30 June 2009
Voice of Malayan Revolution: The CPM Radio War against Singapore and Malaysia, 1969-1981
Voluminous works – popular and academic – have been written on how the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) lost the shooting war in the Malayan Emergency (1948-1960). But much less has been said on what happened thereafter. By 1960, the CPM’s “long march” from the Malayan interior into Southern Thailand was complete. In a sanctuary far from the writ of the Malaysian and Thai governments, the CPM reorganised, reviewed their strategy and bided their time. In 1968, inspired by the Cultural Revolution in Red China and events in Indochina, the CPM sought for a second time to establish a “People’s Republic” in the Malay Peninsula. From 1968 to 1989, the Malaysian security forces and the CPM once again confronted each other in the jungles of the Malaysian-Thai border in what was known as the Second Emergency.
Voluminous works – popular and academic – have been written on how the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) lost the shooting war in the Malayan Emergency (1948-1960). But much less has been said on what happened thereafter. By 1960, the CPM’s “long march” from the Malayan interior into Southern Thailand was complete. In a sanctuary far from the writ of the Malaysian and Thai governments, the CPM reorganised, reviewed their strategy and bided their time. In 1968, inspired by the Cultural Revolution in Red China and events in Indochina, the CPM sought for a second time to establish a “People’s Republic” in the Malay Peninsula. From 1968 to 1989, the Malaysian security forces and the CPM once again confronted each other in the jungles of the Malaysian-Thai border in what was known as the Second Emergency.
