History

Recent scholarship by John Newsinger argues that Clement Attlee’s Labour government was as much a resurgent colonial warfare state as a domestic welfare state in the immediate postwar years.[2] Anne Deighton argues that Britain’s rôle in ideological battlegrounds of the nascent Cold War is demonstrably greater than traditional interpretations have suggested.[3]

One concrete example of postwar Britain as a colonial Cold Warrior state is the Malayan Emergency of 1948–60. The conflict has been described by Malaysian‐born anthropologist Yao Souchou as ‘a small, distant war’ not for its inconsequentiality in global affairs, but for its relegation to the side‐lines of the historiography of the Cold War. [4] Bringing the conflict to the forefront of our attention, I believe, challenges the broad narrative of postwar ‘decline’ and demonstrates the continued international influence of the British state in the post‐war period.

The ‘Emergency’ was the longest conflict fought by British forces in the twentieth century. With the aim of achieving national independence, the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) fought a bitter campaign of insurgency against the British colonial government of Malaya and its local and Commonwealth allies. Despite their determined (and British‐supported) resistance to [Axis] occupation, the MCP were ultimately defeated. More than just a decisive victory for the British empire, the campaign in Malaya was in fact the only conclusive military success by the Western powers in the entirety of the Cold War period.[5]

THE BRITISH ARMY IN MALAYA, 1957 (HU 51581) Men of the 48th Field Regiment, Royal Artillery, in action against a terrorist hide-out near Segri Sembilan, Malaya. Courtesy of the Imperial War Museum, © IWM. Used on an IWM non-commercial licence. http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205216100 [Accessed 22 November 2020]

Because of its abundant tin and rubber resources, Malaya, according to the British Colonial Sectary, was ‘by far the most important source of dollars in the Colonial Empire’.[6] With the British economy profoundly weakened by the loss of the former Indian territories, further capitulation in Asia was simply not acceptable. Although Marshall Plan aid chiefly funded Britain’s extensive (and expensive) programmes of urban revival and welfare reforms, a direct consequence of the economic recovery of ‘the West’ was the continuation of European colonialism for another two decades.[7]

The release of classified Foreign Office files has expanded our understanding of Britain’s propaganda machine in the early Cold War period. The intent of the Information Research Department (IRD) to promote Britain as a socialist ‘Third Force’ in world politics via its attacks on the Soviet Union and Communism is only now being adequately explored.[8] These offensive tactics were mirrored by a defensive approach to events in Malaya. Repeating the rhetoric used to describe the Jewish Irgun and Lehi in Palestine, British state propaganda relied on the dual euphemism of the ‘banditry’ of Malayan Communist rebels and the ‘emergency’ of their anti-colonial independence war in international representations of the conflict.[9]

The conflict was presented as arising from an international communist movement. It was done so with nuance: too strong a line could further align the Malayan Chinese ethnic group with the MCP; the opposite could have given the impression that the British were crushing a true nationalist movement. After the proclamation of American anti-colonial policy in the 1947 Truman Doctrine, the chief aim of British propaganda was to ‘manipulate the American colossus’ into thinking that political and economic support of an archaic colonial régime was ‘the corollary of [Communist] containment’.[10] To this, end, as the war continued, international British propaganda utilised the carefully chosen term ‘Communist terrorists’ in their representations of the MCP.[11]

In terms of national propaganda, a great deal of scholarly attention is often given to the figure of Sir Gerald Templer. Serving as Director of Operations and High Commissioner of Malaya from 1951 to 1954, his view that ‘the answer [to defeating the insurgency] lies not in pouring more troops into the jungle but in the hearts and minds of the [Malayan] people’ has dominated conventional historical analysis of the conflict.[12] A defining component of contemporary ‘cultural Cold War’ strategies, we must remain wary of attributing the ‘hearts and minds’ metaphor too much importance in Britain’s victory over the MCP. Indeed, the position of Templer as a semi-mythic figure in the historiography of the conflict simultaneously empowers the actions of the Western élite and obscures the reality of the counter-insurgency tactics the British utilised throughout the conflict.

THE MALAYAN EMERGENCY 1948–1960 (D 87947) Men of 22 Special Air Service Regiment practice carrying a casualty to a waiting helicopter during a training exercise in a jungle clearing at Ulu Langat, near Kuala Lumpur. Courtesy of the Imperial War Museum, © IWM. Used on an IWM non-commercial licence. http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205212427 [Accessed 20 November 2020]

Based on racially motivated colonial attitudes exemplified by events of the 1948 Batang Kali massacre, Bennett argues that mass arrests, deportation and destruction of property corresponded to a deliberate British campaign of ‘counter-terror’.[13] The forced re-settlement of over 500,000 Malayans in ‘New Villages’ with the ostensible aim of removing Communist influence were in fact little more than concentration camps built to keep the rural Chinese population under strict surveillance and control.[14] The tactics employed by the British state against the MCP demonstrated a resolve to maintain dominance of the colonial periphery by often brutal means.

A colonial attitude of imperial retrenchment, implemented through and influencing a nascent Cold War framework, saw Malaya as a continued source of colonial power for the British state. Britain successfully re-imposed colonial order by armed intervention, protecting its markets and control of natural resources essential to economic recovery. An extensive and influential network of regional intelligence informed international and national propaganda strategies to manipulate public opinion with the objective of the furtherance of British colonial Cold War objectives. Brutal and systematic detention, deportation and violence facilitated the crushing of the MCP revolt.

People once again gathered at noon on May 4 at what is known as the “Victory Bell.” There were an estimated 2,000 demonstrators — three times the number that had previously convened, despite every attempt by the school administration to stop the demonstration. A confrontation between protesters and the Guard ensued outside Taylor Hall. The “tin soldiers” opened fire, stealing the lives of 19-year-old Allison Krause, 20-year-old Jeffrey Miller, 20-year-old Sandra Scheuer and 19-year-old William Schroeder, while shooting and wounding nine others.

Allison Krause and Jeffrey Miller were the only two slain who had participated in the demonstration. Krause was a supporter of the Student Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam and Miller was active with the KSU branch of Students for a Democratic Society. Sandra Scheuer and William Schroeder were simply walking to class.

The murders at KSU led to student strikes and protests on college campuses across the country.

[…]

The four murders at Kent State have always gotten more attention than the two at Jackson State — even among white “progressive” circles — despite being equally horrendous. In the May 21, 1970, issue, Workers World newspaper called out the hypocrisy of the “liberal” wing of the U.S. ruling class and the middle-class layers of the antiwar movement:

“The war against Black America and the war against Indochina are both genocidal wars against colonized people. But while there is a ‘loyal opposition’ within the [neo]imperialist establishment to the war in Indochina, there is no such opposition to the war at home. Where were McGovern, Kennedy, et al., when the bullets cut into the backs of Blacks in Jackson and Augusta? Certainly, these murders are as vicious as the murders at Kent State.

“But these ‘liberals’ didn’t call a press conference to denounce the murders. They didn’t run to be photographed with grief-stricken Black families or ask Black people to come to Washington. […] They want to limit their ‘loyal opposition’ to the war in Indochina — a tactic they hope will get them votes.

“For similar motives, these ‘doves’ used the murders at Kent State for their own political ends. […] And so they shed crocodile tears and called for an end to the violence — but they didn’t call for an end to the violence of the cops, the storm troopers of the ruling class.

“Why? Because there is no loyal opposition to war against Black America — it folded up after the Civil Rights Movement, when the ruling class decided they were not going to give Black people equality, because the class interests of the [neo]imperialists were too intimately tied up with racism and the subjugation of Black people.”

Youth Against War and Fascism — the youth wing of Workers World Party in 1970 — participated in the student strikes following the Kent State shootings, as well as in actions following the Jackson State murders. YAWF proudly carried banners that read, “Avenge the Kent State Four!” and “Racist Ruling Class Wanted for Murder at Jackson State.”

I noticed that several socialist countries took out loans from the IMF (Yugoslavia, Poland, Romania) even though there was an understanding that the IMF is a predatory organisation. I assume it is connected to the wave of liberalisation in the 1980s, but would be interested in a more concrete breakdown of the logic and context behind it, or articles/links on the topic.

… before the bankers who are actually in power told them off. The liberal lefty FDR removed it.

Don’t trust a liberal. Two party system, one master - the bourgeoise.

Yenish child removal practices were justified as a welfare measure aimed at rescuing them from deprivation, and providing the chance to live a better life.

In close cooperation with the Swiss government, the private organisation Pro Juventute was the main contributor to the operation. At the time, Pro Juventute was the largest and only nationwide child and youth protection organisation. It was a quasi‐State foundation: its board included prominent representatives of civil society, politics and the economic sector, such as the Federal Councillor Giuseppe Motta (Huonker, 1987).

Through the operation ‘Relief organisation for the children of the open road’ (‘Hilfswerk für die Kinder der Landstrasse’), with the help of local authorities, Pro Juventute systematically removed approximately 600 children from their families, mainly in the Cantons of Graubünden, Ticino, Saint‐Gall and Schwyz (Galle and Meier, 2009).

Most children ended up in foster homes, orphanages, workhouses, psychiatric and penal institutions, and suffered from various forms of ill‐treatment such as unpaid farm work and educational deficiencies. Only a small portion of the children were put up for adoption (Meier, 2008). These children suffered humiliation and stigmatization. Leimgruber et al. (1998) describe the case of Bruno, a child who shares a similar path to that of many other children.

When 18 months older, he was taken away from his family by the police and placed in a children’s home. He spent his childhood moving several times between various foster families, orphanages, correctional institutions and closed youth custody centres. Children were frequently transferred from one place of custody to the next without explanations and disregarding their voices, thereby enduring very precarious living conditions and the majority did not receive an adequate school education.

The stated reason for the operation was that travelling adults were unable to educate their children so as to create ‘good citizens’ (Galle, 2016). Disrupting family ties, isolating Yenish children from their culture and language, and placing them in sedentary foster families or institutions were thought to be conducive to creating an environment considered educationally favourable.

Education was considered as a means to end the itinerant lifestyle, held as contrary and threatening to bourgeois norms and values dictating family organisation and the experience of childhood (Meier and Wolfensberger, 1998). The practices were in part eugenically driven, as Yenish were diagnosed at the time as ‘racially inferior’ (Mottier, 2010). A key rôle was played by Siegfried Alfred, a staunch eugenicist, who directed the operation almost in its entirety (Meier and Wolfensberger, 1998).

To this day, Yenish persons continue to suffer from trauma and psychological distress as a result of harsh treatment. Former victims of forcible family removal share in the grievance of a stolen childhood and youth (Meier, 2005).

Wish it was higher quality. Still an Interesting documentary from CGTN.

The war against Yugoslavia, which lasted really from the early 1990s until the overthrow of the pro-socialist government in the early 2000s, turned an independent country of 20 million people, embracing many nationalities, into six mini-states dependent on the [neo]imperialist powers, with an occupied puppet state in Kosovo. Four of those semi-colonies are now NATO members.

And, Flounders added, “It’s the NATO powers — again with the U.S. in the leadership — that have given military, economic and diplomatic backing to the [neocolonial] assault on Gaza’s civilian population. We must never forget this. The peoples of Yugoslavia will certainly not forget it.”

https://archive.is/8qmnW