Operation Rimau

Part of the Japanese occupation of Singapore during World War II

Date	10–16 October 1944
Location	Singapore Harbour; Riau, Indonesia
Result	Japanese victory

Belligerents

Empire of Japan

Z Special Unit

Commanders and leaders

N/A

Ivan Lyon †

Strength

N/A

23 commandos
1 junk

Casualties and losses

3 ships sunk

1 junk scuttled
13 killed or died in custody
10 executed

Operation Rimau was an attack on Japanese shipping in Singapore Harbour, carried out by an Allied commando unit Z Special Unit, during World War II using Hoehn military MKIII folboats. It was a follow-up to the successful Operation Jaywick which had taken place in September 1943, and Rimau, a shortened version of the word Harimau (which is Malay for tiger). It was again led by Lieutenant Colonel Ivan Lyon of the Gordon Highlanders, an infantry regiment of the British Army.

Originally part of a much larger operation called Operation Hornbill, the aim of Rimau was to sink Japanese shipping by paddling the folboats in the dark and placing limpet mines on ships. It was originally intended that motorised semi-submersible canoes, known as "Sleeping Beauties", would be used to gain access to the harbour, however, they resorted to folboats. After the raiding party's discovery by local Malay authorities, a total of thirteen men (including raid commander Lyon) were killed during battles with the Japanese military at a number of island locations or were captured and died of their wounds in Japanese captivity. A group of ten commandos were transported to Outram Road Jail in Singapore after capture by the Japanese, were tried with perfidy and espionage in a Japanese court and executed on 7 July 1945.

After the success of the earlier Operation Jaywick mission in September 1943, Ivan Lyon started preparing for Operation Rimau. 'Rimau' is the Malay word for 'tiger' and Lyon had a large multi-coloured tiger head tattooed on his chest.

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