RAF Chia Keng was a non-flying
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
station located in
Serangoon
Serangoon () is a planning area and residential town located in the North-East Region of Singapore.
Serangoon is bordered by these planning areas – Sengkang to the north, Hougang to the east, Ang Mo Kio and Bishan to the west, as well as ...
,
Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...
from 1948 to 1971 serving as a satellite station for
RAF Changi
Changi () is a planning area located in the geographical region of Tanah Merah in the East Region of Singapore. Sharing borders with Pasir Ris and Tampines to the west, Changi Bay to the southeast, the South China Sea to the east and the Sera ...
. It was one of the two British
GCHQ
Government Communications Headquarters, commonly known as GCHQ, is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the Unit ...
radio receiving stations in Singapore, the other one being
RAF Jurong which served as a satellite station for
RAF Tengah ''Tengah'' is an Indonesian and Malay word meaning "Central". It can be found in topography, e.g.
*Kalimantan Tengah
*Tengah Islands or Central Archipelago.
*Tengah, Singapore
*Tengah Air Base
The Tengah Air Base is a military airbase of th ...
. The station was closed in 1971, later being demolished to make way for housing developments.
History
Chia Keng operated between 1948 and 1971 as a satellite station to RAF Changi and a
GCHQ
Government Communications Headquarters, commonly known as GCHQ, is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the Unit ...
radio receiving station. It was made up of two sections – Chia Keng 1 (CK1) and Chia Keng 2 (CK2). CK1 consisted of the main camp while CK2 was a smaller section containing the GCHQ radio receiving station. CK1 contained bungalows manned by people with top-level security clearances, including around fifty civilians but with no more than four or five per shift. Its purpose was to receive radio signals from RAF stations around the world. CK2 served as one of the British
listening station
A radio listening station (also: listening post, radio intercept station or wireless intercept station, W/T station for wireless telegraphy) is a facility used for military reconnaissance, especially telecommunications reconnaissance (also kno ...
s in the Far East, picking up signals received from the United Kingdom, Kenya, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and Hong Kong.
[ It was the first signals-intelligence centre administered by the GCHQ in the Far East, with other previous ones coming under the responsibility of the ]British Armed Forces
The British Armed Forces, also known as His Majesty's Armed Forces, are the military forces responsible for the defence of the United Kingdom, its Overseas Territories and the Crown Dependencies. They also promote the UK's wider interests, s ...
, most of which came under the responsibility of the RAF.
Chia Keng had elaborate aerial masts that were able to pick up sensitive signals. According to Derek Lehrle, a former worker at the station, they were strung up in groups of four, allowing for the best reception. Incoming signals were then fed to the camp's receiving hall via cable. The receiving hall contained the radio equipment used for collecting the signals, which were then transmitted to Changi via landlines. Single sideband
In radio communications, single-sideband modulation (SSB) or single-sideband suppressed-carrier modulation (SSB-SC) is a type of modulation used to transmit information, such as an audio signal, by radio waves. A refinement of amplitude modul ...
, double sideband
In radio communications, a sideband is a band of frequencies higher than or lower than the carrier frequency, that are the result of the modulation process. The sidebands carry the information transmitted by the radio signal. The sidebands com ...
and frequency-shift keying
Frequency-shift keying (FSK) is a frequency modulation scheme in which digital information is transmitted through discrete frequency changes of a carrier signal. The technology is used for communication systems such as telemetry, weather ball ...
radio waves were used by the RAF and they were processed at the receiving hall.[
Chia Keng originally consisted of a large house serving as a receiving station for signals received from various other RAF stations around the world, up until the Chia Keng camp opened in 1951, creating a listening station administered by the GCHQ.][ After British forces pulled out from Singapore in 1971, it was closed and has since been demolished to make way for ]Housing and Development Board
The Housing & Development Board (HDB) (; ms, Lembaga Perumahan dan Pembangunan; ta, வீடமைப்பு வளர்ச்சிக் கழகம்) or often referred to as the Housing Board, is a statutory board under the M ...
(HDB) flats in Serangoon New Town.
Cold War
Described as "the nerve centre of British defence forces east of the Suez" by Richard J. Aldrich, a professor at the University of Warwick
The University of Warwick ( ; abbreviated as ''Warw.'' in post-nominal letters) is a public research university on the outskirts of Coventry between the West Midlands (county), West Midlands and Warwickshire, England. The university was founded i ...
, Singapore was used as a hub for British intelligence in the Far East during the Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
to base its activities across Southeast Asia. Singapore had the regional headquarters of the Joint Intelligence Committee, the intelligence directorates of the British army, navy and air force, a signals intelligence site and an image intelligence centre, among others. Britain's allies, including the United States, France, Australia and the Netherlands, also maintained a presence in Singapore. There was concern among British intelligence services of the potential activities of Soviet and Chinese spies but there was little evidence for their presence.
During the Indonesia-Malaysia confrontation, also known as the ''Konfrontasi'', Chia Keng was used to break and read Indonesian codes. Due to its location, it could get direct reports about developments in Indonesia. According to Duncan Campbell, Indonesia had used sabotaged cypher machines supplied by the Swiss company Crypto AG
Crypto AG was a Swiss company specialising in communications and information security founded by Boris Hagelin in 1952. The company was secretly purchased for US $5.75 million and jointly owned by the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) a ...
which had built-in back doors for GCHQ and the CIA
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...
, allowing them to decode and read secret Indonesian messages "without difficulty". With its spies based in Singapore, Britain took advantage of a failed coup by the 30 September Movement
The Thirtieth of September Movement ( id, Gerakan 30 September, abbreviated as G30S, also known by the acronym Gestapu for ''Gerakan September Tiga Puluh'', Thirtieth of September Movement) was a self-proclaimed organization of Indonesian Na ...
that resulted in the murder of six senior Indonesian generals. The British encouraged the Indonesian Army
The Indonesian Army ( id, Tentara Nasional Indonesia Angkatan Darat (TNI-AD), ) is the land branch of the Indonesian National Armed Forces. It has an estimated strength of 300,000 active personnel. The history of the Indonesian Army has its ...
campaign of mass killings
Mass killing is a concept which has been proposed by genocide scholars who wish to define incidents of non-combat killing which are perpetrated by a government or a state. A mass killing is commonly defined as the killing of group members without ...
after the attempted coup, through spreading anti-Communist propaganda and material. Such content was used to inflame and encourage the destruction of the Communist Party of Indonesia
The Communist Party of Indonesia (Indonesian: ''Partai Komunis Indonesia'', PKI) was a communist party in Indonesia during the mid-20th century. It was the largest non-ruling communist party in the world before its violent disbandment in 1965. ...
(PKI). Hundreds of thousands of members of the PKI were murdered. According to Norman Reddaway
George Frank Norman Reddaway (2 May 1918 – 12 October 1999) was a British civil servant and Diplomat.
Career
The younger son of William Reddaway , William Fiddian Reddaway (1872-1949), Professor of History at Cambridge University, Norman Redd ...
the GCHQ material at Chia Keng could have helped Indonesian generals to persecute the PKI. This was done to undermine Sukarno
Sukarno). (; born Koesno Sosrodihardjo, ; 6 June 1901 – 21 June 1970) was an Indonesian statesman, orator, revolutionary, and nationalist who was the first president of Indonesia, serving from 1945 to 1967.
Sukarno was the leader of ...
and his government and to try to end the Indonesia-Malaysia confrontation, a conflict over the creation of the Federation of Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federal constitutional monarchy consists of thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two regions: Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo's East Malaysia. ...
. The conflict ended after Sukarno relinquished his power to Suharto
Suharto (; ; 8 June 1921 – 27 January 2008) was an Indonesian army officer and politician, who served as the second and the longest serving president of Indonesia. Widely regarded as a military dictator by international observers, Suharto ...
.
Current site
After British forces withdrew from Singapore, the site was demolished and was then built on during the mid-1980s for a housing development project. The site is filled with HDB flats along Serangoon North Avenue 1 near Serangoon Garden
Serangoon Garden Estate is a residential estate in the Serangoon district of the North-East Region of Singapore.
History
Serangoon Garden is one of the oldest estates on the island, and was built during the 1950s.
The estate was upgraded in ...
s and Japanese Cemetery Park
The Japanese Cemetery Park (Japanese: 日本人墓地公園; rōmaji: ''Nihonjin bochi kōen'') is a Japanese cemetery and park in Hougang, Singapore. It is the largest Japanese cemetery in Southeast Asia at 29,359 square metres, consisting ...
. The station was also located near Yio Chu Kang Road, a major road in Singapore.
See also
* List of former Royal Air Force stations
This list of former RAF stations includes most of the stations, airfields and administrative headquarters previously used by the Royal Air Force.
The stations are listed under any former county or country name which was appropriate for the du ...
References
Further reading
*
External links
Royal Air Force Changi Association
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chia Keng
Serangoon
Royal Air Force stations in Singapore