Sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse - Wikipedia

Britain had two components to this horrible tragedy. The first was that HMS Prince of Wales was on sea trials and should not have been a front line unit when she met the battleship Bismarck and cruiser Prince Eugen at the Battle of Denmark Strait. Down to one gun, HMS Hood was lost and the Germans escaped. Churchill branded Captain Leech a coward and he never fully recovered emotionally or from a career perspective. When sent to the Far East, he was more or less on a suicide pact and no matter what choice was made, he had already made his mind up that he would not come back. Several stories report Captain Leech surviving the sinking and refusing to be rescued.

The second part was the attrition war. Britain did not have the cash to fight a three front war. Remember, Britain was already fighting in the desert. So Field Marshall Slim (14th Army) was basically sent to Asia with no supplies and/or men and told to basically "make the best of things. Oh and by the way, no British Field Marshall has ever surrendered/been defeated." Phillips likewise, had a shoestring budget. HMS Warspite was earmarked for his group and had just virtually sunk the entire Italian fleet at battles of Cape Matapan, etc. Her skipper was a genius at night fighting and had taught the Japanese all they knew. Problem is, the Germans weren't going to let Warspite just walk out of the ETO. A parting gift of torpedoes and bombs put her basically out of action and she would not be available.

Carriers likewise, had been savaged during other ETO operations. As a side note, although flight deck armor would be a hallmark of British carriers, small air groups was another. The two carriers Phillips had were barely a Japanese recce party. Churchill was more than happy to allow his skippers in the East to have the widest latitude. Slim took full advantage of that and within months had a stalemate with the Japanese to buy the allies time in India/Burma. Singapore tho, was a lost cause from the first. Had Phillips successfully ambushed the Japanese at sea - at night - he'd have put them back a week. Had HMS Warspite been with him, he'd have set them back a month. But Singapore still would have fallen. As the English are wont to say, it was a "pig's breakfast."

Phillips had the other worry of showing too much of his hand. The Japanese were operating to the limit of their supply train and were up to a gamble if it meant victory. Were the British to have given the Japanese any kind of organized beating, they'd have been incensed to follow up to Trincomalee which - had they destroyed it more fully - would have impacted India/Burma operations. So he had his hands tied. Leech pressed the issue and it became obvious that he was going to get his "going down with the ship" death one way or another. percival (deliberate disrespectful lower case spelling of his name...) was still alive which meant Singapore would fall anyway.

Times were different back then. The Great Britain ruled the waves and believed they were invincible. We made a similar mistake that resulted in Pearl Harbor and our entry into WWII.