Tomoyuki Yamashita - The Tiger of Malaya Responsible for Massacres in Singapore & Philippines - WW2
Tomoyuki Yamashita - The Tiger of Malaya Responsible for Massacres in Singapore & Philippines - WW2
Execution of Tomoyuki Yamashita -“The Tiger of Malaya” Responsible for Massacres in Singapore \u0026 Philippines - WW2. Tomoyuki Yamashita, the second son of a local doctor, was born on the 8 November 1885 in a village named Osugi located on the island of Shikoku. In November 1905, at the age of 20, Yamashita graduated from the 18th class of the Imperial Japanese Army Academy. He was ranked 16th out of 920 cadets. After the February 26 Incident of 1936, which was an attempted coup d’état in the Empire of Japan organized by a group of young Imperial Japanese Army officers with the goal of purging the government and military leadership of their factional rivals and ideological opponents, Yamashita fell into disfavor with Emperor Hirohito due to his appeal for leniency toward rebel officers involved in the attempted coup. He was eventually relegated to a post in Korea and one year later in November 1937 he was promoted to lieutenant-general. At this time Japan was in war with China. Japanese territorial expansion in East Asia began in 1931 with the invasion of Manchuria and continued in 1937 with a brutal attack on China. Yamashita insisted that Japan should end the conflict with China and keep peaceful relations with the United States and Great Britain, but he was ignored and subsequently assigned to an unimportant post. Between 1938 and 1940, Yamashita was assigned to command the infantry Division which saw some action in northern China against insurgents fighting the occupying Japanese armies. The Second World War began on the 1st of September, 1939 when Nazi Germany invaded Poland. On September 27, 1940, Japan signed the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy, thus entering the military alliance known as the “Axis.”
On 6 November 1941 Yamashita was put in command of the Twenty-Fifth Army with which on 8 December he launched an invasion of Malaya from bases in French Indochina. The Malayan campaign concluded with the fall of Singapore on 15 February 1942, in which Yamashita’s 30,000 front-line soldiers captured 80,000 British, Indian and Australian troops, the largest surrender of British-led personnel in history. After this victory, Yamashita became known as the “Tiger of Malaya”. The campaign and the subsequent Japanese occupation of Singapore included war crimes committed against captive Allied personnel and civilians. On 17 July 1942, he was again reassigned from Singapore to far-away Manchukuo which was a puppet state of the Empire of Japan in Manchuria from 1932 until 1945, having been given a post in commanding the First Area Army, and was effectively sidelined for a major part of the Pacific War. It is thought that general Hideki Tojo, by then the Prime Minister, was responsible for his banishment, taking advantage of Yamashita’s gaffe during a speech made to Singaporean civilian leaders in early 1942, when he referred to the local populace as “citizens of the Empire of Japan”. This was considered embarrassing for the Japanese government, who officially did not consider the residents of occupied territories to have the rights or privileges of Japanese citizenship. Despite this, in February 1943 Yamashita was promoted to full general. Some have suggested that he may have been sent there to prepare for an attack on the Soviet Union in the event that Stalingrad fell to Germany. However this never never happened.
On 26 September 1944, when the war situation was critical for Japan, Yamashita was rescued from his enforced exile in China by the new Japanese government after the downfall of Hideki Tōjō and his cabinet, and he assumed the command of the Fourteenth Area Army to defend the occupied Philippines on 10 October. Yamashita commanded approximately 262,000 troops in three defensive groups. He tried to rebuild his army but was forced to retreat from Manila - the capital of the Philippines - to the mountains. Yamashita ordered all troops, except those given the task of ensuring security, out of the city. While evacuating most of his soldiers, Yamashita, who also served as the governor-general and military governor of the Philippines, did not declare Manila an open city…
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Content
0.78 -> The 7th of December, 1941. 7:55
AM. The first of two waves of
6.9 -> Japanese naval aircraft launched from six
aircraft carriers attack Pearl Harbor,
11.16 -> catching the US forces completely by surprise.
While the attack costs only 29 Japanese planes,
18.12 -> two thousand four hundred US sailors and
soldiers are killed and 1,200 are wounded.
23.88 -> Over half of the military aircraft are
damaged or destroyed, almost all of which
28.38 -> were grounded at the time. One day later on
the 8th of December, the Japanese launch the
33.84 -> invasion of the Philippines and the US and the
Philippine Armies finally surrender in May 1942.
40.02 -> More than 2 years later in October 1944, American
forces begin retaking the Philippines from
46.2 -> Japanese troops which are led by Military
Governor whose units committed unspeakable
50.76 -> atrocities there as well as on the island of
Singapore. His name is Tomoyuki Yamashita.
56.76 -> Tomoyuki Yamashita, the
second son of a local doctor,
60.84 -> was born on the 8 November 1885 in a village
named Osugi located on the island of Shikoku.
68.16 -> In November 1905, at the age of 20,
Yamashita graduated from the 18th class
73.56 -> of the Imperial Japanese Army Academy.
He was ranked 16th out of 920 cadets.
79.74 -> The First World War began on the 28th of July
1914. During the war, Yamashita fought against
86.88 -> the German Empire in Chinese Shandong and
in 1916 he was promoted to captain. The same
92.88 -> year he married a daughter of retired general and
became an expert on Germany, serving as assistant
98.52 -> military attaché at Bern and Berlin from 1919 to
1922. He then returned to Japan but after falling
106.26 -> into disfavor as a result of his involvement with
political factions within the Japanese military,
110.94 -> from 1927 until 1930 Yamashita was posted
as a military attaché to Vienna in Austria.
117.54 -> After the February 26 Incident of 1936, which
was an attempted coup d'état in the Empire of
123.72 -> Japan organized by a group of young Imperial
Japanese Army officers with the goal of purging
128.76 -> the government and military leadership of their
factional rivals and ideological opponents,
133.14 -> Yamashita fell into disfavor with Emperor
Hirohito due to his appeal for leniency
138.12 -> toward rebel officers involved in the attempted
coup. He was eventually relegated to a post in
143.52 -> Korea and one year later in November 1937
he was promoted to lieutenant-general.
148.86 -> At this time Japan was in war with China.
Japanese territorial expansion in East Asia
155.58 -> began in 1931 with the invasion of Manchuria and
continued in 1937 with a brutal attack on China.
162.72 -> Yamashita insisted that Japan
should end the conflict with
166.5 -> China and keep peaceful relations with
the United States and Great Britain,
169.98 -> but he was ignored and subsequently
assigned to an unimportant post.
173.34 -> Between 1938 and 1940, Yamashita was assigned
to command the infantry Division which saw some
180.42 -> action in northern China against insurgents
fighting the occupying Japanese armies.
184.56 -> The Second World War began on the 1st of
September, 1939 when Nazi Germany invaded Poland.
191.46 -> On September 27, 1940, Japan signed the
Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy,
197.94 -> thus entering the military
alliance known as the "Axis."
201.24 -> In December 1940 Yamashita was sent on a six-month
clandestine military mission to Germany and Italy.
207.66 -> Weeks after arriving in Germany, Yamashita was
presented to Adolf Hitler. While Hitler intended
213.9 -> to pressure the Japanese military into declaring
war on Britain and the United States, Yamashita,
218.94 -> facing the wrath of Russia and the ongoing costs
of Japan’s war on China, had no interest. Instead,
225.6 -> he hoped to inspect Germany’s military techniques
and improve Japan’s own prospects at war.
230.7 -> In private, Yamashita was disappointed with the
Führer. He told staff, “He can be a great speaker
236.34 -> on a platform, but standing behind his desk
listening, he looks a lot more like a clerk.”
241.2 -> On 6 November 1941 Yamashita was put in command
of the Twenty-Fifth Army with which on 8 December
248.58 -> he launched an invasion of Malaya from bases in
French Indochina. Because the Japanese force was
254.58 -> about one-third as large as the opposing
British forces in Malaya and Singapore,
258.24 -> Yamashita remarked that only a "driving
charge" would ensure victory in Malaya. The
263.7 -> plan was to conquer Malaya and Singapore in the
shortest time possible in order to overcome any
268.8 -> numerical disadvantage, as well as to minimize any
potential losses from a long, drawn-out battle.
274.26 -> The Malayan campaign concluded with the
fall of Singapore on 15 February 1942,
279.72 -> in which Yamashita's 30,000 front-line
soldiers captured 80,000 British,
284.88 -> Indian and Australian troops, the largest
surrender of British-led personnel in
289.68 -> history. After this victory, Yamashita
became known as the "Tiger of Malaya".
294.9 -> The British Prime Minister Winston Churchill
called the ignominious fall of Singapore to
300.06 -> Japan the "worst disaster" and "largest
capitulation" in British military history.
304.68 -> The campaign and the subsequent
Japanese occupation of Singapore
308.7 -> included war crimes committed against
captive Allied personnel and civilians.
313.56 -> One such massacre occurred at the Alexandra
British Military Hospital in Singapore when
318.6 -> on 14 February 1942 at about 1 PM, the Japanese
broke through and advanced towards the hospital
325.56 -> which was caught between the advancing Japanese
troops and the retreating British forces. A
330.84 -> British lieutenant—acting as an envoy with a white
flag—approached Japanese forces but was killed
336.24 -> with a bayonet. After Japanese troops entered
the hospital, they killed up to 50 soldiers,
341.34 -> including some undergoing surgery. Doctors
and nurses were also killed. The next day,
347.58 -> about 200 male staff members and patients who
had been assembled and bound the previous day,
352.44 -> many of them walking wounded, were ordered
to walk about 400 m to an industrial area.
358.2 -> Those who fell on the way were bayoneted. The
men were forced into a series of small, badly
363.96 -> ventilated rooms where they were held overnight
without water. Some died during the night as a
369.18 -> result of their treatment and the remainder were
killed with bayonet the following morning. Several
374.58 -> survivors were identified after the war, some
of whom had survived by pretending to be dead.
379.8 -> Another massacre occurred on the 18th
February 1942, four days after the Japanese
385.98 -> officially conquered Singapore. The Imperial
Japanese Army with the help of the Kempeitai
390.96 -> – Japanese secret police - began a genocide of
the Chinese people there which became known as
396.24 -> the Sook Ching Massacre. In Chinese, Sook
Ching means “to purge through cleansing.”
401.52 -> The purge, which was only meant to last two
days but was extended for more than a week,
406.56 -> finally ended on 4th of March.
Some experts estimate that 10 to
411.72 -> 20 percent of the entire Chinese population in
Singapore were killed during the mass murder,
416.22 -> devastating the overall population. The death
toll ranges between about 25,000 to 50,000.
422.88 -> These atrocities were committed by
soldiers under Yamashita’s command.
427.14 -> On 17 July 1942, he was again reassigned
from Singapore to far-away Manchukuo
434.22 -> which was a puppet state of the Empire of
Japan in Manchuria from 1932 until 1945,
440.22 -> having been given a post in commanding
the First Area Army, and was effectively
444.36 -> sidelined for a major part of the Pacific
War. It is thought that general Hideki Tojo,
449.28 -> by then the Prime Minister, was responsible
for his banishment, taking advantage of
453.54 -> Yamashita's gaffe during a speech made to
Singaporean civilian leaders in early 1942,
458.76 -> when he referred to the local populace as
"citizens of the Empire of Japan". This
464.04 -> was considered embarrassing for the Japanese
government, who officially did not consider the
468 -> residents of occupied territories to have the
rights or privileges of Japanese citizenship.
472.56 -> Despite this, in February 1943 Yamashita
was promoted to full general. Some have
479.28 -> suggested that he may have been sent
there to prepare for an attack on the
482.76 -> Soviet Union in the event that Stalingrad fell
to Germany. However this never never happened.
487.8 -> On 26 September 1944, when the war
situation was critical for Japan,
493.62 -> Yamashita was rescued from his enforced exile
in China by the new Japanese government after
499.08 -> the downfall of Hideki Tōjō and his cabinet,
and he assumed the command of the Fourteenth
503.4 -> Area Army to defend the occupied Philippines on 10
October. Yamashita commanded approximately 262,000
510.72 -> troops in three defensive groups.
He tried to rebuild his army but was
514.92 -> forced to retreat from Manila - the capital of
the Philippines - to the mountains. Yamashita
519.9 -> ordered all troops, except those given the
task of ensuring security, out of the city.
524.46 -> Soon, another massacre followed.
In order to prevent the rescue of
529.56 -> prisoners of war by the advancing Allies, on 14
December 1944 near the city of Puerto Princesa in
537.24 -> the Philippine province of Palawan, units of the
Japanese Fourteenth Area Army under the command
541.86 -> of General Yamashita, brought the prisoners of
war back to their own camp. After an air raid
547.14 -> warning was sounded to get the prisoners into the
shelter trenches, the 150 prisoners of war entered
552.96 -> those trenches, and the Japanese soldiers
set them on fire using barrels of gasoline.
558.42 -> Prisoners who tried to escape the flames
were shot down by machine gun fire. Others
563.88 -> attempted to escape by climbing over a cliff
that ran along one side of the trenches,
567.66 -> but were later hunted down and killed.
Only 11 men escaped the slaughter and 139
573.78 -> were killed. This atrocity became
known as the Palawan massacre.
578.64 -> While evacuating most of his soldiers, Yamashita,
who also served as the governor-general and
584.1 -> military governor of the Philippines, did not
declare Manila an open city. When a military
589.14 -> commander or political leader formally declares an
open city this means that the defending military
594.18 -> will not defend the city in battle and the
victorious forces can enter unopposed. In
599.52 -> addition, open city declaration saves civilian
lives and guarantees no destruction of buildings.
605.04 -> During the evacuation of Yamashita’s
soldiers, Japanese Navy Rear,
609.42 -> Admiral Sanji Iwabuchi re-occupied Manila with
16,000 sailors, with the intent of destroying
615.36 -> all port facilities and naval storehouses.
Once there, Iwabuchi took command of the
621 -> 3,750 Army security troops, and against
Yamashita's specific order, turned the
626.4 -> city into an open battlefield. The battle and
the Japanese atrocities resulted in the deaths
632.22 -> of more than 100,000 Filipino civilians, in
what became known as the Manila massacre,
637.14 -> during the fierce street fighting for the capital
which raged between 4 February and 3 March 1945.
644.46 -> Yamashita was able to hold on to part
of Luzon, the largest and most populous
648.48 -> island in the Philippines as well as
home to the country’s capital Manila,
652.44 -> until after the formal Surrender of Japan in
August 1945. At the time of his surrender,
658.44 -> his forces had been reduced to under 50,000 by
the lack of supplies and tough campaigning by
663.9 -> elements of the combined American and Filipino
soldiers including the recognized guerrillas.
668.4 -> Justice finally caught up with Yamashita
when from 29 October to 7 December 1945,
676.2 -> an American military tribunal in Manila tried him
for war crimes relating to the Manila massacre
682.08 -> and many atrocities in the Philippines
against civilians and prisoners of war.
686.88 -> For his part Yamashita denied he had knowledge
of the crimes committed by his men and claimed
692.28 -> that he would have harshly punished them if he had
had that knowledge. Further, he argued that with
697.56 -> an army as large as his, there was no way for him
to control all actions by all his subordinates.
703.38 -> As such he felt that what he was really
being charged with was losing the war.
708.3 -> However, evidence that Yamashita
did not have ultimate command
712.08 -> responsibility over all military units
in the Philippines was not admitted in
716.04 -> court which found Yamashita guilty as
charged and sentenced him to death.
720.42 -> Following the Supreme Court decision,
an appeal for clemency was made to U.S.
725.04 -> President Harry S. Truman,
who declined to intervene.
727.86 -> Tomoyuki Yamashita was 60 years old when he was
731.76 -> hanged on 23 February 1946 at Los Baños
Prison Camp, 30 miles south of Manila.
737.88 -> The ruling against Yamashita set a precedent,
called command responsibility or the Yamashita
743.88 -> standard, in that a commander can be held
accountable before the law for the crimes
748.14 -> committed by his troops even if he did not
order them, didn't stand by to allow them,
753 -> or possibly even know about them
or have the means to stop them.
756.36 -> There were no tears shed for Tomoyuki Yamashita.
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773.16 -> episodes we thank you and we'll
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