Forgotten Wars_ Freedom and Revolution in Southeast Asia - Christopher Bayly [5]
Smith Dun, Colonel (b. 1906). Karen military officer who fought with 14th Army in Burma campaign, became commander-in-chief of Burma’s armed forces 1948, but was speedily dismissed.
Soe, Thakin (b. 1905). Communist leader. Set up ‘base area’ in Burma delta, 1942–5. Broke with Anti-Fascist People’s Front government and led Red Flag communists in rebellion against British and independent government of Burma, 1946–55.
Stevenson, Henry Noel Cochrane (b. 1903). Joined Burma Frontier Service in 1926. Organized Chin levies, 1942–3. Served in Civil Affairs Secretariat Burma, 1944–5. Director Frontier Areas Administration, 1946 to February 1947, when he was replaced for being too close to minorities leaders.
Suhrawardy, H. S. (b. 1892). Bengali Muslim politician. Minister of labour, Bengal, 1937. Minister of supplies in Bengal government during 1943 famine. Chief minister, Bengal, after 1946 elections. Implicated in Great Calcutta Killing, 1946. Founded East Pakistan Awami League.
Sukarno (b. 1901). First president of Indonesia, 1945–66. Presided at Bandung Conference, 1955. Declared martial law and ‘guided democracy’ in 1957. Removed by Suharto after failed military coup in 1965.
Tan Cheng Lock (b. 1883). Straits Chinese leader, businessman and legislator. Fled to India on Japanese invasion of Malaya. Figurehead leader of left-wing United Front in 1947; founding president of the Malayan Chinese Association in 1949. Knighted 1952. His son, Tan Siew Sin (b. 1916) succeeded him and was a minister in independent Malaya.
Tan Kah Kee (b. 1874). Leader of the Overseas Chinese; headed the China Relief Fund, 1937–41. Spent the war hiding in Java, returning to Singapore to head China Democratic League. Returned to China in 1949.
Tan Malaka (b. 1897). Sumatra-born leader of Partai Kommunis Indonesia and Comintern. In hiding in Singapore on outbreak of war, and later escaped incognito to Indonesia. Revealed himself in 1946 to lead calls for social revolution. Died at hands of republican soldiers in 1948.
Templer, Sir Gerald Walter Robert (b. 1898). High Commissioner of Malaya, 1952–4. Earlier served in military government of occupied Germany and as director of military intelligence. After Malaya became Chief of the Imperial General Staff, 1955–8, and retired a field marshal.
Than Tun (b. 1911). Student leader. Minister of agriculture under Ba Maw, 1943. Joined anti-Japanese resistance. Led Burma Communist Party in 1945. Broke with AFPFL in 1946
Thein Pe Myint (b. 1914). Burmese communist who escaped to India in 1942. Author of What happened in Burma, an attack on the Japanese occupation. Sent to Chungking, China, but maintained links with Burmese resistance to Japanese. Secretary of the Burma Communist Party, 1945–55. Broke with AFPFL in 1946.
Tin Tut (b. 1895). Barrister and Burmese member of Indian Civil Service. Accompanied U Saw to London in 1941. Joined Dorman-Smith in Simla, 1942. Left ICS and became financial adviser to AFPFL government. Accompanied Aung San to London, January 1947. Assassinated 1948.
Tunku Abdul Rahman (b. 1903). Malay prince of Kedah. Served as a district officer during war. As head of the United Malays National Organization led Malaya to independence in 1957; prime minister until 1970.
Wavell, Field Marshal Sir Archibald (b. 1883). Commander-in-chief, India, 1941–3. Viceroy and Governor General of India, 1943–7.
Yeung Kuo (b. 1917). Malayan Communist Party leader. In Penang in 1946, aided Chin Peng in exposure of Lai Teck and was viewed as Chin’s deputy. Killed in the jungle shortly before the 1955 Baling peace talks.
Preface
In August 1945 the US dropped atomic bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, so bringing to an end the Second World War. Yet in Asia the Second World War was only one intense and awful phase of a much longer conflict: ‘the defeat of Japan would not end war in Asia’, as one Indian newspaper mused when news of the Japanese surrender leaked out. This long