Another old hero, Chin Peng, going to up lorry soon

[lovesamleong]

Wah lau eh... a simple tribute turned into a discussion about blood debts.

Think you are missing the point.

This simple tribute is like:

The Japanese paying tribute to Hotsumi Ozaki
The British paying tribute to Kim Philby, Don Maclean, Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt
The American paying tribute to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
The American paying tribute to Anwar al-Awlaki
And of course, Malaysians and Singaporean paying tribute to Chin Peng

 

[scroobal]

People are trying to tell you it is not a war. They were killing civilians by calling them running dogs just as old man was labelling people Marxist. They hardly fought the armed forces. They slaughter the civilians and the armed forces would pursue them. It was blatant terror on the civilians. The death toll was much more on civilians. The first victims were rubber planters and their workers and it just continued to other civilians. What war are you talking about. Tell us what battles they fought? This is an opportunity to put your case across.

Wah lau eh... a simple tribute turned into a discussion about blood debts. To the forummers who have relatives killed by insurgents, I have to remind you that it was just war. My family clan in china was almost wiped out by war. One assassinated by local warlord in the university he was teaching in, 1 was dragged out of his room in the middle of the night and executed by the KMT, and 1 died fleeing HK when the japs came. My point is, during those turbulent times, life was cheap. That's why we should never take peace for granted. And I have to say that I've heard more stories of people's relatives being killed by the japanese than the MCP. To Charlie258, it would be naive to wholly believe a japanese invader's account of things. Collaborators came in many shapes or forms. If you have a chance to speak to old timers, you will get an idea of how fickle chinese loyalty is. Some jap soldiers were speaking hokkien or hainanese. At least one interpreter is hakka.And again to those old folks with failing eyesight, please note the spelling difference between "national" and "nationalist". I am not Yap kheng hoe. And Chin Peng is not Harban Singh.

 

[Glaringly]

Wah lau eh... a simple tribute turned into a discussion about blood debts.

Haha... Hero's only in the eye of the victors and community. You are singing to the wrong audience.

 

[Rogue Trader]

Think you are missing the point.

This simple tribute is like:

The Japanese paying tribute to Hotsumi Ozaki
The British paying tribute to Kim Philby, Don Maclean, Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt
The American paying tribute to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
The American paying tribute to Anwar al-Awlaki
And of course, Malaysians and Singaporean paying tribute to Chin Peng

After ww2 britain and america were not colonies of slaves without citizenship status. For them it was merely a game of territorial grab.

 

[Rogue Trader]

People are trying to tell you it is not a war. They were killing civilians by calling them running dogs just as old man was labelling people Marxist. They hardly fought the armed forces. They slaughter the civilians and the armed forces would pursue them. It was blatant terror on the civilians. The death toll was much more on civilians. The first victims were rubber planters and their workers and it just continued to other civilians. What war are you talking about. Tell us what battles they fought? This is an opportunity to put your case across.

Again, I don't condone any hit on soft targets. These guys were fighting against the world's most powerful empire (albeit a dying one) who could mobilise troops and weaponry from various former colonies. Eventually the briggs plan strangled them and they were losing. When you are outnumbered, outgunned, starving and the jungle is your only ally, you fight dirty.

Seriously what do you expect from poor people with guns? A game of bridge?

 

[Rogue Trader]

Haha... Hero's only in the eye of the victors and community. You are singing to the wrong audience.

If that hideous Lady gaga can go platinum, I'm sure I can find my place in this world.

 

[scroobal]

From the very start they were targeting civilians and not the armed forces. Long before Briggs landed in Malaysia. I think you have muddled your history. No issues if they were fighting armed forces even for the wrong reasons. Killing unarmed citizens from the very start is a different ball game.

Stalin, Osama, hitler all had causes but their methods were unacceptable. They crucified Hitler not for his war effort but his atrocities during the war including the holocaust. People have high regard and respect for Rommel and the tag Desert Fox was apt. Ever wondered why?

Again, I don't condone any hit on soft targets. These guys were fighting against the world's most powerful empire (albeit a dying one) who could mobilise troops and weaponry from various former colonies. Eventually the briggs plan strangled them and they were losing. When you are outnumbered, outgunned, starving and the jungle is your only ally, you fight dirty. Seriously what do you expect from poor people with guns? A game of bridge?

 

[Fook Seng]

This rumor is being denied.

 

[LeMans2011]

From the very start they were targeting civilians and not the armed forces. Long before Briggs landed in Malaysia. I think you have muddled your history. No issues if they were fighting armed forces even for the wrong reasons. Killing unarmed citizens from the very start is a different ball game.

Stalin, Osama, hitler all had causes but their methods were unacceptable. They crucified Hitler not for his war effort but his atrocities during the war including the holocaust. People have high regard and respect for Rommel and the tag Desert Fox was apt. Ever wondered why?

History is written by victors. Losers have little chance to tell the world what they did in their lifetime, bearing in mind there was no internet during his days. It is hard to believe a man will just take to the jungles and kill civillians.

 

[Pinkieslut]

Remember the Americans bomb everyone in their path in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Effectively turning the local populations against them.

 

[fukyuman]

Nothing against you bro. My grandfather was killed by them and body never recovered. But where did you get the facts? You are probably not born or too young then. The victors get to write history but anything from PAP archives are suspect as far as I am concerned. All I have is the book 'War of the Running Dogs' plus Vietnam wars books on how the commies love to remove entrails of teachers while alive. There are atrocities by both sides. The commies when caught are roasted alive by the malayan rangers.

From the very start they were targeting civilians and not the armed forces. Long before Briggs landed in Malaysia. I think you have muddled your history. No issues if they were fighting armed forces even for the wrong reasons. Killing unarmed citizens from the very start is a different ball game.

Stalin, Osama, hitler all had causes but their methods were unacceptable. They crucified Hitler not for his war effort but his atrocities during the war including the holocaust. People have high regard and respect for Rommel and the tag Desert Fox was apt. Ever wondered why?

 

[scroobal]

Not to worry bro. We are all here to learn. Let me make another attempt to put my view across.

What was CPM hoping to achieve? Independence were already in the air. When Malaysia had achieved independence, these people were still killing civilians. So what were they fighting? I am sure Rogue Trader can't explain. Fair enough they fought the Japanese. They were recognised for it and were awarded medals. I am sure many people are not familiar with what went on.

Vietnamese were fighting for independence and fighting the French and the US army. They gave the French and the Americans more than a bloody nose. 2 different scenarios. I asked him what battle CPM fought during their insurgency and he still does not know. So which battle did the National Hero lead his men into? I can tell you none. He spent most of his time walking around his apartment in Beijing. Later he operated a radio station. Maybe DJ of the year>

Nothing against you bro. .

 

[Rogue Trader]

What was CPM hoping to achieve? Independence were already in the air. When Malaysia had achieved independence, these people were still killing civilians. So what were they fighting?

Independence already in the air when the emergency was declared? I don't know what secret british file you've been reading. CC Toh's private collection?

Did he mention anything about the secret society muscle hired by plantation owners to keep underpaid workers from go on a strike?

Or were those paid thugs suddenly become rubber tappers when killed?

 

[Rogue Trader]

na beh.. cracked my skull last night trying to recall the name of this incident that happened during the emergency but covered up by the press.

Just to give you guys a flavour of the enemy Chin Ping was fighting against. And this is 20 years before My Lai.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/09/malaya-massacre-villagers-coverup


New documents reveal cover-up of 1948 British 'massacre' of villagers in Malaya
Foreign Office intervened to halt an investigation in the 1990s by Malaysian authorities into the deaths of 24 unarmed villagers
Mark Townsend
guardian.co.uk,
Saturday 9 April 2011 10.18 BST

Communist prisoners are held during the Malaya emergency of the late 1940s. Photograph: Jack Birns/Time & Life Pictures

The Foreign Office intervened to stop a criminal investigation into the alleged massacre of 24 unarmed villagers by British troops, in a cover-up that puts Britain's colonial past under renewed scrutiny. Newly disclosed documents reveal that in the 1990s UK officials pressured Malaysian authorities into aborting a police inquiry into the alleged killings by Scots Guards in Malaya in 1948.

They reveal that Malaysian police officers contacted Interpol and were due to visit the UK in 1993 to interview soldiers involved in the shootings, only for the Foreign Office to pressure the country's high commissioner into halting the visit. One memorandum states that senior Foreign Office officials later met Malaysian police chiefs to discuss closing the inquiry shortly before it was aborted.

The documents, released by Malaysian sources ahead of a judicial review related to the massacre, also reveal how a Metropolitan police investigation in 1970 into the allegations was "terminated" because an incoming Conservative government did not want the darker aspects of Britain's colonial past exposed.

The plantation workers were shot in cold blood by a 16-man patrol of Scots Guards in December 1948. Many of the victims' bodies were found to have been mutilated and their village of Batang Kali was burned to the ground. No weapons were found when the village was searched during a military operation against Chinese communists in the post-second world war Malayan emergency.

The British government has refused to apologise for the incident or offer reparations, and last November it said it would not hold a public inquiry into an incident that campaigners dub "Britain's My Lai massacre". A recent letter from Treasury solicitors indicates that the government is not prepared to discuss whether the killings were lawful or not.

News of the suppressed investigations follows last week's disclosure of government reports in the high court revealing the extent of British brutality during the Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya.

Four Kenyans who allege that rebels were sexually abused, castrated and beaten while detained under colonial rule in the 1950s will continue their claim for compensation this week.

A separate legal challenge over allegations of colonial brutality will shortly commence, with the Bindmans law firm launching a judicial review over the government's refusal to hold an independent inquiry into the Malaysian killings.

The case is being brought on behalf of four survivors, including one whose father was allegedly beheaded. The government's refusal to reopen the matter has provoked claims that it is carrying on a cover-up that has lasted more than half a century.

Documents released by Tan Kai Hee, founder of the Action Committee Condemning the Batang Kali Massacre, also show that the lead investigating officer in the 1970 Scotland Yard inquiry, Detective Chief Superintendent Frank Williams, had major concerns "over a political aspect to the case".

The defence secretary, Denis Healey, had instructed the Met to investigate the incident and arranged for Williams to travel to Malaysia to interview other witnesses and disinter the bodies for forensic examination.

However, the inquiry was abruptly stopped. Previously unreleased documents citing Williams's investigation state: "It was patently clear that the decision to terminate inquiries in the middle of the investigation was due to a political change of view when the new Conservative government came into office."

Author Ian Ward, who wrote an account of the massacre, Slaughter and Deception at Batang Kali, said: "Personally I was appalled at the cover-up that was instituted and has been systematically renewed year after year since it occurred."

Speaking from Malaysia, Ward said that, since his book was published in 2009, he had obtained notes of a 1994 meeting between two senior Foreign Office officials and a police chief in Malaysia during which they discuss winding up the investigation.

The four Malaysians represented by Bindmans are Loh Ah Choi, who was seven at the time and claims to have witnessed his uncle being shot dead; Lim Kok, whose father's corpse was allegedly beheaded by the soldiers; Chong Nyok Keyu, whose uncle was allegedly shot and killed; and Wooi Kum Thai, whose father was also killed.

John Halford, a partner at Bindmans, said: "This case is all about questions which, when they are finally answered, will bring about accountability for a massacre that was as immoral as it was unlawful. For six decades successive governments have gone to extraordinary lengths to evade answering these questions."

A letter seen by the Observer reveals that the government is threatening the four claimants with legal costs of up to £100,000 if the quest for an inquiry fails. "Many will question whether that is something a government with nothing to hide and confidence these killings were legal would resort to," said Halford.

Tan Kai Hee said the British government's decision to refuse a public inquiry into the allegations had left him shocked and deeply disappointed. He added: "Many of us had believed for much of our lives that Britain stood for openness, fairness and honour. The current impasse is neither honourable nor moral."

The official British position maintains that the villagers were killed as they attempted a mass escape into the jungle, having been warned they would be shot if they tried. Some of the troops involved have, however, claimed that there was no escape attempt and that they were ordered to take the men out in groups and shoot them.

The original investigation, in December 1948, amounted to a "superficial cover-up", according to Halford. Conducted by the Malaya attorney-general, Sir Stafford Foster Sutton, it did not question any survivors or carry out forensic examinations. An undated memo records the attorney-general's view that there "was something to be said for public executions".

A BRUTAL CONFLICT
Three years after the end of the second world war, Commonwealth forces became embroiled in a bitter jungle war against a resolute army of Chinese communists whose attacks on industry and rubber-tree plantations threatened Britain's colonial interests.

At stake was control of the new Federation of Malaya, a patchwork of states on the Malayan peninsula which were then British colonies. The federation was the successor to British Malaya, the loosely described set of states that were brought under colonial control between the 18th and 20th centuries.

Had the guerrillas prevailed, Malaya would have become a communist republic, tied to China, but after 12 years of fighting the insurgency was defeated.

The British government classified the conflict as an "emergency", in deference to the British owners of Malaya's lucrative rubber plantations and tin mines, who were insured for losses from theft, but not for those incurred in wartime.

During the first five years alone, the British dropped 545,000 tons of bombs in 4,500 air strikes. More than 500 British personnel, including the high commissioner, Henry Gurney, 1,300 Malayan police and 3,000 civilians were killed. In addition, the British interned 34,000 people and sprayed hundreds of acres with defoliant.

 

[CakeLengKia]

he almost become the president of the people's republic of malaya (which includes singapore)!

 

[scroobal]

Batang Kali Massacre were not the only atrocities committed by the British. The British Parliament came to know of British Troops beheading dead communist including females on the pretext of bringing the heads back for identification. So we now know there are arseholes from both sides.

Stll haven't answered 2 questions posed despite "having cracked my skull last night" which is

1) Malaysia had gained independence, so what where they fighting for?
2) What battles did they fight with the Armed Forces?

We still trying to determine how you came to classify him as "National Hero"

na beh.. cracked my skull last night trying to recall the name of this incident that happened during the emergency but covered up by the press.

Just to give you guys a flavour of the enemy Chin Ping was fighting against. And this is 20 years before My Lai.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/09/malaya-massacre-villagers-coverup

 

[scroobal]

Anyway the "National Hero" is fine. Only went to BKK for routine check-up. Still will be chairing the Northern Politburo and trying to ascertain what cause they were fighting for after countries got independence.

 

[Agoraphobic]

It would be nice if people could forgive.

CP fought the Japs. That made him a hero. He also fought the Brits and M`sian (& if you consider the Bersatu Padu 5 nation exercise, Singapore), that makes him a villain. To me, when the Brits gave independence to to Malaya to form the Federtion, there was no more cause for the MCP.

But Chin Peng is an old man. Ideology is gone, no more. Let him go back to Malaysia, and die peacefully.

Cheers!

 

[scroobal]

I heard the same thing about Hitler and Stalin. It would be good to forgive them. I don't know why people think they are so bad.

It would be nice if people could forgive.

CP fought the Japs. That made him a hero. He also fought the Brits and M`sian (& if you consider the Bersatu Padu 5 nation exercise, Singapore), that makes him a villain. To me, when the Brits gave independence to to Malaya to form the Federtion, there was no more cause for the MCP.

But Chin Peng is an old man. Ideology is gone, no more. Let him go back to Malaysia, and die peacefully.

Cheers!

 

[Rogue Trader]

Batang Kali Massacre were not the only atrocities committed by the British. The British Parliament came to know of British Troops beheading dead communist including females on the pretext of bringing the heads back for identification. So we now know there are arseholes from both sides.

Btw, the brits also deployed their most racist servicemen from Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) to capture, skin and shoot the yellow and brown rebelling natives. You know, the sort who would rape and kill Gandhi's nanna for king and country. Or tin and rubber. Whatever.

Excellent. So now you see it was not a simple "good vs evil battle". That's good progress. Need a break before we move on?

Stll haven't answered 2 questions posed despite "having cracked my skull last night" which is

1) Malaysia had gained independence, so what where they fighting for?
2) What battles did they fight with the Armed Forces?

1) One of Tunku and Marshall's conditions during the Baling talks was CPM's surrender. Which means detention, interrogation and trial for their war crimes. Of course Chin peng could not agree to that. The war was not lost. He decided to carry on fighting.

2) Har? They fought many battles. And collectively it was called "The Emergency". I'm sure you know why it's not called "The Malayan War" so you can understand why there are no specific "battles" with fancy names.

Or it could also have something to do with the CPM's tactic. Heard of guerilla warfare? It's when open warfare is a suicidal option due to the imbalance of manpower and resources.

We still trying to determine how you came to classify him as "National Hero"

sigh.... get new glasses.

Btw, a Sir Robert Thomson had once admitted that Chin Peng had "accelerated Mederka by 10 to 15 years". He was only the Malayan Perm Sec of Defence then. Do a search for it to verify.