By Kunchur Bharat (26A01B)

Cast your mind back to your lower secondary History lessons for a moment. The phrases “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere”, “banana money”, and “did not ATQ” may bring back horrific memories of poring over stacks of notes, trying to cram every last detail into your brain, or sacrificing legibility for speed as you raced against the clock to finish the Source-Based Case Study. 

Or, perhaps, the dread that set in as you weighed two conflicting interpretations and wondered which was the “correct” one? Indeed, history is written (and taught and examined) by the victors — so what do the losers have to say? And why are they worth listening to, if at all?

These are exactly the questions that Professor Gary Lit concerns himself with in examining the history of Malaya during and after WWII. And it’s best encapsulated in his book, If the Sky Were to Fall.

A retired academic from Nanyang Technological University, he contributes regularly to regional newspapers in Malaysia and is a well-known tour guide for a series of heritage tours of Kinta Valley. His book still sits comfortably on Kinokuniya’s bestseller list in KLCC and was named one of the Top 10 books of 2023 in Malaysia.  

RI had the pleasure of hosting Professor Lit to deliver a special lecture to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Japanese surrender in WWII, and to share his insights as he interrogated the “top-down narratives” that dominate this tumultuous period of Singapore’s and Malaysia’s history. Joining us in the PAC as the Guest-of-Honour was Mdm Lim Oon Geok, daughter of the late Major-General Lim Bo Seng. 

Opening Address

Before Prof. Lit took the floor, our Principal, Mr Aaron Loh, addressed the PAC, and the importance of this event rang clear in it. He described Prof. Lit’s research as “a labour of love”, and emphasised the importance of Singaporeans standing united as global forces threaten to undermine the harmony that we have painstakingly cultivated since independence – a message that was only sharpened when Prof. Lit divulged how the war in Ukraine had tragically caused some of his students to be Killed In Action (KIA) – while we sat in our lush seats enjoying the air-conditioning of the PAC. 

The 9-year-old with a Changkol

Prof. Lit began his lecture with a story. A story that went back to 1968 of a 9-year-old in Kampar, Perak, digging around with a Changkol until he struck something – not gold or diamonds – but bullet boxes and guns, hidden in the dirt, telling of a battle that had evaded history books thus far. 

That 9-year-old was Prof. Lit himself, and had it not been for his History teacher at that time, he probably would have heeded those who scolded him, ridiculed him, and told him to shut up. That battle turned out to be the Battle of Kampar, “the most ferocious [battle] in the whole war in Malaya,” as he described it. “It [was] not in KL, not in Penang, maybe not even in Singapore,” Prof. Lit shared. 

However, this story has been obscured from our common retelling of the war, and the experiences of the folks that lived through it have been lost in the process. That experience when he was 9 continues to resonate with Prof. Lit nearly 60 years later and has spurred his interrogative approach to history. 

He then moved on to contend with Singapore’s and Malaysia’s colonial past. “God Save the King,” the British anthem goes – the same one that RI-RGS alumni and friends of Prof. Lit present in the PAC sang when they were in school – yet is it the same God for the rich and the poor? Are the hallowed founders of Singapore and Penang given that title because we were “lost” before? 

This neocolonialist impulse that permeates our syllabus and insidiously roots in our minds, even through nomenclature, is what Prof. Lit wished to bring to light, and the puzzled murmurs that ran through the PAC after being posed these questions were indicative of just how thought-provoking this alternate perspective was.

In the same way that the Battle of Waterloo was famously won on the playing fields of Eton, “can you say the same thing [about us]? That the Battle of Singapore was already decided on the fields of Raffles,” he asked us. 

Sook Ching – Monolith or One of Many?

Much to our confusion, Prof. Lit had posed more questions than answers at this point in the lecture. So, now it was time to hear some answers. A bulk of his research was on uncovering the lost stories of those who suffered brutally under the infamous Operation Sook Ching.

Unlike our common understanding of Sook Ching as being a singular traumatic event, Prof. Lit shared with us how there were actually multiple Sook Chings that had been obscured from their public retelling, and he discovered this only through his extensive ground-up research and numerous interviews. 

He recalled how his hands shook as he felt the scars of the survivor. The survivor, himself, was in tears, as Prof. Lit felt as if 80 years of suppressed trauma had been unleashed in that one instance. The PAC, now dead silent, was rapt with attention as Prof. Lit continued recounting the cruelty of the Japanese. Executions for insulting the Empire and babies being speared by bayonets were routine occurrences during the Occupation. 

While most attendees had been taught this in Lower Secondary and possibly even used it as evidence for our essays, none of us were ready for the graphic pictures that Prof. Lit showed us. His response to every horrified gasp was unnerving in its simplicity – “You need to know this.” 

Force 136 In A New Light

Force 136, for which the late Lim Bo Seng is most famous for being a member of, was something that Prof. Lit had done extensive ground-up research on as well. In fact, to the amusement of the audience, he joked about how he was unsure if he would even make it for the lecture, as he was in a jungle near Bidor Village, investigating the operations of Force 136 and the raid of Bukit Bidor by the Japanese. 

Bukit Bidor was used as a base camp by Force 136 and the Malayan People’s Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA) during Operation Gustavus. He recounted how the natives trapped the Japanese by shooting them with blowpipes and placing boar traps with spikes in the ground that impaled them if stepped on. This was met with fierce retaliation from the Japanese, and after the eventual raid on Bukit Bidor, the river was said to run red with blood for days as the natives were brutally slaughtered by the Japanese. 

Force 136’s ties with the communists were also of great interest to Prof. Lit in his research. Although the MPAJA was instrumental in ending the war in Malaya and assisting the British, they were still villainised not only by the British but also by the Malaysian government. 

In fact, Prof. Lit was warned by the Malaysian Special Branch not to show pictures of Chin Peng (the Secretary-General of the Malayan Communist Party and the liaison officer of the MPAJA during Operation Gustavus) shaking hands with Lord Mountbatten at the victory parade following the Japanese surrender, highlighting the extent to which historical narratives are distorted, which has continued to spur Prof. Lit on in his journey to dig out what others wish to sweep under the rug. 

To end the talk, Prof. Lit also distributed a few banana notes that he had brought with him, which were later given out as prizes for his quiz. Some described the notes as smelling strangely sweet, while others were simply in awe of being able to physically hold what had only been described to them in their lessons until this point.  

Q&A

Prof. Lit was joined by the late Lim Bo Seng’s children, Mdm Lim Oon Geok and Dr. Lim Whye Geok, in answering questions from the floor.

Attendees were, naturally, curious about Prof. Lit’s unique research process and the challenges that he faced along the way. According to him, they were two-fold. He started by joking that he wasn’t even sure if would be alive for his lecture as just the very previous day he was battling unfamiliar terrain while conducting his ongoing research.

Contrary to what most would imagine, the biggest threats aren’t the cobras or the tigers but rather the elements. The unpredictable weather and the danger of being caught in a flood or a landslide adds an extra layer of challenges which perhaps makes the stories obtained despite them even more rewarding. 

Finally, Prof. Lit’s unflinching opposition to sterilised state narratives inevitably results in unwanted attention from the governments that he scrutinises. He mentioned specifically how the Special Branch was particularly unhappy with his research and, as he had mentioned previously, had taken measures to obstruct his ground-up retelling of history.

Telling of the decades of experience he had, Prof. Lit had this much to say, “You’re shining light where there shouldn’t be, and they want to keep you in the dark.” 

The question that visibly struck the deepest chord with all three of them was deceiving in its simplicity: is forgiving forgetting? 

In light of the deep personal connection that Major General Lim’s children had to the question, Dr Lim answered first. He shared in great detail about his father’s journey, having been thrust into the family business at a young age and how it suffered as he had to cease his involvement in it during the war. His passing in service to the nation affected the family business terribly, and Dr Lim was often left wondering what his life would have been like had he had the opportunity to spend more time with him. 

While Major General Lim’s story often centres around the eventual sacrifice of his life that he gave to protect his colleagues, Dr Lim’s response was an acute reminder that he sacrificed much more before that. He sacrificed being a father, a husband, and his family’s business, all for the greater good. Yet, despite the pain of his death, Major General Lim’s family could not be more proud of him for it. 

The follow-up to this question was equally thought-provoking, as it probed Prof. Lit for his thoughts on the Japanese approach to their war history: to forget but never to seek forgiveness. 

He began by saluting the Asahi Shimbun newspaper for publishing an article about his book despite pressures from the political right, which would choose to ignore Japan’s wartime atrocities rather than confront them. Yet, Prof. Lit’s palpable frustration with Japanese state officials’ visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, which enshrines many of WW2’s most notorious war criminals, was a clear indication that more needed to be done to provide closure to those traumatised by the war.

The acute personal connection that Prof. Lit had to bringing closure to those traumatised by the war, in light of his experience with conducting his ground-up research, was fully evident and resonated deeply with the audience. 

Due to time constraints, that was the last question that the panel was able to entertain, yet it was a suitable ending to the entire lecture. It was safe to say that none of the audience members truly knew what they were getting themselves into when they first stepped into the PAC.

However, it’s even safer to say that everyone walked out with a refreshed perspective on how we interpret historical narratives, a heightened understanding of the malleability of these narratives, and the realisation of how significant telling the story of just one person can be.