Word: malayan
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...Means. The Communists had expected to take over Malaya after World War II, but the British beat them to it. In 1948 the Malayan Communist Party passed a resolution advocating "the capture of power by the peasants and workers by any means." This meant going back to their hidden jungle camps and attempting to paralyze the country's life by terrorism and sabotage. Soon they were derailing trains, cutting telephone wires, ambushing police, murdering planters and holding up schools. Unwilling to call them "Communists," the British (who had recognized Communist China) labeled them "bandits"; afraid of skyrocketing insurance rates...
...surprising that such a man should say to Churchill: "If I make a mess of it I want to go back to the army. If I don't make a mess of it I -want to go back to the army." In the Malayan jungle, fighting a cruel war, there were moments when many thought he was making a mess...
...World War II the Communists, known then as the Malayan Peoples' Anti-Japanese Army, were accepted as allies. Colonel Chapman, the survivor of a British "stay-behind" party after the fall of Singapore, describes a Communist camp: "A roughly leveled parade ground, about the size of a tennis court ... A motley guard of honor consisting of about 20 Chinese, including two girls, armed with service rifles or shotguns . . . The majority of them were under 20, and there was one boy who could not have been more than twelve...
...When an informer was brought in, "after being burned with brands and beaten almost to death with rattans, [he was] finished off with a bayonet in the grave that had been prepared for [him]." Out of these surroundings came Chin Peng, slight, 31, pimply-faced, fanatical leader of the Malayan Communists, for whose capture the British will...
Templer told the Malayan Civil Service : "If you don't make a decision and it's a mistake, you'll be put on the next boat; if you make a decision and it happens to be a mistake, you'll be put on the next boat, but somebody'll be there to see you off." Templer began touring the country in an armored car-instead of the Rolls-Royce used by his predecessor. At one stop Templer listened for the second time to a planter angrily complain about inadequate police and army protection...