1st February– 18th April 1942 – Malaya and Burma - Operation Yari – Part V – The Second Battle of Kuala Lumpur
In early versions of Operation Yari the force attack Kuala Lumpur had strictly limited objectives, with a matching force level. It was intended to pin the British defenders in place while the attack in the east broke through and if the opportunity arose to drive them back towards Singapore and prevent the British from establishing a new line of defence. This latter objective was largely included as a sop to the more aggressive elements in the Japanese High Command. The problem arose when this hoped for pursuit was transformed into a requirement of the plan, despite the continued concerns of some planners, who objected to the fact that this heavier weighting for the west of Malaya came at the expense of every other part of Yari. Colonel Masanobu Tsuji, was primarily responsible for the demands to increase the weight of the attack in the west, fearing that a mere holding action would give the British too much room to manoeuvre and that they had to be pushed out of the Swettenham Line and kept off balance. Tsuji did express the view that this should not be done at the expense of weakening the attack in the east, however when it became clear that this simply wasn’t possible Tsuji, safely removed from the front line in a comfortable office, reverted to his aggressive instincts and allowed the western arm of the offensive to draw strength away from the other parts of the operation [1].
One item that the western force absorbed almost entirely was armoured support, on the grounds that the additional weight of firepower was best used to break the Swettenham Line and pave the way for a sweep into the British rear, while the attack in the east would use the amphibious assault to achieve the same result. The Japanese were not looking to the kind of sweeping armoured flanking manoeuvre that Manstein and Guderian had embraced, especially as the Japanese could only assemble some 81 tanks for the battle and Montgomery had no intention of offering any open flank to be exploited. The tanks would though be used in a concentrated mass intended to punch a hole in the line and in many cases, they would go into battle with Japanese infantry clinging to them, intended to be swiftly deployed when the Japanese broke into the Swettenham Line. Troops hitching a ride on tanks to reach the front was hardly unusual in WWII, riding on them into the thick of the action was a different matter and few of these troops survived their ride to engage in battle, either unceremoniously thrown from the tanks they were precariously holding onto or victims of enemy fire. The latter would have been less of an issue if the Japanese had maintained better operational security. Instead the British learned where the Japanese had placed their armour and Montgomery adjusted his forces accordingly [2].
The Japanese offensive in the west opened on the 20th of March, with the armoured spearhead leading the way, though as often happened in all theatres it was less a question of leading more of running ahead in the heat of battle and becoming isolated from infantry support as a result, an issue that the infantry riding on them was supposed to address. They were met by a force of 27 Cruiser tanks, largely Cruiser II and Cruiser IV that briefly skirmished with the Japanese spearhead before falling back with the enemy in hot pursuit, which was precisely what Montgomery had planned for. As the Japanese advanced, they came under fire from concealed anti-tank guns and hull down Matilda IIs and Valentines. Most of the infantry tanks were still only equipped with 2pdr guns, these were more than adequate against the available Japanese tanks and the spearhead was cut to pieces with British artillery adding to the carnage [3].
The infantry attacks that were intended to follow up a successful armoured breakthrough went in nonetheless and persisted for three days, making little ground before they were finally called off and a series of small-scale British attacks between the 25th and 26th of March retook what meagre ground they had taken. After this there was a lull in the fighting, with Montgomery resisting calls for a full-scale counterattack on the grounds he had neither the numbers nor the logistics to sustain a meaningful pursuit. Some of the Japanese saw this ‘inertia’ as a sign that they had stretched the British to the breaking point and with the failure of the attacks in the east they cajoled their troops into preparing what was hoped to be the final attack that would break the Swettenham Line and open the road to Singapore. This was fuelled by a sense that the British must have had to create a weak point somewhere in their lines to mount an effective defence in the east and faced with the knowledge that abandoning the attack would essentially mean giving up on conquering Malaya altogether there really was no other option but one last push from the Japanese perspective. This fresh attack was launched on the 30th of March [4].
Certainly, the defenders on the Swettenham line were tired and not as strong as they had been on the 20th, however they were still stronger than the Japanese and their supply lines were secure and able to provide rations and ammunition to the troops, not something the Japanese troops could count on by this stage of the battle. The renewed attack didn’t achieve even the limited gains of the previous assault on the 20th, nevertheless the renewed attack continued for five days this time, with some Japanese units being reduced to mounting bayonet attacks by the 4th of April, whatever else they lacked determination was not in short supply, though it was not nearly enough in the face machine guns and artillery that never quite ran out of ammunition even though the British were running short by the 4th of April. The Japanese did try to vary their tactics, putting in a night attack on the 6th of April that turned into a confused mess with Japanese units running into one another in the dark and alerting the defenders. On the other hand British probes of the Japanese lines were also met with stiff resistance, confirming Montgomery’s decision to remain on the defensive [5].
It was only when reports were received that the attack into Burma had been also repulsed, which was not until the 10th of April after the remnants of the 55th Division finished their retreat, that it was finally conceded that the forces facing the Swettenham Line would have to withdraw and regroup. The theoretical threat of a British attack towards Bangkok from Burma provided a face-saving excuse to withdraw northwards, and the Japanese began pulling out of the forward positions on the 11th, with the entire force in motion by the 13th, hence Montgomery marking this as the end of the battle. For the defending troops this was an immense relief, though as far as Montgomery was concerned the defence of the Swettenham Line was simply a steppingstone to driving the Japanese completely out of South East Asia and the Dutch East Indies, the Pacific he was prepared to leave to the Americans [6].
On the Japanese side there was a very quiet shift in strategy, a reluctant acceptance that for the time being at least they had no choice but to shift to the defensive, not only in Malaya but across the rest of their conquests. This did not spare several senior officers from being dismissed in disgrace, carrying the blame for the overreach that was now handing the initiative to their enemies. This shift in Japanese strategy not only gave the British a secure base of operations, but it also meant that when faming struck Bengal in 1943 the British were able to mount a meaningful relief effort through Burma, countering claims by some nationalists that they were prepared to leave Indians to die of hunger [7].
From this point on Japan would be facing a battle for survival, not conquest The Royal Navy would return to Singapore in due course and from there they would be able to blockade the Japanese forces in the Dutch East Indies and the need to fight on so many fronts put an ever greater strain on an already overextended IJA and IJN, with the latter facing its own catastrophes in the spring of 1942 [8].
[1] So yes there were some attempts to try and properly balance the forces, but no one was willing to dial things back when it became clear that wasn’t possible.
[2] A big part of the problem for the Japanese is that they don’t have as much room for surprise as they did back in December 1941, and even they telegraphed a lot of their moves, the counters were just poorly handled.
[3] It’s a trick that was used time and again in the war, using armour as bait to draw in the enemy.
[4] Its one last throw of the dice for the Japanese, and such things have worked on occasion, its just the Japanese no longer enjoy that kind of luck.
[5] Both sides are getting close to complete exhaustion at this point.
[6] So Montgomery’s ego is quite unlimited.
[7] So yes, the Bengal famine doesn’t happen.
[8] And those catastrophes will be along in a few updates.