The sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse was a naval engagement in World War II, as part of the war in the Pacific, that took place on 10 December 1941 in the South China Sea off the east coast of the British colonies of Malaya (present-day Malaysia) and the Straits Settlements (present-day Singapore and its coastal towns), east of Kuantan, Pahang. The Royal Navy battleship and battlecruiser were sunk by land-based bombers and torpedo bombers of the Imperial Japanese Navy. In Japan, the engagement was referred to as the . The objective of Force Z, which consisted of one battleship, one battlecruiser and four destroyers, was to intercept the Japanese invasion fleet in the South China Sea north of Malaya. The task force sailed without air support. Although the British had a close encounter with Japanese heavy surface units, the force failed to find and destroy the main convoy. On their return to Singapore they were attacked in open waters and sunk by long-range torpedo bombers. The commander of Force Z, Admiral Sir Tom Phillips, elected to maintain radio silence and an alert was not sent (by the Repulse) until one hour after the first Japanese attack. With the attack on Pearl Harbor only two days earlier, on the other side of the International Date Line, the Malayan engagement illustrated the effectiveness of aerial attacks against even the heaviest of naval assets if they were without air cover. This added to the importance for the Allies of the three United States Navy aircraft carriers in the Pacific: , , and . The sinking of the two ships severely weakened the British Eastern Fleet in Singapore, and the Japanese fleet was engaged only by submarines until the Battle off Endau on 27 January 1942. Singapore itself would fall to the Japanese just a month later on 15 February, leading to the largest surrender in British history. Background In meetings on 17 and 20 October, the British Defence Committee formally discussed Far East naval reinforcement in response to the fall of the moderate Konoe government on 16 October. In agreement with August–September assessment of Japanese intentions, Churchill and his cabinet favoured the deployment of a modern battleship for deterrent effect. The Royal Navy, as part of its offensive strategy, planned to send the Nelson-class and Revenge-class battleships to Singapore, but the Nelsons could not deploy. was damaged in the Mediterranean Sea