Eurasia Review
12 December 2014
- RSIS
- Media Mentions
- Singapore’s Struggle against CPM: What if the Barisan Sosialis had Won? – Analysis
Singapore’s Struggle against CPM: What if the Barisan Sosialis had Won? – Analysis
On the 25th anniversary of the end of the long struggle against the Communist Party of Malaya, it is critical that the conflict be remembered and evaluated accurately. Due regard should be given especially to the sacrifices of those Singaporeans who suffered or perished as a result of Communist violence. To do any less would be a travesty.
This year marks the 25th anniversary of the signing of the peace agreement between the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) and the Malaysian and Thai governments in Hat Yai, which ended four decades of conflict. On 8 December 2014 a marker of the ‘Struggle Against the Communist Party of Malaya’ was unveiled at Esplanade Park in Singapore near the Cenotaph and Lim Boh Seng Memorial on Queen Elizabeth Walk.
The marker is intended as a timely reminder of the approximately 8,000 civilian and security personnel casualties during the Communist insurgency in Malaya (including Singapore) from 1948 to the end of the 1980s. 2014 also marks the 60th anniversary of the People’s Action Party (PAP), which has formed the government of Singapore from self-government to independence till today. This year is also the 51st anniversary of Operation Coldstore, the historic internal security sweep carried out by the British, Singapore and Malayan governments against the Communist United Front (CUF) in Singapore on 2 February 1963.
…Kumar Ramakrishna is Associate Professor and Head of the Centre of Excellence for National Security (CENS) at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University. He is the author of Emergency Propaganda: The Winning of Malayan Hearts and Minds (2002) and Editor of Freedom News: The Untold Story of the Communist Underground Publication (2008). His new book on Operation Coldstore will be published in early 2015. A version of this commentary appeared earlier in TODAY.
CENS / GPO / RSIS / Online
Last updated on 15/12/2014
