Barry Bull
Donor
Second, Phillips told the Admiralty he intended to attack the enemy forces off Kota Bharu and eight hours later, he sailed, 1005 on the 8th London time. The Admiralty did not reply to his message, and at 2200 on the 9th London time, when Force Z had been at sea for some 36 hours, there was a staff conference on naval dispositions in the Pacific. Churchill, Alexander (First Lord of the Admiralty) and Pound were in attendance. Churchill favored withdrawal, but at the late hour, it was decided to settle things in the morning. It was already too late. If deterrence had failed, why not immediately order him to Ceylon or Australia? That's a failure of the Prime Minister and the Admiralty.
To return to the original question, what was really needed was an equal commitment by all three services. The Army should have provided artillery, including AAA (when the Japanese bombed Singapore on the 8th, the only guns that could reach the altitude of the bombers were the 5.25in aboard Prince of Wales), and some light and/or medium tanks, and the RAF needed to provide more modern fighters and some twin-engine medium bombers A squadron or two of heavy bombers, even Short Stirlings would have helped as well. Vickers Vildabeest were not exactly the planes to give the Japanese pause. Ad those to a cruiser squadron with supporting destroyers, and larger carrier/capital ship fleet in the Indian that could be in Singapore in a number of days (even if it doesn't do so, the threat is there) and the Japanese calculations for their southern move would be very different, in my opinion.
My thoughts,
Politics (colonial ones, to boot)demand a fleet, no matter how adequate, be deployed to Singapore to save face from the natives.
Where can all the extra force be diverted from?