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COLONEL TSUJI WAS ONE OF THE MOST BRILLIANT JAPANESE OFFICERS OF WORLD
WAR TWO, THIS IS A MILITARY BOOK ABOUT THE MALAYA CAMPAIGN 1941-1942, THAT
LASTED FOR ONE HUNDRED DAYS STARTING IN THAILAND AND ENDED WITH THE FALL
OF SINGAPORE, HE FOUGHT VALIANTLY AND CORAGEUSLY AGAINST BRITISH COLONIALISM
THROUGH THE JUNGLES OF MALAYA ENDING 130 YEARS OF BRITISH RULE.
THE APPENDIX OF THE BOOK DESCRIBES THE JAPANESE COPROSPERITY SPHERE
WHICH BASICALLY WAS A PAN ASIAN LEAGUE FREE FROM BOTH SOVIET COMMUNISM
AND WESTERN IMPERIALISM.
THE BOOK IS DEDICATED TO THE GENERAL TOMOYUKI YAMASHITA KNOWN AS THE TIGER
OF MALAYA WHO WAS UNJUSTLY HANGED BY THE VENGEFUL ALLIES AFTER THE WAR,
IN A KANGAROO COURT MORE AKIN TO FIDEL CASTRO AND CHE GUEVARA REVOLUTIONARY
JUSTICE ( THE SHOOTING WALLS OF LA CABANA FORTRESS CAME TO MY MIND) THAN THE
ANGLO SAXON RULE OF LAW.

This is one of the rare books which narrates invasion of Malayan peninsula ,Singapore from the Japanese perspective. Colonel Masanobu Tsuji served in operations branch of General Tomoyuki Yamashita's Twenty fifth Army and was involved in the detailed planning to seize the above.

Firstly, author debunks Churchill's claim that Japanese had been preparing for this operation for a long time. Author argues fighting Western powers was secondary in Japan's scheme of priorities. Russia had always been Japan's traditional enemy. Troops fought Red Army in Siberia and Manchuria. Japanese soldiers were not accustomed to fighting in the tropics as they were no jungles in Japan. But pressure of events forced Tokyo to take 180 degree turn to the south. This was in response to economic warfare waged by Anglo Saxon powers. Halt in US oil exports to Japan hurt her economy badly.

Operational planning commenced only on January 1941 . Planning was executed with utmost urgency and impeccable efficiency attests to the skill of Japanese strategists. For the smooth conduct of operation it was essential to collect information on tropical areas. So a research department was set up called UNIT 82 which was based at Taipei, Formosa. It was given the task of collecting every conceivable information on tropical warfare. Research work engaged by the organisation was called Doro Nawa model.

Many people ungrudgingly shared their knowledge. An old sea dog gave information about coastal conditions,disembarkation methods, atmospheric conditions. Professor from Taiwan university gave lectures on tropical medicine and counter measures against Malaria. During the course of research Japanese found out Thailand was virtually defenceless . No Thai troops could be seen along the coast and government was corrupt , complacent. In Malaya, the situation was slightly different . Coastal defences were strong in Mersing but less strong elsewhere. British commonwealth troops were inadequately trained, poorly equipped and badly deployed. RAF appeared strong in paper. But most planes were obsolete unsuited for combat. In other words, area would not pose an obstacle to a determined assault. Then came a stunning information : Singapore fortress was strong formidable from the sea but its rear facing Johore province was defenceless. Not even Mr. Churchill realised this vulnerability.

British deliberately kept the area unfortified. According to British military thinking malaria-ridden ,mosquito-infested jungles laced with swamps, marshes formed an impenetrable barrier to any attacker planning to assault Singapore fortress from the north. British strategists further thought jungle would impede the movement of armour.These men were myopic because they overlooked the fact during German invasion of France and Low countries panzers threaded its way through hilly , wooded terrain of Ardennes in southern Belgium and Luxembourg before debouching into the plains of northern France.The incident drives home the lesson that against determined foe no terrain can form an obstacle.

Japanese launched an amphibious assault by landing in isthmus of Kra on December 8, 1941. Established air superiority after quickly seizing the airfields on northern Malaya. Author narration shows how rapidly Japanese troops worked its way down the Malayan peninsula. In the course they fought a series of short, sharp engagements with the retreating British:battles of Jitra river, Sims, Gemas, Bakri Muar. British defence lines were breached by turning movements from the jungle as well from the sea as the invaders consistently menaced British lines of retreat. Japanese frustrated attempts by British to demolish bridges which would have slowed down their advance. Soldiers riding on bicycles helped invading army surmount obstacles. Wherever bridges were blown infantry continued to advance wading across river carrying bicycles on their shoulders and use log bridges supported on shoulders by engineers standing on the stream.

Commomwealth troops exhausted, outfought crossed over to Singapore damaging the causeway linking the island to Malayan peninsula. Japanese army without any pause assaulted the northern sector of island which was poorly defended;rebuilt causeway and sent tanks across it. British attacks were broken up by dive bombing. 15th February all resistance ceased. Some, however, argue general Percival had sufficient men, supplies,war material. He could have prolonged resistance. And Yamashita almost the end of logistical tether would have buckled. By this time British were terribly demoralised and had no will to continue resistance.

Thus Yamashita scored biggest triumph in his life and his nation won biggest victory in her history. Laid low an island fortress which for years was prepared at a great cost to withstand attack and siege. In Berlin German High Command was stunned, for it expected that capture of Singapore would take five and half divisions and eighteen months . But Yamashita achieved within two months with just two divisions.For a long time British propaganda claimed Singapore to be an impregnable fortress. Japanese success showed the claim was absurd.

Fall of Singapore was an irretrievable blow to British pride and arrogance. A turning point in history ,for it hastened the collapse the of British empire. India, Pakistan,Ceylon, Phillipines, Dutch East Indies gained independence. As author aptly puts it, reduction of the Singapore fortress was a 'hinge of fate' for peoples of Asia.

Colonel Tsuji was an example of the field-grade officers who so influenced Japanese foreign policy in the 1930s. He literally wrote the book on the outbreak of December 1941--"Read This Only and the War Is Won," which appears as an appendix to this narrative history of the Malaya campaign. Tsuji later turns up in the Philippines, Guadalcanal, and China, where he earned immortality of sorts by cooking and serving the liver of an American pilot. He was a tactical genius and a monster, and this was only one of his campaigns, and only one of his books. Later he became a respected politician--until he mysteriously disappeared on a trip to China and perhaps Vietnam.

In the matter of Singapore during the Pacific War, Masanobu Shuji should not be remembered for whatever tactical "brilliance" he tends to attribute to himself in this book (and for which he was always known to take more than his share of credit for.) The primary action that Shuji should be, and is known for in Singapore, is the Sook Ching Massacre, which took the lives of up to 50,000 Chinese men, women, and children. In the aftermath of the Surrender of Singapore, Masanobu Shuji was tasked by General Yamashita to "stabilize" the city by whatever means necessary. Shuji directed the Kempetei in a systematic pogrom from late February to early March 1942, "screening" able-bodied men, along with some women and children, who all "disappeared" and whose remains were eventually found in mass graves around Singapore during the 1960s.

Masanobu Shuji was a clever and vicious fanatic for the Imperial Japanese Army who helped to instigate the Nomonhan Incident along the Soviet border with disastrous results for the Japanese; Superseded and countermanded orders by his superiors while in Guadalcanal to make questionable troop movements that he himself admitted likely led to the deaths of at least 20,000 Japanese soldiers (one situation the Allies were grateful for his bungling); Through many anonymous calls to field commanders, Tsuji ordered the massacres of all Allied and Filipino POWs captured after the fall of Bataan, resulting in a number of brutal slaughters carried out by unsuspecting junior officers; And while in Burma, continually interfered and intimidated his superiors to force a "die in place" mandate on all Japanese units remaining in Burma, that led to thousands of unnecessary deaths of both Allied and Japanese soldiers. During this period, he is said tomhave ordered the death of a captured American pilot, whereupon he ordered the pilot's liver to be served for dinner and consumed the first portion.

Tsuji was a supremely evil instigator and dogmatic racist who encouraged atrocities by his subordinates wherever he was posted during WWII. He manipulated and riled up hatred in his fellow officers, while also encouraging insubordination against their superiors, a tactic known as "leading from below." Tsuji was despised by most conventional IJA commanders for his disrespect in their presence and his tendency to exaggerate his actions on the battlefield, but also feared for his suspected connections to Tojo and the Kempetei. He escaped prosecution after WWII by hiding with the Natuonalist Chinese until the majority of war crime trials had already started.

Praising Masanobu Tsuji for his military tactics is like praising Mengele for a book on medicine, or the commanders of SS Das Reich and Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler for their "brilliance" and "bravery" on the battlefield. One should not confuse psychopathic brutality with the profession of arms. And those who have posted such extravagant praise for this war criminal's bloated prose here should become really more informed on who this wicked man truly was, and the extreme suffering he caused to so many people, both Allies, Japanese and civilians.