Tom Phillips

Admiral Sir Tom Spencer Vaughan Phillips, (19 February 1888 – 10 December 1941) was a Royal Navy officer who served during the First and Second World Wars. He was nicknamed "Tom Thumb", due to his short stature. He is best known for his command of Force Z during the Japanese invasion of Malaya, where he went down with his flagship, the battleship . Phillips was one of the highest ranking Allied officers killed in battle during the Second World War.

Early and private life Phillips was the son of Colonel Thomas Vaughan Wynn Phillips, Royal Artillery and Louisa Mary Adeline de Horsey Phillips, daughter of Admiral Algernon de Horsey. Phillips was married to Lady Phillips, of Bude, Cornwall.

Navy career Phillips joined the Royal Navy in 1903 as a naval cadet following education at Stubbington House School. He became a midshipman in 1904 and trained aboard . He was promoted to sub-lieutenant on 9 April 1908, and to lieutenant on 20 July 1909.

In the First World War, Phillips served on destroyers in the Mediterranean and in the Far East. He was promoted to lieutenant commander on 15 July 1916. on the quayside at Singapore Naval Base, 2 December 1941.

Phillips was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the China Station in late 1941, an action which raised some controversy in the higher echelons of the Royal Navy, where he was considered a "desk admiral". He was appointed acting admiral, and he took to sea on 25 October 1941 en route to his headquarters in Singapore. He travelled with a naval detachment then designated as Force G, consisting of his flagship, the new battleship , together with the veteran Great War-era battlecruiser , and the four destroyers , , , and .

Prince of Wales (left, front) and (left, behind) under Japanese air attack on 10 December 1941. A destroyer, either or , is manoeuvring in the foreground.

The deployment of the ships was a decision made by Winston Churchill. He was firmly warned against it by the First Sea Lord, Admiral of the Fleet Sir Dudley Pound, and later by his friend, Field Marshal Jan Smuts, Prime Minister of South Africa, who prophesied the fate of the capital ships, when he addressed the crew of HMS Repulse just before she left Durban for Singapore.

No. 453 Squadron RAAF, which was assigned to Force Z, was not scrambled until after the Japanese air attack began.

It was intended that the new aircraft carrier would also travel out to Singapore, but she ran aground on her maiden voyage in the West Indies, and was not ready to sail from England with the other ships. Phillips and the vessels arrived in Singapore on 2 December 1941, where they were re-designated Force Z. Without a formal declaration of war, the Japanese landed in Malaya on 8 December 1941, on the same day as the attack on Pearl Harbor (on the other side of the International Date Line). The Japanese, by striking at three points almost simultaneously, hoped to attract all available land-based fighters of the Royal Air Force and leave Phillips without air cover when they were ready for him; and he steamed right into this trap.

Phillips hoped to intercept any further Japanese convoys to prevent the landing of more troops. He signalled his fleet upon departure, "We are out looking for trouble, and no doubt we shall find it. We hope to surprise the enemy transports tomorrow and we expect to meet the ."

Shortly after midnight, Phillips's chief of staff radioed that the Royal Air Force was so pressed by giving ground support to land operations that the Admiral could expect no air cover off Singora. Japanese heavy bombers were already in southern Indochina, and General Douglas MacArthur had been asked to send General Lewis H. Brereton's B-17 Flying Fortresses to attack their bases. By this time, the Japanese invasion force was already well established in the peninsular section of Thailand, which had already surrendered. At Kota Bharu within British Malaya, there was bitter fighting in a series of rear guard actions fought desperately by British and native troops. But by the time the British warships arrived, their opportunity had passed; the vulnerable transports were already returning to base. Admiral Phillips did not realize this.

At 18:30, when the weather cleared and three Japanese naval reconnaissance planes were sighted from the flagship, Phillips realized that his position was precarious and untenable. Reluctantly, he reversed course to return to Singapore at high speed. As Phillips steamed south, dispatches from Singapore portrayed impending doom on the shores of Malaya. The British Army was falling back fast. Shortly before midnight on 9 December, word came through of an enemy landing at Kuantan, halfway between Kota Bharu and Singapore. Phillips, in view of the imminent danger to Singapore, decided to strike at Kuantan. They were designated the Fleet Defence Squadron for this task, with Flight Lieutenant Tim Vigors given the radio procedures used by Force Z. After the war, Vigors remained bitter towards Admiral Phillips for his failure to call for air support. On 15 February, Percival surrendered his remaining army of 85,000 British, Indian, and Australian troops to the Japanese, the largest capitulation in British history.

Regarding Phillips's decision to proceed without air cover, Naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison wrote:Those who make the decisions in war are constantly weighing certain risks against possible gains. At the outset of hostilities [U.S.] Admiral Hart thought of sending his small striking force north of Luzon to challenge Japanese communications, but decided that the risk to his ships outweighed the possible gain because the enemy had won control of the air. Admiral Phillips had precisely the same problem in Malaya. Should he steam into the Gulf of Siam and expose his ships to air attack from Indochina in the hope of breaking enemy communications with their landing force? He decided to take the chance. With the Royal Air Force and the British Army fighting for their lives, the Royal Navy could not be true to its tradition by remaining idly at anchor.

Phillips's name is inscribed at the Plymouth Naval Memorial in Plymouth, England.