Pol/F.007B/N.006
Answering questions shot at them in rapid succession, Captain Henry Steele, who recently returned from Malaya and Java, and Mr Henry Stokes, of the ABC staff, who was in various theatres of war, gave some very interesting facts on Japanese methods to members of the Constitutional Club yesterday.
Mr Stokes said the Japanese were assisted by a wonderful fifth column, wonderful information and a great air force, about which other nations knew nothing prior to the war.
Asked if it were true that Indian troops in Malaya threw down their arms, Mr Stokes said that two-thirds of the British were Indians and Asiatics. General Bennett saw the possibility of Singapore's fall. The 45th Indian brigade was put into a weak sector on the west flank of the Australians. The Japanese came over strongly, more particularly with aircraft. They wiped out the whole of the 45th brigade's head quarters, except one man, and the troops were left without officers. The Asiatics under the dive bombing cracked up badly and did drop their arms, but he had seen a number of our own men do just the same thing, because it was just suicide to stand and "take it." Between 400 and 500 Indians had dropped their guns. Very much the same thing applied on the islands. The Asiatics could not take the dive bombing and he did not know how men lived through such bombing. About 400 men of the AIF were mown down trying to hold an aerodrome. The Indians could hardly be blamed for what they did.
Questioned regarding infiltration, Captain Steele said if the Japanese ever arrived here they would find infiltration more difficult, but in Malaya they had great opportunities for infiltration, because they could go anywhere they liked, as long as they could hack their way through the jungle.
Mr Stokes, replying to a question regarding Japanese atrocities, said that Australian prisoners who had escaped said they had been treated well by the Japanese. He was inclined to think that the atrocity stories were greatly exaggerated.
Captain Steele, referring to the same matter, said that when the Japanese had a job in hand they did not bother much about the prisoners they had taken, but herded them in between the Japanese troops and afterwards gave them a light guard. Atrocity by the Japanese probably developed when the job in hand was finished and the Japanese sat down with nothing to do.
Mr Stokes said the Japanese were first-class soldiers. They might not have initiative, but when the plan of co-ordination was worked out the generalship behind the whole movement made the Japanese a good soldier.
Captain Steele said that probably the main reason why the Japanese appeared to be a first-class solider was that he was fighting as an individual. He had a definite task to perform. He was told to get to some place and there re-form. The Japanese had to get there or die in the attempt. They became individual gangsters and shot their way through. However, when they had hard-fighting soldiers right up against them they would not stand up to serious business.
When asked whether the complete destruction of the causeway would have prevented the fall of Singapore Captain Steele said the engineering performances of the Japanese in Malaya were remarkable. In four hours they reconstructed bridges which it was estimated would take a full day. If the causeway had been blown from end to end it would not have made any difference to the Japanese landing on the island.