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Battle of Kuala Lumpur | |||||||
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Part of Pacific War, World War II | |||||||
Japanese troops advancing through Kuala Lumpur. | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
United Kingdom Federated Malay States | Twenty-Fifth Army: Imperial Guards 5th Division 18th Division 3rd Air Division 22nd Air Flotilla | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Arthur Percival [1] Lewis Heath Henry Gordon Bennett Merton Beckwith-Smith | Tomoyuki Yamashita Takuma Nishimura Takuro Matsui Renya Mutaguchi | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
Unknown | Unknown | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Unknown | Unknown |
The Battle of Kuala Lumpur was a battle between Japanese invasion forces and the British forces in Kuala Lumpur, in the then capital of the Federated Malay States, a British protectorate. Starting in late December Japanese began bombing the city;ground forces reached the city by 11 January 1942. The battle was part of Empire of Japan's expansive attack across the Pacific in December 1941, invading and attacking all over the Pacific, from Pearl Harbor, striking islands across the Pacific, Philippines, Malaya, Borneo, Burma, and Thailand. The invasion of Malaya leading up this battle had started after midnight on December 8 with the invasion of Kota Bharu.
Japanese naval aircraft launched the first air raid over Kuala Lumpur on 21 and 22 December 1941. British anti-aircraft guns and RAF aircraft intercepted the attack and shot down one Japanese aircraft and damaged another. [2] [3] More raids followed on the 25th and 27th. The last bombing was on 10 January 1942, after Port Swettenham fell.
By 7 January, the northern part of Malaya, including Perlis, Kedah, Kelantan, Terengganu and the Straits Settlement of Penang had fallen into Japanese hands.
After the Battle of Slim River, the Japanese troops' next military objective was Kuala Lumpur. Being the capital of the Federated Malay States it was of utmost importance to the Japanese. Kuala Lumpur by then was also the capital of the State of Selangor. The city was also home to RAF Kuala Lumpur.
On 7 January, it was decided to abandon Selangor and Negeri Sembilan to the Japanese, and British forces began a quick retreat to Johor then to Singapore. The city, now abandoned, quickly descended into a state of anarchy and chaos. Looting was widespread; the Robinsons and Whiteaway and Laidlaw department stores at Java Street were sacked by panicked KLites. Cinemas such as Cathay and Odeon at Batu Road were closed, and the Malay Mail published its last pre-war issue. The FMS administration is no longer in place. [4]
As the British retreated, they continued the scorched earth policy they had used in Perak - tin mines, rubber plantations and munitions were simply torched. Fires continued to burn for days even after the Japanese took over Kuala Lumpur.
On 10 January the Japanese reached Serendah, about 26 km from Kuala Lumpur.
The following day the Japanese entered Kuala Lumpur without much resistance, besides small skirmishes. The British troops had left the city. The Japanese troops quickly took control of government and institutional buildings, such as the Sultan Abdul Samad Building, the railway station and the Pudu Jail.
After the battle, the Japanese used Pudu Jail as a POW detention centre. Many Allied POWs were tortured to death.
Japanese troops continued their advance southward along highway 1. Kajang was bombed on 12 January; the bombs, intended for the railway station, missed, and landed on a nearby church instead. [5]
Kuala Lumpur, with the rest of the peninsula, remained under Japanese occupation until September 1945, when the Japanese home islands surrendered unconditionally after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by American forces in August 1945. The British Military Administration took over thereafter.
Little is known about the battle, since it did not bear much significance when compared to greater battles in British Malaya such as the Battle of Singapore.
The Malayan Union was a union of the Malay states and the Straits Settlements of Penang and Malacca. It was the successor to British Malaya and was conceived to unify the Malay Peninsula under a single government to simplify administration. Following opposition by the ethnic Malays, the union was reorganised as the Federation of Malaya in 1948.
The Federated Malay States was a federation of four protected states in the Malay Peninsula — Selangor, Perak, Negeri Sembilan and Pahang — established in 1895 by the British government, and which lasted until 1946. In that year they formed the Malayan Union together with two of the former Straits Settlements,, and the Unfederated Malay States. Two years later, the union became the Federation of Malaya, which achieved independence in 1957, and finally Malaysia in 1963 with the inclusion of North Borneo, Sarawak and Singapore.
The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War or the Pacific Theater, was the theater of World War II that was fought in eastern Asia, the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and Oceania. It was geographically the largest theater of the war, including the Pacific Ocean theater, the South West Pacific theater, the Second Sino-Japanese War, and the Soviet–Japanese War in the last few months of the war.
The South-East Asian Theatre of World War II consisted of the campaigns of the Pacific War in the Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia, Indochina, Burma, India, Malaya, and Singapore between 1941 and 1945.
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The Pudu Prison, also known as Pudu Jail, was a prison in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Built in phases by the British colonial government between 1891 and 1895, it stood on Jalan Shaw. The construction began with its 394-metre prison wall at a cost of 16,000 Straits dollars, and had been adorned with the world's longest mural at one point in its history.
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Kuala Lumpur is the largest city in Malaysia; it is also the nation's capital. The history of Kuala Lumpur began in the middle of the 19th century with the rise of the tin mining industry, and boomed in the early 20th century with the development of rubber plantations in Selangor. It became the capital of Selangor, later the Federated Malay States, and then Malayan Union, Malaya and finally Malaysia.
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The bombing of Singapore was an attack on 8 December 1941 by seventeen G3M Nell bombers of Mihoro Air Group, Imperial Japanese Navy, flying from Thu Dau Mot in southern Indochina. The attack began at around 0430, shortly after Japanese forces landed on Kota Bharu, Kelantan in northern Malaya. It was the first knowledge the Singapore population had that war had broken out in the Far East.
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The Penang and Province Wellesley Volunteer Corps, also known as Penang Volunteer Corps and Penang Volunteer Rifle was a militia unit in Malaya. It was established on 1 March 1861 and together with Singapore Volunteer Corps and Malacca Volunteer Corps, they were a part of the Crown Colony of the Straits Settlements Volunteer Force (SSVF). The Penang Volunteer Rifle was the 3rd Battalion SSVF while Singapore is 1st and 2nd Battalion SSVF and Malacca was the 4th Battalion SSVF. After the expulsion of Singapore from Malaysia in 1965, the Penang Volunteer Rifle became the oldest military unit established in Malaysia.
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