Wen-Qing Ngoei
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- January 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781501716409
- eISBN:
- 9781501716423
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501716409.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This book recasts the history of American empire in Southeast and East Asia from the Pacific War through the end of U.S. intervention in Vietnam. It argues that anticommunist nationalism in Southeast ...
More
This book recasts the history of American empire in Southeast and East Asia from the Pacific War through the end of U.S. intervention in Vietnam. It argues that anticommunist nationalism in Southeast Asia intersected with pre-existing local antipathy toward China and the Chinese diaspora to usher the region from European-dominated colonialism into U.S. hegemony. Between the late 1940s and 1960s, Britain and its indigenous collaborators in Malaya and Singapore overcame the mostly Chinese communist parties of both countries by crafting a pro-West nationalism that was anticommunist by virtue of its anti-Chinese bent. London’s neocolonial schemes in Malaya and Singapore prolonged its influence in the region. But as British power waned, Malaya and Singapore’s anticommunist leaders cast their lot with the United States, mirroring developments in the Philippines, Thailand and, in the late 1960s, Indonesia. In effect, these five anticommunist states established, with U.S. support, a geostrategic arc of containment that encircled China and its regional allies. Southeast Asia’s imperial transition from colonial order to U.S. empire, through the tumult of decolonization and the Cold War, was more characteristic of the region’s history after 1945 than Indochina’s embrace of communism.Less
This book recasts the history of American empire in Southeast and East Asia from the Pacific War through the end of U.S. intervention in Vietnam. It argues that anticommunist nationalism in Southeast Asia intersected with pre-existing local antipathy toward China and the Chinese diaspora to usher the region from European-dominated colonialism into U.S. hegemony. Between the late 1940s and 1960s, Britain and its indigenous collaborators in Malaya and Singapore overcame the mostly Chinese communist parties of both countries by crafting a pro-West nationalism that was anticommunist by virtue of its anti-Chinese bent. London’s neocolonial schemes in Malaya and Singapore prolonged its influence in the region. But as British power waned, Malaya and Singapore’s anticommunist leaders cast their lot with the United States, mirroring developments in the Philippines, Thailand and, in the late 1960s, Indonesia. In effect, these five anticommunist states established, with U.S. support, a geostrategic arc of containment that encircled China and its regional allies. Southeast Asia’s imperial transition from colonial order to U.S. empire, through the tumult of decolonization and the Cold War, was more characteristic of the region’s history after 1945 than Indochina’s embrace of communism.
Wen-Qing Ngoei
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- January 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781501716409
- eISBN:
- 9781501716423
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501716409.003.0006
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines Southeast Asia’s imperial transition from Anglo-American predominance to U.S. hegemony between the late 1960s and mid-1970s, a product of British decolonization strategies in ...
More
This chapter examines Southeast Asia’s imperial transition from Anglo-American predominance to U.S. hegemony between the late 1960s and mid-1970s, a product of British decolonization strategies in Singapore and the growing stability of the arc of containment. As Britain’s military withdrew from Singapore, London established the Five Power Defense Arrangement (FPDA), a security framework for Malaysia, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand, that thwarted the Soviet Union’s hopes of expanding its regional influence beyond Vietnam. At the same time, Southeast Asia’s anticommunist statesmen founded ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) in 1967 and forged increasingly intimate political, economic and military ties with America, stabilizing their regimes and effectively containing Vietnam and China. Moscow and Beijing were cognizant of U.S. dominance in Southeast Asia and keen to thaw relations with Washington, the de facto hegemon despite U.S. policy failures in Indochina.Less
This chapter examines Southeast Asia’s imperial transition from Anglo-American predominance to U.S. hegemony between the late 1960s and mid-1970s, a product of British decolonization strategies in Singapore and the growing stability of the arc of containment. As Britain’s military withdrew from Singapore, London established the Five Power Defense Arrangement (FPDA), a security framework for Malaysia, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand, that thwarted the Soviet Union’s hopes of expanding its regional influence beyond Vietnam. At the same time, Southeast Asia’s anticommunist statesmen founded ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) in 1967 and forged increasingly intimate political, economic and military ties with America, stabilizing their regimes and effectively containing Vietnam and China. Moscow and Beijing were cognizant of U.S. dominance in Southeast Asia and keen to thaw relations with Washington, the de facto hegemon despite U.S. policy failures in Indochina.
Wen-Qing Ngoei
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- January 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781501716409
- eISBN:
- 9781501716423
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501716409.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This coda concludes the book by examining how the United States and its Southeast Asian allies responded to the fall of Saigon to communist forces in 1975. It shows that the regimes of the arc of ...
More
This coda concludes the book by examining how the United States and its Southeast Asian allies responded to the fall of Saigon to communist forces in 1975. It shows that the regimes of the arc of containment did not proceed to topple like dominoes to communist factions at home, or bow to Chinese or Soviet power, but instead elected to reinforce their ties with Washington. Equally, U.S. policymakers discerned this “reverse domino effect” across Asia (or so they termed it) and unreservedly renewed American economic, political and military commitments to their allies in the region. Given that the arc of containment underpinned imperial transition and the rise of U.S. empire in Southeast Asia, the coda contends that reversals of the domino theory, not its fulfilment, were the true prevailing motif of American interference in the region’s fraught decolonization after the Pacific War.Less
This coda concludes the book by examining how the United States and its Southeast Asian allies responded to the fall of Saigon to communist forces in 1975. It shows that the regimes of the arc of containment did not proceed to topple like dominoes to communist factions at home, or bow to Chinese or Soviet power, but instead elected to reinforce their ties with Washington. Equally, U.S. policymakers discerned this “reverse domino effect” across Asia (or so they termed it) and unreservedly renewed American economic, political and military commitments to their allies in the region. Given that the arc of containment underpinned imperial transition and the rise of U.S. empire in Southeast Asia, the coda contends that reversals of the domino theory, not its fulfilment, were the true prevailing motif of American interference in the region’s fraught decolonization after the Pacific War.
