdrawal of 4th Flotilla from Singapore explains why Imperial Japanese Navy submarines had a free run of the South China Sea in December 1941. These submarines formed a picket line which detected Force Z as it made its passage north for its date with destiny.

The fact that half of the HMSO booklet sings praises to successful RN submarine operations in the Mediterranean tells us the impact these boats could have had in regional waters. RN submariners could have been sent first in, ahead of Force Z to protect the surface ships from enemy submarines.

The aircraft carrier Eagle was pulled out for the same reason.

The HMSO booklet, East of Malta West of Suez, recounted: "Early in 1940, Italian neutrality deteriorated into passive hostility towards the Allies. By the end of March, 1940, she had made it plain that she was only biding her moment to throw in her lot with Germany. The lull was nearly over and the gathering storm sent the Battle Fleet from home waters to the Mediterranean, and reinforced it with cruisers from the East Indies, the aircraft-carrier Eagle and some submarines from China."

HMS Eagle served with distinction in the Mediterranean. The RN recognised the value of naval aviation and paired aircraft carriers together with battleships and battlecruisers into task groups named after letters of the alphabet (Force A, Force B, Force H etc).

In that theatre, the battlecruiser HMS Renown showed that warships steaming at speed in the open sea were hard to hit. That the Renown was a sister ship of HMS Repulse is unlikely to have been overlooked by British planners who despatched the Repulse to Singapore.

The battleship Prince of Wales was no ordinary battle wagon either. The King George V-class warship was then Britain's newest battleship, bloodied during the Battle of the Denmark Strait during the encounter with the Bismarck and having won the affection of Britons for ferrying British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to Newfoundland for his meeting with US President Franklin D. Roosevelt. She was known fondly as Churchill's yacht.

After two years of operations in the Mediterranean, no RN capital ships had been lost to air attack.

British disdain for the "new weapon" (i.e. air power), as noted in the WW2 HMSO booklets, is spelt out clearly in this account of a clash with the Italians.

"The Warspite and her attendant destroyers were attacked by bombers twenty two times. Force C fifteen times; altogether nearly 400 bombs were dropped on the British Fleet during its return to Alexandria without causing damage or casualties. The new weapon had had every chance to prove itself a substitute for sea power and had apparently failed; in the confusion of the enemy's retreat to the Straits of Messina the Italian bombers were twice observed to be attacking their own fleet. The German dive-bombers had not yet appeared on the scene."

HMSO's text is accompanied by pictures I've not seen elsewhere. These show RN warships under heavy air attack. One picture shows the battleship Malaya (what an irony, considering where Force Z met its fate) sailing "unscathed through the forest of water hurled up in the bombing attack".

With more than two years of experience fending off attacks by two air forces in the narrow seas, one cannot be surprised at British confidence that Force Z would stand up to the then-untested Japanese air power.

The signal lessons for Singapore are as follows:
1. The Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) military history reading list should include British naval ops in the Med. This theatre should not be considered out of the syllabus. Understanding how and why British sea power remained undefeated in the Med is a key to appreciating the importance of a balanced fleet.

2. A study of Allied ops in the Med would also show the importance of timely intelligence. What the HMSO booklets do not mention is how Axis convoys were found and wrecked. Years later, we all know the part that Ultra intelligence played in betraying Axis intentions and destroying Rommel's supply lines.

3. Early SAF planners seem to have spent too much time fighting the last war. Singapore's defenders during WW2 had no tanks, a weak air force and relied on powerful warships for their defence. The 1st Generation SAF reversed all three factors - we had armour and plenty of it, a strong air force and the navy became the Cinderella of the SAF.

4. The Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN) needs to maintain a balanced fleet. Sea power amounts to more than what its six Formidable-class stealth frigates can bring to the party. Photo calls with all the good and the great aboard these stealth warships should not detract from the fact that the RSN needs to keep its undersea, naval aviation, close escort (i.e. patrol vessels), underway replenishment and special operations capabilities sharp.

5. Some naval capabilities such as naval aviation will cost a pretty penny. This is because specialised warships need to be designed and built for naval air power. Central to the whole operation are the people who generate and sustain naval air power. Underfund the navy and you undermine the SAF's full spectrum capabilities. How much is the economy worth?

6. In the pre-Springboard era, the neglected Navy lost many officers and WOSEs. With economic prospects in the private sector continuing to beckon warfighters to hang up their uniforms for good, we cannot afford to have a similar mindset or the Navy will never make good its manpower losses.

7. The best drawer plans can sometimes be scuttled by events outside one's control. Pre-war Singapore had an aircraft carrier plus submarines. These were siphoned off to shore up the Med front. Drawer plans are imperiled by cost pressures that cut capabilities razor thin. Our one-per-ship assignment for the S-70B Seahawks is a good example - there's no spare capacity to go round. The cost per helo in the event we ever need to replace one will be far in excess of what it would have cost Singapore to buy spare airframes in the first place.