No, I am not in jail. Or gaol as it was originally spelt when the Changi prison was built by the British in the 1930's.

I've rudely decided not to blog about Changi I'm any detail: it is too important to be trusted to my ham-fisted, sound-bite treatment. If you come to Sing, then go on the tour of the area. If you do, doubtless you will have in your group, as I did, the offspring of PoWs held here and I would not dream of spoiling that experience for you.

One thing that couldn't go unmentioned: the Sinaporean plans for the critical sites. They are incrementally being demolished or redeveloped for other things...

The gun battery shown in this entry's picture is the only one which remains; the others have been cleared away already!

For those who may be sketchy on the significance of this, let me recap...

We all know, hopefully, that the Japanese attacking Pearl Harbour brought the US into the war. Less well remembered is that the attack was conducted in sync with the attack on Singapore. The Japanese had to take both positions simultaneously to secure oil supplies from the Dutch colonies of Sumatra and Java, for their freshly expanded empire, with the British and Americans protecting the region from naval bases at Sing and Pearl Harbour respectively.

Singapore fell in a matter of days, which was deeply troubling and embarrassing for the Brits, but why? Lots of reasons. Mainly, our navy was focussing on Germany at the time so we'd only left two ships behind; so we were always going to get creamed on water. Then there were astute diversionary tactics by the Japanese: they sent 400 soldiers to make a ruckus in a place from which they weren't going to attack to divert the Brits from the real plan.

But much of the blame for losing Sing was put down to the reliance on the three 15 inch guns which covered the Johore straits up to the naval base. I'm not good at capturing how much of a mess a shell from a 15 inch gun would make, but put it this way: three stories below ground level, each battery had to have an engine room just to lift the shells up and load the guns. The guns themselves are the length of a bulky estate car.

Accusations that the guns could not be turned round to fire at ground troops, or that they were never fired at all, are entirely untrue. They were turned. They were fired. However they caused virtually no casualties whatsoever.

Why? Because the Brits had only stocked up on shells to fire at ships. These have time-delayed fuses so that the impact punctures the hull before going off. Japanese accounts record how troops would hear a massive thud as a shell hit the ground near them, but that they could watch the shell spin to a stop in the ground and still have time to find cover before they went off. High explosive shells would have caused them big problems. Hence our one good card in an otherwise crappy hand was useless too.

A critical event which ultimately shaped the war, but a site which was just going to be bulldozed.

How is this being averted?

They are turning the gun battery into a bistro. I kid you not, but without candles in wine bottles it would be concreted over.

It worries me to say this, but I suspect that within a generation, our news coverage will increasingly feature stories regarding commercial pressures to clear unprofitable battle sites and war memorials away. Very worrying.