The CT attack on Bukit Kepong

Statement by CUING MOl CUAI aged 43 years Member of the 4th Independent Company Malayan National Liberation Army (terrorist)

I was a member of the terrorist gang that attacked Bukit Kepong Police Station on 23 February 1950. We chose this station as the target because it was isolated, it had no radio contact with other stations and we wanted to strengthen our prestige in that area. There were 200 men in our gang and we knew that only twenty Malays manned the police station. We encircled the station at 0400 hours. We chose that time because we thought the sentries would be asleep. At exactly 0430 hours the bugle sounded and our attack started. We fired on the station from all sides. We immediately received a heavy barrage of return fire. I was in the party attacking the front of the station and I could see the policemen taking defensive positions. They had divided into two sections. One section manned the defences under the station using two Bren guns and the other section manned defence posts in the charge room above. A few men, I don't know how many, defended the married quarters at the rear of the station. Most of our armament was automatic weapons but some of us were armed with rifles and grenades. The greatest resistance to our attack was coming from underneath the station where the Bren guns were. We concentrated our attack there and, after about one hour, it was silenced. We then received orders to charge the front of the station. This we did with fixed bayonets but the gunfire was so intense that we withdrew to reform for another attack. In that attack we lost two killed and several wounded.

We then called on the police to surrender promising them no harm if they did so. They refused and increased their resistance. In the meantime, some of my comrades had been attempting to break in at the rear of the police compound but they had been met by stiff resistance and suffered several casualties. When daylight came we were able to see the damage better. I could see dead policemen lying under the station. The one in charge, Sergeant Jamil, was slumped over one of the Bren guns. We received orders to charge and we did so, time after time, but we were still unsuccessful, so we withdrew and again called on the station to surrender but again they refused. Our leader was getting impatient and so he ordered us to attack the married quarters, which was the weakest part of the defence. They could not defend that properly and we were able to break through the defences. One of the police wives tried to run to the station but my comrades caught her. They asked her to walk to the station and call on the men to surrender. She refused and she told my comrades that there were only two people left alive in the married quarters, a policeman's wife and daughter. My comrades shot the wife they had caught and called upon the one in the quarters to surrender. She refused and shouted that both she and her daughter preferred to die. So my comrades set fire to the married quarters and burnt both of them alive. Then they threw the body of the other wife into the blazing building.

There was a boat moored at the rear of the station and a marine policeman defended that until he was killed. He could have escaped but didn't. We had got into the compound and now charged both front and rear. We got within grenade range and threw several grenades into the charge room. Then my comrades set fire to the rear of the station. A group of several policemen came charging out of the front firing their weapons. Some of them had their clothes on fire. their wives also came out and, as we shot their husbands, the wives picked up their guns and continued to fire at us. We were able to shoot them all and throw them into the burning building. They were not all dead when they were thrown. Just as we were leaving, we found a small boy under a bunker and my comrades threw him into the fire as well. The attack took us five hours

Source:   Operation Sharp End: Smashing Terrorism in Malaya 1948-58. Memories of the Malayan Police. Edited by Brian Stewart. Paperback: 384 pages. Publisher: Acorn Publications (1 Jan 2003)  ISBN-10 : 190326376X & ISBN-13 : 978-1903263761 ASIN : B003XX5NG2