For a colonial outpost that was considered to be one of the pearls in the imperial crown, the supposed fortress of Singapore fell with surprising rapidity. A combination of incompetence, unpreparedness and ill-fortune led to the naval taskforce being sent to the ocean depths by Japanese planes; a swift landing and then the rolling up of what remained of the defenders soon followed and then that was it for British invincibility in Asia.
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In Primitive Rebels, one of his first published works (originally written in 1959 and published in 1965), the leading Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm focuses on various instances of small-scale rebellion and uprising by individuals and small groups which had previously been ignored, because in his own words: “Little attention has been paid to modern movements of social protest which fall outside the classic patterns of labour or socialist agitation, and even less to those whose political colouring is not modernist or progressive but conservative, or reactionary or, at any rate, rather inarticulate.”
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The beauty and grandeur of the monuments left by the Khmer Empire, together with the anarchy and disorganization suffered by the people of that country for centuries, persuaded the European travelers and colonists who ‘discovered’ them that they must have been created by some other people, possibly Alexander the Great or the tribe of wandering Jews. Adding to the mystery of the ruins was the difficulty involved in trying to interpret their meaning and who was responsible for them.
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Last week (at the time of writing this, of course–November 2010), I was in Phuket for a conference. Phuket came to international prominence because of the exploitation of the tin used there on an industrial scale (primitive mining had been taking place for centuries beforehand) and then exported around the world. To work the mines, numerous Chinese workers were imported and their presence has radically transformed the sociology of the island.
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“Historically, the territory of Lan Na had its own history, culture, traditions, and language. The Lan Na people had closer ties with the Burmese, Shan, Lue, and Lao than with the Thai. They felt little in common with the Siamese, who felt likewise about their northern neighbors.
By 1903 it was government policy that Central Thai script be taught in schools throughout the kingdom. In the beginning, the study of local languages was also allowed. The government believed that a lenient approach would eventually lead to the disappearance of local languages, particularly given the rule that government officials had to know Central Thai. The use of Lan Na Tham script has continued to decline to the present day, together with knowledge of the old texts.”
Sarassawadee Ongsakul, History of Lan Na (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2005), translated by Chitraporn Tanratanakul, p.210.
“On April 2, 1867, the expedition reached Vientiane. They quickly saw how thorough the Thai destruction had been. Vientiane’s ruler had been singularly unwise in choosing to rebel against King Rama III of Thailand. This Thai monarch matched austerity with a determination to ensure that his kingdom would never again be a prey to the attacks and invasions that had been such a feature of the eighteenth century. When his trusted and favoured vassal rebelled, Rama III did not offer half-measures in response. Vientiane was occupied in 1827 and the destruction began. Religious monuments were left standing, but the temporal buildings of the city were razed. Inhabitants who had not been killed in battle or chosen for slavery were driven into great bamboo structures and burned to death. When Chou-Anou, the defeated ruler of Vientiane, was captured a year later, he was sent to Bangkok, where he was immediately displayed in a cage to reap a bitter harvest of taunts and abuse. Within a few years – experts disagree on just how many – he was dead, though whether through disease or secret assassination is unknown.”*
I thought I had posted this yesterday – is the internet broken or am I losing what tenuous grasp on reality is left to me?
* Osborne, Milton, River Road to China: The Search for the Source of the Mekong, 1866-73 (Singapore: Archipelago Press, 1996), first published in 1975, p.97
Speaking about Afghanistan after that country had been invaded by the Soviet Union, Tariq Ali writes (p.120): “Given that Afghanistan, thanks to the Russians, had now become fundamental to civilization, it was crucial for it to acquire a heroic political history. This required outside help on various levels. Knights in shining armour were dispatched to the region. Washington alerted researchers and advisers from different agencies and think tanks.”
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One of the great incentives for empire-building in Southeast Asia was the search for the land trade route to China – it motivated the British in Burma and the French in Vietnam and Cambodia. The man (women were not considered suitable for such work) who could find the secret route would become a hero. Well, he would become a hero if he were British, since the tradition of gentlemen adventuring explorers was well-embedded into a process of recognising and lauding those who were successful at filling in some of the blank parts of the map.
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This slim volume consists of two separate documents: a reprint of Book 12 of The Silken East; London, 1904, the original goes from Chapters XLIV to XLVIII, pp.751-832 and, secondly, Robert Gordon, C.E., “On the Ruby Mines near Mogok, Burma,” Proceedings of the Royal Geographic Society and Monthly Record of Geography, Read at the Evening Meeting, February 27th, 1888. It will be part of three volumes gathering together documents concerning the ruby mine district in Burma and lavishly illustrated as ever by White Lotus Press in Bangkok.
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