The devils circle, p.7
The Devil's Circle, page 7
The change in management of Singapore didn’t really matter to most people at first. We were willing to give the new masters a chance. The lurid stories of rape and pillage, the barbaric treatment of POWs and civilian prisoners, all these were put down to British propaganda. The Japanese soon wiped away that illusion. They extorted $50 million from the Chinese of Malaya. Family fortunes were ruined paying this “donation” towards the civilising mission of the Japanese Empire. Worse was Sook Ching, the operation to clean up Chinese opposition to the new order. I escaped with my life, barely. Many were not as lucky. Sook Ching embittered the Chinese in a way that no amount of placatory gestures would have appeased, even if the Japanese had bothered to try. Winning the hearts and minds of their new subjects was not part of their agenda.
Not unnaturally, the resistance to the Japanese was mainly Chinese-based. It was also Communist-led for the most part, although there were a few Kuomintang-affiliated groups up north near the Siamese border. Ah Moy had been a revelation to me. I hadn’t realised that the Overseas-Chinese Anti-Japanese Army had a presence in Singapore. The Communist-dominated MPAJA posed as the only resistance to the occupiers. They gave short shrift to any other resistance groups when they found them. I had no doubt that Ah Moy had kept a very low profile indeed, not just for fear of the Japanese.
The sudden surrender of Japan left a void that the Communists were quick to fill. They had practically the only organised armed force in Malaya. The British pretended that the Communists were acting under orders as part of the grand Allied scheme of things, but the reality was different and everyone knew it. The small groups of Allied liason officers from Force 136 were more hostages of the MPAJA than its leaders. They were useful in getting supplies of arms and ammunition. A few were genuinely respected by their hosts; the rest were tolerated as long as they were useful.
The MPAJA had marched into the towns and villages of Malaya as the Japanese withdrew, posing as liberators. Then they started to mete out justice. The police were the first targets. So were those who had worked with the Japanese to keep the place running: district officers, penghulu, employees of government departments. The most savage reprisals were reserved for informers and profiteers. Popular justice was lynch-mob justice. Women who had liaisons with Japanese men were paraded through the streets naked, tortured and then murdered. Men who had worked too closely with the Japanese were dragged from their homes and subjected to all sorts of barbarities before being killed. The mere accusation of being an informer often was enough to condemn a man to a horrific death. Many personal scores were paid off during that vicious interregnum. The Japanese had been barbaric. The Communists proved that barbarism was not exclusive to one race.
In an ironic way, the British would have preferred that the Japanese had resisted their reoccupation of Malaya. They had a grand plan for the invasion and reconquest of Malaya, Operation Zipper. Operation Zipper came unzipped when the atom bombs were dropped. Reconquest would have re-established their predominance; reoccupation was such an anticlimax. They couldn’t just let the MPAJA take over. The main invasion force was far from ready. It would be weeks before they could reach Malaya. So they decided that some token force had to go and plant the flag. Ralph had been one of the valiant vanguard. He told me how it had happened.
The CO of his unit had called him into his office the day after the Surrender.
“Are you doing anything in particular today, Smallwood?” asked the CO.
“No, Sir, nothing in my diary,” answered Ralph innocently.
“Right-ho, get your kit packed. We’re dropping you into Singapore tonight.”
The next morning he and his Gurkha support team found themselves on Farrer Park Racecourse re-taking the fortress of Singapore for the British Empire.
Like the MPAJA, the British also were out to nail the collaborators. Unlike the MPAJA, they did it legally. The started from the top, with the Malay sultans who had made their peace with the Japanese. Some, like the Sultan of Johore, were clearly white. He had put his Johore State Force at the disposal of the British during the fight for Malaya. When the British abandoned the mainland he chose to stay with his people rather than run away, and made his peace with the new imperial power. Others were grey. They said that they had no choice but to obey the new masters, but there was a suspicion that in some cases their obedience was not entirely forced. Two were black; they had been installed by the Japanese as compliant puppets. They were deposed quickly and banished. The hunt went down the line from the top to the bottom. The newspapers started baying for blood practically from the day they started publishing again. Renegades and traitors had to get their just desserts. Society demanded it. They were even going to rename Japan Street. It definitely wasn’t a good time to be a friend of the Japanese.
I was acutely aware of all this as I trudged through the gates of the internment camp in Jurong. I had come to interview a Japanese friend in order to prepare the defence of a Japanese war criminal. This wasn’t going to do anything for my popularity among the public.
COMMANDER HOJO YOSHISADA looked a lot older. It had only been a couple of months since I saw him last, but he had aged perceptibly. We bowed in the customary manner. I noticed though that he had added a couple of degrees to his bow and his head was lower than mine.
“Hojo-san, you are well?” I enquired.
“As well as can be expected,” he replied courteously. “The British have been exemplary. I personally have no complaints. They give me much liberty. Many of my countrymen are not so fortunate. They have been made to labour in the hot sun at Tengah and are humiliated daily. Some of the British cannot forget and will not forgive the treatment that they and their comrades received. They are paying us back in our own coin. I cannot say that I blame them.” He sighed. “And you, Chiang-san? You are well?”
“I also cannot complain,” I responded with equal courtesy. “What news of Takeda-san?”
“He has been repatriated. The Americans need help with the occupation. His talents are in demand. He can contribute to the rehabilition of my homeland.”
We sat down at the bare table in his office. Hojo and I had worked together in a department of the Syonan Tokubetusi. Our job had been to write pleasant little pieces to show the world how happy and gay everyone was under the new regime; in a word, propaganda. He was a naval officer who had lost an eye aboard the cruiser Jintsu during the Battle of the Java Sea, which gave him a vaguely Nelsonian look. Hojo had been trained in Dartmouth at a time when the Anglo-Japanese Alliance was still alive. He was a decent man. Those of us who knew him put in a good word when the British came back. It seemed to have worked. Most of his compatriots had been kept locked up in the internment camps. Hojo was allowed a degree of freedom to come and go without escort. The British needed interpreters and liaison officers. Hojo fitted the bill. He couldn’t leave the camp without permission of course; but he had no reason or desire to do so. A lone Japanese wandering around the island wouldn’t have lasted very long.
I explained what I had come for. “I have been tasked to defend one Warrant Officer Nakamura Nagamasa. He has been charged with war crimes, specifically murdering four people during interrogation. Do you know him?”
Hojo smiled slightly. “Why should I know him? He is Kempei, is he not?”
I nodded. “No reason, just asking. Anyway, I need to defend him. To do that I have to know why. Why did he act as he did? Was he ordered to do so?”
Hojo arched his eyebrows interrogatively. “Why do you ask me? Should you not be talking to him instead?”
“He won’t talk. All he’ll say is his rank and name. I thought you might explain it to me.”
“You have cigarettes?” asked Hojo. I drew a pack out of my pocket and passed it to him. He withdrew one and lit it, savouring the aroma for a time. I waited patiently.
“You ask me why,” he said at length. “Who can say? I am a naval officer. My family have been naval officers since the Meiji Restoration. Before that we were samurai, for generations stretching back long before the Gempei War. What do I know of the ways of the Kempeitai?”
I was disappointed and said so. Hojo shook his head. “You take an ashigaru and give him a toy sword, a shin gunto, and think by this to make him a samurai?” He made a scornful noise. “What does such a man know of Bushido, of the way of the warrior? He sees but he does not understand. He acts as he thinks a samurai acts, without understanding the code of the warrior and the customs of war.
“There are seven principles of Bushido: righteousness, humanity, sincerity, propriety, honour, courage and loyalty. The old samurai families understand this. But the new army is not a samurai army. An army raised from peasants, officered by peasants, remains a peasant army, for all their fine uniforms and shining medals. You met some of them, men like Tsuji, mad dogs lusting for power. They think that it is Nippon’s manifest destiny to supplant the white man and rule Asia. This can only be done by conquest, by terrorising people into submission. If there is resistance, it must be crushed. If anyone fights back there must be vengence — two eyes for an eye, ten teeth for a tooth. To hold an empire by fear, that is their creed.” He took a deep whiff of smoke. “The mad dogs had good teachers — Russians and Frenchmen and Germans. And even Britons. They learned the lessons of European history well; that the strong take from the weak and that there is great honour and prestige in possessing the lands of others. Now we are told that this is wrong. It is wrong to seize colonies from the Europeans. That is a war crime, a crime against humanity.”
He paused momentarily. “Not all of us wanted this war,” he continued. “Admiral Yamamoto did not want war. He knew that we would lose if we fought the Americans. He said so often. But he was overruled. We have paid the price. Yamamoto paid the price. The Americans shot him down in an ambush. You remember how we had to suppress the news of his assassination?”
“If you knew you would lose why did you do it?” I asked.
Hojo took a deep breath. “Duty. You do not understand the word. The duty of a samurai is to obey his lord above all. It is his duty to fight and die for the Emperor. His own life means nothing.”
“Even in a war you say you did not want?” I pressed.
“Even in such a war. The Kwantung Army was responsible for getting Nippon involved in the China Incident. The civilians lost control. There was a military clique that was bent on conquest. Even senior officers could not control them. Gekokujo we called it; the juniors prevail over the seniors. Assassins and murderers went unpunished. The politicians were too weak or too afraid to oppose the military clique. After they assassinated Prime Minister Inukai, who can blame them? We saw where it was leading but what could we do? All was done in the name of the Emperor. We had no choice but to obey, even though it meant our destruction. When the Americans imposed their oil embargo, we were forced to fight. We could not just surrender. To surrender is to lose one’s honour. To live dishonoured is far worse than to die.”
I let the matter drop, not wanting to get into a long debate. “This doesn’t give me anything to go on,” I said. “I can’t argue that because the British and the Dutch and the French have forcibly colonised Asia, the Japanese are justified in killing and torturing the very people whom they have made their subjects.”
Hojo lit another cigarette. “You are right, of course. You wish to understand? Let me try to explain. Australian and British officers came into the Harbour and sank our ships. They were brave men and worthy opponents. We honoured them even as we executed them. But the Army cannot believe that such a thing can happen without help from the population. So what do they do? They turn to the Kempeitai. They order them to find the people responsible. I do not know this Nakamura. From the little you tell me, I deduce that he is not an intelligent man. To such a man, there is only one way to find out. Beat the truth out of the prisoner. Extract his fingernails and crush his genitals until he talks. That is the way of the Kempeitai.”
I shuddered involuntarily. I knew exactly what he was talking about. My back still had the scars. Shaking off the evil memory, I pressed on. “Nakamura isn’t being tried for that incident. Others will be in the dock soon for that, I hear. This was afterwards, early in 1944.”
“The principle is the same,” he responded. “The Army decides that there are too many subversive elements in the population. They fear lawlessness. Resistance must be crushed. The Kempeitai are called in to extract information.”
“And what if a man like Nakamura couldn’t get the information his superiors wanted? Would he be killed?” I persisted.
Hojo laughed shortly. “Killed? Of course not. No army can operate on the principle that those who fail are to be killed. He would have been disgraced. He would be dishonoured by his failure. If that failure were bad enough, he would have committed seppuku. To atone for his failings and redeem his honour.”
“Would he have been forced to commit hara-kiri?”
“No true samurai is forced to do what honour demands. Say that an important prisoner escapes through negligence of the guards or dies in custody without giving information. The officer in charge is dishonoured. A samurai would know what to do, even if the fault was that of his subordinates. Such a dishonour can only be redeemed by seppuku. For one such as Nakamura, I do not know. It may be that he would have to be told what to do. You cannot ask me. He is the only one who knows. Or his superiors, if you can find them.”
I pursed my lips. It wasn’t much of a defence; certainly not one that I would be happy to advance as an excuse for murder. “Who would his superiors be?” I asked.
“I cannot say for sure. The 3rd Kempeitai Headquarters of the Southern Army was responsible for Malai, Syonan and Lingga. The commanding officer of the 4th Kempeitai Branch in Syonan at that time was Lieutenant-Colonel Sumida Haruzo. He would know who Nakamura’s superiors were. You might perhaps ask him what you want.”
“This Lieutenant-Colonel Sumida. Do you know him personally?”
“Slightly,” replied Hojo dismissively. “A man of culture, but with no other redeeming qualities. The British must have him if he is still alive.”
I rose to leave. “Thank you for your assistance Hojo-san,” I said, bowing.
“I am pleased to have been of assistance, Chiang-san,” he replied, bowing deeper. As I reached the door he spoke again. “I fear that I have upset you, my young friend. You asked me to explain. I have done so as far as I am able. To understand is not to condone. I understand why my countrymen have done what they did in the name of patriotism. I do not condone it. I am deeply ashamed.”
I never saw him again. He was repatriated early in 1946. Under different circumstances we might have become close friends.
ON the way back from Jurong I decided to drop in on Marge. Colonel Newman had provided d’Almeida with a Humber staff car, which Ahmad drove. The Morris was put at the disposal of whoever needed out-of-town transport. I enjoyed the freedom that possession of a car gave me. I took the long route by the sea. The road ran past little fishermen’s kampongs set in the middle of mangrove swamps. The village folk bred prawns in the swamps and made charcoal out of the mangrove wood. Rickety plank walkways connected the huts to the road. Small crocodiles basked on the mudbanks. Once past the 7th milestone the Malay kampongs gave way to the mansions of the rich Babas, looking much the worse for wear now. Most had been taken over by the Japanese during the Occupation. They hadn’t bothered to maintain them much, which was to be expected given the shortages we suffered. The grand gardens had been dug up and planted with vegetables. Despite the general dilapidation the area still retained an air of faded gentility.
I wasn’t entirely sure where Ahmad’s kampong was. We’d taken a trishaw from town, which was in the opposite direction. Had I missed it somehow, I asked myself. I was debating whether to turn around and retrace my road when I saw the stream and the pillbox. I might have driven right past if it hadn’t been for the army truck parked by the roadside. I pulled up and got out full of foreboding.
There was a welcoming committee already at the kampong. Half a dozen British soldiers with fixed bayonets were at the small bridge crossing the stream. Beyond them was a throng of villagers, maybe thirty or forty strong. They were armed with a collection of parangs and bamboo spears. One of the soldiers stepped forward to bar my way.
“What the hell’s going on?” I demanded. “Who’s in charge here?”
The soldier flinched in surprise, not quite expecting to be addressed in such a manner by a native. A sergeant detached himself from the group.
“What’s your bloody business ’ere then?” he demanded.
“What’s your business here?” I retorted. “You’ve no right to block access. This is a public path.”
“We ’ave our orders,” replied the sergeant. “No one leaves the village.”
“Well, I’m not leaving am I?” I responded, pushing my way past him. “I’m bloody well going in.”
I marched right over the bridge before the astounded sergeant could react. The kampong folk looked uncertain. I was a stranger of unknown intent. There was an awkward silence as I stood facing them.
“Tuan Dennis,” called a voice from the crowd.
“Karim,” I responded with relief, “apa khabar?”
“Khabar baik,” he answered, giving the customary response. All is well. How ironic, I thought, with armed troops in front and a mob behind. I got the story from him with an effort, trying hard to follow his quick-fire Malay. Apparently, a British officer had appeared out of the blue and demanded to see Mariam — or Margaret, as he called her. The kampong folk demurred. Karim and his brother Roslan were called. Heated words were exchanged. Shortly afterwards the officer had returned with a platoon of troops. He tried to force his way across the bridge but found it barred by the villagers. Not wanting to break the impasse by force, he had ordered his men to surround the kampong. No one was to leave.
