Foremost and Utmost (3rd Division: The First Combined Arms Division)
BG Ng unveiling the plaqueOn 21st March 1991, a major milestone was reached in the history of the SAF. It was on this day that 3rd Div was officially inaugurated as a Combined Arms Division, the first in the SAF to do so. The guest-of-honor on this momentous occasion was the then Chief of Army, Brig-General Ng Jui Ping and it was held at the HQ 3rd Division.
Prior to the formation of 3rd Division as a Combined Arms Division, there was no other unit in the SAF that had integrated combat capabilities. Although 3rd Division worked regularly with the various support arms, they all belonged to separate formations. The concept of a Combined Arms Division is to combine and draw upon the different capabilities of the support arms - namely signals, artillery, armor, logistics, air defence artillery and combat engineers - to augment the infantry units and achieve maximum combat effectiveness and readiness on and off the battlefield.
The different units within the Combined Arms Division allow it to perform a diversity of roles, therefore creating balance and flexibility in responding to any peacetime or wartime contingencies. With the division commander having control over the support units as well, the entire division is able to react much faster. 3rd Division was also given an additional role - to serve as the principle testbed for new doctrines, concepts and tactics for land battles.
Its units serve as a ready force to respond to any peacetime contingencies. Thus, with the amalgamation of these units into the 3rd Division family, training could now be better coordinated and the co-operation between the different units further enhanced. In the next two years, 6th Division and 9th Division were reorganized to embrace the Combined Arms concept.
A further development came about on 4th Jan 1995 when all the Combined Arms Divisions were reorganized to include both active and NSmen units. Under this arrangement, 3rd Division would no longer comprise of purely active troops as before but also NSmen as well. This move did much to reaffirm the importance and capabilities of Nsmen as frontline soldiers. It also meant that all three Combined Arms Divisions could now contribute towards the development of new Land Battle concepts, doctrines and tactics.
The inauguration of 3rd Division as a Combined Arms Div not only brought the development of SAF as a modern army up another notch but it was also an indication of the rapid evolution that SAF underwent in its relatively short history.