Recently, a book "The 1963 Operation Coldstore inSingapore: Commemorating 50 Years" was launched in Singapore. The book edited by Poh Soo Kai, Tan Kok Fang & Hong Lysa aims to present history from the perspective of those arrested during Operation Coldstore. (Note: Poh Soo Kai was one of those detained during Operation Coldstore)
From excerpts and articles published online, Operation Coldstore was
positioned as a political move that aimed to shore up Lee Kuan Yew's waning
political support during 1963. Apparently, Lee Kuan Yew's own party base was not supporting
him and due to that, he sought help from the Malayan Communist Party and then the British. Furthermore, it is
claimed that Lee Kuan Yew inserted names onto the arrest list to ensure that
even if his own popularity collapsed after the arrests, there would be no real
alternative to the PAP.
With such mouth watering details extracted from de-classified British documents, I look forward to reading the book! To make this even more mouth watering, what the British documents said were in contradiction to other British documents and the records of the local government and Special Branch. For the uninitiated, read Dennis Bloodworth's Tiger and the Trojan Horse.
With such mouth watering details extracted from de-classified British documents, I look forward to reading the book! To make this even more mouth watering, what the British documents said were in contradiction to other British documents and the records of the local government and Special Branch. For the uninitiated, read Dennis Bloodworth's Tiger and the Trojan Horse.
Strangely though, amongst the publicity there was little mention of the
links between these individuals and the Malayan Communist Party, especially for
those who were in the Barisan Socialis. This is problematic as we know for
certain that Lim Chin Siong, the leader of the Barisan Socialis was a Communist
and this important fact was conveniently omitted. Even Fong Chong Pik, the
leader of the then Singapore underground
Communist network admitted in his book written in 2008 that he possessed
a special relationship with Lim Chin Siong.
Interestingly, perhaps in their attempts to whitewash their
relationship with the Communist cause, it is such glaring gaps in narrative
that draw further attention to their relationship with the Communist Party of
Malaya.
Despite this historical tug of war between the PAP government and ex-ISA detainees, one fact is for certain - the Communists were an armed insurgency that caused undeniable physical damage to Singapore's infrastructure and terrorized the population. At the end of the Communist insurgency, no less than 12,000 people perished. This violent doctrine only officially ended in 1989 when the CPM signed a peace treaty to cease all hostilities. Therefore, maybe it is the CPM's violence that presented the advantage and legitimacy to Lee Kuan Yew's PAP government to clamp down on the Malayan Communist Party and its affiliates.
That said, there were innocent individuals scooped up for their political allegiances and became the collateral damage in this Communist insurgency. But at a time when the CPM waged a physical insurgency and conducted shrewd political manoeuvrings through its political proxies, weeding out the Communists at its bud would be no easy task.
For your viewing pleasure, I have embedded a History Channel documentary on the Malayan Emergency depicting the the dire situation at the height of the Communist insurgency (1948 - 1950s).
