The Showdown and the Prelude to the Emergency
Britain’s defence of Malaya from the MRLA’s widespread sabotage and attacks on mines, estates, villages, road convoys, and heavy vehicles similarly boosted its image among anti-communist states worldwide. Among its most successful strategies was the Briggs Plan, devised in June 1950. The Plan sought to deprive the MRLA of its main supply of food, medicine, intelligence, and recruits, which it had obtained from squatters living on and cultivating the land along isolated
Emergency resettlement of the people Source: The National Archives of Malaysia jungle fringes ever since its MPAJA days, by relocating these squatters into ‘New Villages’. Initiated by Lieutenant-General Harold Briggs, then Director of Operations, the Plan began northwards from Johore (Department of Information, Malaya, 1950; ‘Ambush: Official Story’, Straits Times, 8 October 1951, pp. x-xi), and saw the relocation of 573,000 squatters (about 85 per cent of whom were Chinese5) into heavily guarded New Villages with security checks, roadblocks, and curfews, in an attempt to prevent contact with the MRLA. Alongside the provision of lawful tenure of land in these villages, the scheme also gave allowances and grants for squatters to build new homes on plots of land allotted to them, as well as piped-water supply, electricity, schools, and community halls, which were never enjoyed by the villagers before. By the end of 1951 alone, the government had spent $41 million on the resettlement scheme.
The Templer Era
1 A nation heavily in debt after the war, Britain had accumulated external liabilities almost five times her pre-war totals and her liabilities were 15 times greater than her available reserves. See Herring, 1971.
2 The Malayan Union Plan was introduced by the British government in October 1945 and implemented in April 1946, incorporating the British settlements of Penang and Malacca with the Federated and Unfederated Malay states in a single political entity; and with Singapore as a separate Crown Colony. The Plan faced widespread protests from Malays, rallied by Onn bin Jaafar, who went on to form the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) in opposing the granting of equal rights in citizenship to immigrants and the stripping of the Sultans’ sovereignty. The Union was eventually scrapped and replaced with the Federation of Malaya in February 1948.
3 Soon Kwang was arrested by the Royal Air Force in October 1945 for alleged extortion. Having been twice pronounced innocent before a bench of two local assessors and a BMA official, Soon Kwang was re-tried and convicted at the third attempt by three BMA officials. See Chin Peng, 2003, pp. 143-144 and Shennan, 2007, p. 174.
4 ‘Ganapathy Protest’, The Singapore Free Press, 19 April 1949, p. 1.
5 Of the total population of New Villages by 1954, 86 per cent were Chinese, 9 per cent Malays, 4 per cent Indians, and 1 per cent aborigines. See Nyce, 1973, pp. xxxviii-xli.
6 Accordingly, Chin Peng was worth $250,000, Politburo members $150,000, and State and Regional Committee Members $120,000. A CT was worth $2,500 whether dead or alive. Also see ‘Now it’s $250,000 for Public Enemy No. 1 – if brought in alive’, Straits Times, 1 May 1952.
7 ‘Sir Gerald Talks to Reds – in Chinese’, Straits Times, 23 January 1954.
8 Report of the Royal Commission Enquiry to Investigate into the Workings of Local Authority in West Malaysia (The Athi Nahappan Report), 1970, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, pp. 19-21.
9 Also see ‘Sir Gerald Punishes Town of 20,000 Cowards’, Straits Times, 28 March 1952; ‘Secrets sent to Sir Gerald’, Straits Times, 7 April 1952.
10 A policy introduced by Templer, a ‘white area’ was one free of CTs and therefore free of Emergency Regulations. ‘No Curfew and No Food Control: 160,000 are Free’, Singapore Standard, 4 September 1953.
11 ‘Reds shoot Police Chief’, Straits Times, 14 November 1975, p. 1.