Daniel Orr's Blog, page 111

January 3, 1949 – Arab-Israeli War: Israeli forces trap Egyptian units in Gaza

On January 3, 1949, the Israeli Army surrounded the Egyptian forces inside the Gaza Strip in southwestern Palestine during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.  Three days later, Egypt agreed to a ceasefire which soon came into effect, ending the war.  In the following months, Israel signed separate armistices with Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria.

At war’s end, Israel held 78% of Palestine, 22% more than was allotted to the Jews in the original UN partition plan.  Israel’s territories comprised the whole Galilee and Jezreel Valley in the north, the whole Negev in the south, the coastal plains, and West Jerusalem.  Jordan acquired the West Bank, while Egypt gained the Gaza Strip.  No Palestinian
Arab state was formed.

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, and the 1947-1948 Civil War in Palestine (previous article) that
preceded it, over 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled from their homes, with most of them eventually settling in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and southern Lebanon (Map 11).  About 10,000 Palestinian Jews also
were displaced by the conflict.  Furthermore, as a consequence of these wars, tens of thousands of Jews left or were forced to leave from many Arab countries.  Most of these Jewish refugees settled in Israel.

1948 Arab-Israeli War. Key battle areas are shown. The Arab countries of Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq, assisted by volunteer fighters from other Arab states, invaded newly formed Israel that had occupied a sizable portion of Palestine.

(Taken from 1948 Arab-Israeli War – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 1)

On May 14, 1948, the Palestinian Jews established the State of Israel.  The next day, the infant nation was attacked by the armies of Egypt,
Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq, assisted by volunteer fighters from other Arab states.  The Arabs’ stated reasons for the invasion were to stop the violence and to restore law and order in Palestine, and to allow the Palestinian people to form a government of their choice.  Also cited by the Arabs was the displacement of Palestinian Arabs caused by Jewish aggression. As the nation of Israel was by now in existence, the
resulting 1948 Arab-Israeli War was one fought by sovereign states.

From the east, Jordanian and Iraqi forces crossed the Jordan River into Palestine.  The Jordanians advanced along two columns for Jerusalem,
which they surrounded on May 17, 1948.  After heavy house-to-house fighting, the Jewish defenders of the city were forced to surrender when they ran low on food and ammunition.  The Jordanians captured Jerusalem and then occupied Latrun, a strategic outpost overlooking the highway that led
to Jerusalem.

Meanwhile, the Iraqis advanced to the vicinity surrounding the Arab-populated city of Jenin, Nablus, and Tulkaran.  On May 25, they captured Geulim, Kfar Vona, and Ein Vered before being stopped at Natanya, their ultimate objective on the western coast.  Natanya’s fall would have divided Israel’s
coastal areas in two.

A strong Israeli counterattack on Jenin forced the Iraqis to pull back and defend the city.  The Iraqis repulsed the Israeli attack.  Now, however, they were concerned with making further advances because of the risk of being cut off from the rear.  The Iraqis, therefore, switched to a defensive position, which they maintained for the rest of the war.

From the northeast, Syrian forces began their campaign by advancing toward the south side of the Sea of Galilee.  They captured some Israeli villages before being defeated at Degania.  The Syrians soon withdrew across the border in order to regroup.  On June 6, they launched another attack, this time in northern Galilee, where they captured Mishmar Hayarden.  Israeli Army reinforcements soon arrived in northern Palestine, stopping further Syrian advances.

From the south, the Egyptian Army, which was the largest among the invading forces, entered Palestine through the Sinai Desert.  The Egyptians then advanced through southern Palestine on two fronts: one along the coastal road for Tel-Aviv, and another through the central Negev for Jerusalem.

On June 11, 1948, the United Nations (UN) imposed a truce, which lasted for 28 days until July 8.  A UN panel arrived in Palestine to work out a deal among the warring sides.  The UN effort, however, failed to bring about a peace agreement.

By the end of the first weeks of the war, the Israeli Army had stopped the supposed Arab juggernaut that the Israelis had feared would simply roll in and annihilate their fledging nation.  Although the fighting essentially had ended in a stalemate, Israeli morale was bolstered considerably, as many Israeli villages had been saved by sheer determination alone.  Local militias had thrown back entire Arab
regular army units.

Earlier on May 26, Israeli authorities had merged the various small militias and a large Jewish paramilitary into a single Israeli Defense Force, the country’s regular armed forces.  Mandatory conscription into the military service was imposed, enabling Israel to double the size of its forces from 30,000 to 60,000 soldiers.  Despite the UN arms embargo, the Israeli government was able to purchase large quantities of weapons and military equipment, including heavy firearms, artillery pieces, battle tanks, and warplanes.

The Arabs were handicapped seriously by the UN arms restriction, as the Western countries that supplied much of the Arabs’ weapons adhered to the embargo.  Consequently, Arab soldiers experienced ammunition shortages during the fighting, forcing the
Arab armies to switch from offensive to defensive positions.  Furthermore, Arab reinforcements simply could not match in numbers, zeal, and determination the new Israeli conscripts arriving at the front lines.  And just as important, the war revealed the efficiency, preparedness, and motivation of the Israeli Army in stark contrast to the inefficiency, disunity, and inexperience of the Arab forces.

During the truce, the UN offered a new partition plan, which was rejected by the warring sides. 
Fighting restarted on July 8, one day before the end of the truce.  On July 9, Israeli Army units in the center launched an offensive aimed at opening a corridor from Tel-Aviv to eastern Palestine, in order to lift the siege on Jerusalem.  The Israelis captured Lydda and Ramle, two Arab strongholds near Tel-Aviv, forcing thousands of Arab civilians to flee from their homes to escape the fighting.  The Israelis reached
Latrun, just outside Jerusalem, where they failed to break the solid Jordanian defenses, despite making
repeated assaults using battle tanks and heavy armored vehicles.  The Israelis also failed to break into the Old City of Jerusalem, and eventually were forced to withdraw.

On July 16, however, a powerful Israeli offensive in northern Palestine captured Nazareth and the whole region of lower Galilee extending from Haifa
in the coastal west to the Sea of Galilee in the east.  Further north, the Syrian Army continued to hold Mishmar Hayarden after stopping an Israeli attempt to take the town.

In southern Palestine, the Egyptian offensives in Negba (July 12), Gal (July 14), and Be-erot Yitzhak
were thrown back by the Israeli Army, with disproportionately high Egyptian casualties.  On July 18, the UN imposed a second truce, this time of no specified duration.

The truce lasted nearly three months, when on October 15, fighting broke out once more.  During the truce, relative calm prevailed in Palestine despite high tensions and the occasional outbreaks of small-scale fighting.  The UN also proposed new changes to the partition plan which, however, were rejected once more by the warring sides.

January 2, 1992 – Croatian War of Independence: Yugoslavia and Croatia agree to a ceasefire

By December 1991, the battle lines in Croatia began to settle, as the Yugoslav forces shifted their efforts away from overwhelming Croatia to securing conquered territories for the breakaway Republic of Serbian Krajina (RSK).  In turn, the Croatian Army’s
counter-offensives made only limited gains.  With mediation efforts by the United States, Yugoslavia and Croatia agreed to a ceasefire, which came into effect on January 2, 1992.  In compliance with the ceasefire agreement, the Yugoslav Army withdrew from RSK (completed in May 1991) and was replaced by the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR).  The UN force established buffer zones called United Nations Protected Areas to separate the warring sides and to demilitarize Serb-held territories.  The presence of UNPROFOR
prevented large-scale confrontations between Croats and Croatian Serbs for the next three years.

Yugoslavia comprised six republics, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Macedonia, and Macedonia, and two autonomous provinces, Kosovo and Vojvodina.

Just before the outbreak of the war, Croatia formed its armed forces from existing police and TO units.  However, the Croatians faced a serious shortage of weapons to confront the Yugoslav Army.  In mid-September 1991, Croatian units and Croatian defectors from the Yugoslav Army carried out the “Battle of the Barracks”, where they attacked dozens of Yugoslav Army bases, barracks, supply depots, and other military installations across Croatia, and consequently seized large quantities of military hardware including over 600 tanks and armored vehicles, 400 artillery pieces, 100 anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons, and 240,000 light weapons.

The Croatian government called for a general mobilization, enabling the Croatian armed forces to increase greatly the number of enlisted personnel from 40,000 in August 1991 to 200,000 by the end of 1991.  President Tudjman also took advantage of the many ceasefires (15) negotiated by the international community during the first months of the war, readily agreeing to a cessation of hostilities that broke the Yugoslav Army’s momentum and allowed time for the Croatian government to build up its military resources.

The Croatian armed forces increased their predominantly Soviet- and Yugoslavian-made arsenals by making arms purchases from foreign sources; the weapons were then smuggled into the country to circumvent the UN arms embargo.  Croatia declared its independence a second time on October 8, 1991, after the three-month deferral stipulated by the Brioni Agreement lapsed.  The Croatian state was legitimized when it was recognized by the European Community in January 1992 and admitted to the UN three months later.

By contrast, the RSK did not gain international recognition and its support was limited to a few countries.  A European Economic Community arbitration committee upheld the territorial integrity of Croatia, a decision that was reaffirmed later by the United Nations Security Council.  Furthermore, the war had a devastating effect on the RSK’s economy, seriously undermining the break-away state’s capacity to continue for long.  Its industries ceased to exist while its farm lands were abandoned because of the fighting.  Inflation and unemployment soared.  The RSK was dependent totally on the Serbian government’s monetary infusions; however, this
support diminished as Serbia itself became faced with a devastated economy, as over 80% of its budget was
directed to the war effort.  With the withdrawal of the Yugoslav Army, the military role for the RSK passed into the hands of the newly formed Croatian Serb Army and the various Croatian Serb militias and the other armed groups from Serbia.

Ethnic Serbs in Croatia formed the majority population in Northern Dalmatia, Lika, and parts of Western Slavonia and Eastern Slavonia.

(Taken from Croatian War of Independence – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 2)

Background

By the late 1980s, Yugoslavia was faced with a major political crisis, as separatist aspirations among its ethnic populations threatened to undermine the country’s integrity (see “Yugoslavia”, separate article).  Nationalism particularly was strong in Croatia
and Slovenia, the two westernmost and wealthiest Yugoslav republics.  In January 1990, delegates from Slovenia and Croatia walked out from an assembly
of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, the country’s communist party, over disagreements with their Serbian counterparts regarding proposed reforms to the party and the central government.  Then in the first multi-party elections in Croatia
held in April and May 1990, Franjo Tudjman became president after running a campaign that promised greater autonomy for Croatia and a reduced political union with Yugoslavia.

Ethnic Croatians, who comprised 78% of Croatia’s population, overwhelmingly supported Tudjman, because they were concerned that Yugoslavia’s
national government gradually had fallen under the control of Serbia, Yugoslavia’s largest and most
powerful republic, and led by hard-line President Slobodan Milosevic.  In May 1990, a new Croatian Parliament was formed and subsequently prepared a new constitution.  The constitution was subsequently passed in December 1990.  Then in a referendum held in May 1991 with Croatian Serbs refusing to participate, Croatians voted overwhelmingly in support of independence.  On June 25, 1991, Croatia,
together with Slovenia, declared independence.

Croatian Serbs (ethnic Serbs who are native to Croatia) numbered nearly 600,000, or 12% of Croatia’s total population, and formed the second largest ethnic group in the republic.  As Croatia
increasingly drifted toward political separation from Yugoslavia, the Croatian Serbs became alarmed at the thought that the new Croatian government would carry out persecutions, even a genocidal pogrom against Serbs, just as the pro-Nazi ultra-nationalist Croatian Ustashe government had done to the
Serbs, Jews, and Gypsies during World War II.  As a result, Croatian Serbs began to militarize, with the formation of militias as well as the arrival of armed groups from Serbia.

Croatian Serbs formed a population majority in south-west Croatia (northern Dalmatian and Lika).  There, in February 1990, they formed the Serb Democratic Party, which aimed for the political and territorial integration of Serb-dominated lands in Croatia with Serbia and Yugoslavia.  They declared that if Croatia wanted to secede from Yugoslavia, they, in turn, should be allowed to separate from Croatia.  Serbs also interpreted the change in their
status in the new Croatian constitution as diminishing their civil rights.  In turn, the Croatian government opposed the Croatian Serb secession and was determined to keep the republic’s territorial integrity.

In July 1990, a Croatian Serb Assembly was formed that called for Serbian sovereignty and autonomy.  In December, Croatian Serbs established the SAO Krajina (SAO is the acronym for Serbian Autonomous Oblast) as a separate government from Croatia in the regions of northern Dalmatia and Lika. 
Croatian Serbs formed a majority population in two other regions in Croatia, which they also transformed into separate political administrations called SAO Western Slavonia, and SAO Eastern Slavonia (officially SAO Eastern Slavonia, Baranja, and Western
Syrmia).  (Map 17 shows locations in Croatia where ethnic Serbs formed a majority population.) In a referendum held in August 1990 in SAO Krajina, Croatian Serbs voted overwhelmingly (99.7%) for
Serbian “sovereignty and autonomy”.  Then after a second referendum held in March 1991 where Croatian Serbs voted unanimously (99.8%) to merge SAO Krajina with Serbia, the Krajina government
declared that “… SAO Krajina is a constitutive part of the unified state territory of the Republic of Serbia”.

January 1, 1949 – Indian-Pakistani War of 1947: A UN ceasefire takes effect in Kashmir

The United Nations released two previously approved resolutions for ceasefire and the future of Kashmir, which were accepted by India and Pakistan.  The war officially ended on December 31, 1948, with a UN-imposed ceasefire coming into effect one minute before midnight on January 1, 1949.

On January 5, 1949, the UN approved the following:

1. Pakistan must withdraw its forces from Kashmir;

2. India must also withdraw its forces from Kashmir, but leave a small police contingent to maintain local peace and order;

3. After these two stipulations are met, Kashmiris will hold a plebiscite to decide the future of their land.

Neither India nor Pakistan carried out its part of the ceasefire agreement.  Consequently, no plebiscite was held in Kashmir.  Furthermore, India and Pakistan
held on to their captured territories from the war.  Pakistan held about one-third of Kashmir, while India occupied two-thirds, including the major cities and the best farmlands.  Because the war failed to resolve Kashmir’s sovereignty, high tensions remained between India and Pakistan, which eventually led to another outbreak of war in 1965 (next article).

India and Pakistan. Diagram shows India and the two “wings” of Pakistan (West Pakistan and East Pakistan) on either side. Kashmir, the battleground during the Indian-Pakistani War of 1947, is located in the northern central section of the Indian subcontinent.

(Taken from Indian-Pakistani War of 1947 – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 2)

Backgreound

On August 15, 1947, the new state of Kashmir (Map 1) found itself geographically located next to India and Pakistan, two rival countries that recently had gained their independences after the cataclysmic partition of the Indian subcontinent.  Fearing the widespread violence that had accompanied the birth of India and Pakistan, the Kashmiri monarch, who was a Hindu, chose to remain neutral and allow Kashmir
to be nominally independent in order to avoid the same tragedy from befalling his mixed constituency of Muslims, Hindus, and Sikhs.

Pakistan exerted diplomatic pressure on Kashmir, however, as the Pakistani government had significant strategic and economic interests in the former Princely State.  Most Pakistanis also shared a common religion with the overwhelmingly Muslim Kashmiri population.  India also nurtured ambitions on Kashmir and wanted to bring the former Princely
State into its sphere of influence.  After Kashmir gained back its sovereignty, the British colonial troops departed; consequently, Kashmir was left only with a small native army to enforce peace and order.

War On October 22, 1947, when rumors surfaced that Kashmir would merge with India, Muslim Kashmiris in the state’s western regions broke out in rebellion.  The rebels soon were joined by Pakistani fighters who entered the Kashmiri border from Pakistan.  The rebels and Pakistanis seized the towns of Muzzafarabad and Dommel (Map 1) where they disarmed the Kashmiri troops, who
thereafter also joined the rebels.

Within a few days, the rebellion had spread to Baramula and threatened Srinagar, Kashmir’s
capital.  The Kashmiri ruler fled to India, where he
pleaded for military assistance with the Indian government.  The Indians agreed on the condition that Kashmir be merged with India, to which the Kashmiri ruler gave his consent.  Soon thereafter, Kashmir’s status as a sovereign state ended.  On October 27, 1947, Indian forces arrived in Srinagar
and expelled the rebels, who by this time, had entered the capital.

Earlier, India and Pakistan had jointly agreed to a policy of non-intervention in Kashmir’s internal affairs.  But with the territorial merger of India and Kashmir, Indian forces gained the legal authority to occupy the former Princely State.  The Pakistani government now ordered its forces to invade Kashmir.  The Pakistan Armed Forces chief of staff, however, who was also a British Army officer, refused to comply, since doing so would pit him against Lord
Mountbatten, the British Governor General of India, who had ordered the Indian troops to Kashmir.  With the Pakistani military leadership in a crisis and its army placed on hold, the Indian Army virtually deployed unopposed in Kashmir and secured much of the state.

In early November 1947, the Gilgit Scouts, a civilian paramilitary based in the Gilgit region in northern Kashmir, broke out in rebellion over some disagreement with the Kashmiri government.  The Gilgit Scouts soon were joined by tribal militias from Chitral in northern Pakistan.  Together, they wrested control of the whole northern Kashmir.

By mid-November 1947, the Indian Army’s counter-attacks in the west had recaptured Uri and Baramula and had pushed back the coalition of Kashmir rebels and Pakistani fighters toward the
Pakistani border.  Further Indian advances were stalled by the onset of winter, however, as the Indian troops were not prepared for fighting in the cold, high altitudes and were encountering logistical problems.

With the Indian forces settling down to a defensive position, the rebel coalition forces went on the attack and captured the towns of Kotli and Mirpur in the south, thereby extending the battle lines on the west to a nearly north to south axis.  In
southwest Kashmir, the Indians took Chamb, and fortified the key city of Jammu, which remained in
their possession throughout the war.

December 31, 1958 – Cuban Revolution: Rebel forces capture Santa Clara

With Jaguajay’s fall and the voluntary capitulation of the military garrisons at Caibarien and Cienfuegos
three days earlier, Che Guevara proceeded unopposed to Santa Clara.  Fighting in the city began in the early morning of December 31, 1958,
with confused skirmishes breaking out across the city.  From Havana, President Fulgencio Batista dispatched a 22-car armored train containing troop
reinforcements, weapons, equipment, and food supplies.  Che Guevara’s forces, which had set up
blockades around Santa Clara, destroyed the rail tracks and then ambushed the train.  The rebels forced the surrender of the reinforcing troops and seized the trains’ cargo.  By the afternoon of December 31, Santa Clara’s garrison of 6,500 soldiers, which generally had shown half-hearted performance in battle, surrendered to the rebels.

When reports of the fall of Santa Clara reached Havana, President Batista decided to step down from office, and prepared to leave immediately.  A few weeks earlier, in early December, his government had received a major diplomatic setback when the
United States ceased recognition of his presidency and urged him to step down as Cuba’s leader.  In the early hours of January 1, 1959, Batista and a large entourage of his closest supporters, left Havana for exile in the nearby Dominican Republic.  He brought with him a vast amount of money, estimated at $300 million.  Batista eventually settled in Portugal, where he was granted political asylum.

Before leaving, Batista had tasked General Cantillo with forming a new civilian government under Supreme Court justice Carlos Piedra.  On January 2, the Cuban Supreme Court struck down Justice Piedra’s attempt to take over as president; at the same time, the justices affirmed former Justice Manuel Urrutia, who had been chosen as provisional president by Fidel Castro, as Cuba’s new head of state.  General Cantillo tried to form a military
government under Colonel Ramon Barquin, a respected public figure who had led an unsuccessful coup against President Batista in 1955.  The strength and popularity of Castro’s revolution were overpowering, however, forcing Colonel Barquin to abandon plans to take control of the Cuban Armed Forces in a desperate attempt to prevent Castro from
taking power.  On January 2, 1959, Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuego, together with their forces, entered Havana, where large crowds welcomed them as liberators.

In November 1956, Fidel Castro and 81 other rebels set out from Tuxpan, Mexico aboard a decrepit yacht for their nearly 2,000 kilometer trip across the Caribbean Sea bound for south-eastern Cuba.

 (Taken from Cuban Revolution – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 2)

Aftermath of the Cuban Revolution In Havana, President Manuel Urrutia (who Castro had appointed as provisional president and Cuba’s new head of state), and especially Che Guevara, Camilo Cienfuegos, and the M-26-7 fighters, took control of civilian and military institutions of the government.  Similarly in Oriente Province, Fidel Castro established authority over the regional governmental and military functions.  In the following days, other regional military units all across Cuba surrendered their jurisdictions to rebel forces that arrived.  Then from Santiago de Cuba, Fidel Castro began a nearly week-long journey to Havana,
stopping at every town and city to large crowds and giving speeches, interviews, and press conferences.  On January 8, 1959, he arrived in Havana and declared himself the “Representative of the Rebel Armed Forces of the Presidency”, that is, he was effectively head of the Cuban Armed Forces under the government of President Urrutia and newly installed Prime Minister Jose Miro.  Real power, however, remained with Castro.

In the next few months, the Castro regime consolidated power by executing or jailing hundreds of Batista supporters for “war crimes” and relegating to the sidelines the other rebel groups that had taken part in the revolution.  During the war, Fidel Castro
had promised the return of democracy by instituting multi-party politics and holding free elections.  Now however, he spurned these promises, declaring that the electoral process was socially regressive and benefited only the wealthy elite.

Castro denied being a communist, the most widely publicized declaration being during his personal visit to the United States in April 1959, or four months after he gained power.  Members of the Popular Socialist Party, or PSP (Cuban communists), however, soon began to dominate key government positions, and Cuba’s foreign policy moved toward
establishing diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries.  (By 1961 when Castro had declared Cuba a communist state, his M-26-7 Movement had formed an alliance
with the PSP, the 13th of March Movement – DR, and other leftist organizations; this coalition ultimately gave rise to the Cuban Communist Party.)

President Urrutia, who was a political moderate and a non-communist, made known his concern about the socialist direction of the government, which put him directly in Castro’s way.  Consequently in July 1959, President Urrutia was forced to resign from office, as Prime Minister Miro had done earlier in February.  A Cuban communist took over as the new president, subservient to the dictates of Fidel Castro.  Castro had become the “Maximum Leader”
(Spanish: Maximo Lider), or absolute dictator; he abolished Congress, ruled by decree, and suppressed all forms of opposition.  Free speech was silenced, as were the print and broadcast media, which were placed under government control.  In the villages, towns, and cities across Cuba, neighborhood watches called the “Committees for the Defense of the Revolution” were formed to monitor the activities of all residents within their jurisdictions and to weed out
dissidents, enemies, and “counter-revolutionaries”.  In 1959, land reform was implemented in Cuba;
private and corporate lands were seized, partitioned, and distributed to peasants and landless farmers.

On January 7, 1959, just a few days after the Cuban Revolution ended, the United States recognized the new Cuban government under President Urrutia. But as Castro later gained absolute power and his government gradually turned socialist, relations between the two countries deteriorated rapidly.  By July 1959, just seven months later, U.S.
president Dwight Eisenhower was planning Castro’s overthrow; subsequently in March 1960, he ordered the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to organize and
train U.S.-based Cuban exiles for an invasion of Cuba.

In 1960, Castro entered into a trade agreement with the Soviet Union that included purchasing Russian oil.  Then when U.S. petroleum companies in Cuba refused to refine the imported Russian oil, a succession of measures and retaliatory counter-measures followed quickly.  In July 1960, Cuba
seized the American oil companies and nationalized them the next month.  In October 1960, the United States imposed an economic embargo on Cuba and banned all imports (which constituted 90% of all Cuban exports) from Cuba.  The restriction included sugar, which was Cuba’s biggest source of revenue.  In January 1960, the United States ended all official diplomatic relations with Cuba, closed its embassy in Havana, and banned trade to and forbid American private and business transactions with the island country.

With Cuba shedding off democracy and taking on a clearly communist state policy, thousands of Cubans from the upper and middle classes, including politicians, top government officials, businessmen, doctors, lawyers, and many other professionals fled the country for exile in other countries, particularly in
the United States.  However, many other anti-Castro Cubans chose to remain and subsequently organized into armed groups to start a counter-revolution in the Escambray Mountains; these rebel groups’ activities laid the groundwork for Cuba’s next internal conflict, the “War against the Bandits”.

December 30, 1950 –Korean War: General Douglas MacArthur recommends to the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff that air and naval strikes be launched against China

On December 11, 1950, the UN offered to negotiate a ceasefire at the 38th parallel, which the Chinese government rejected.  On December 30, 1950, General MacArthur recommended to the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff that air and naval strikes be
launched against China, and that forces of Nationalist China (Taiwan), whose leader Chiang Kai-shek, was eager to go to war with China, become involved in the Korean conflict.  President Truman rejected these proposals, not wanting the Korean War to escalate.  Such an escalation could potentially require the United States to transfer troops and resources from Western Europe, leaving the latter vulnerable to an invasion by the Soviet Union.  Instead, the U.S. high command advised General MacArthur to hold onto Korea as best he could, but that if this became impossible, to abandon the peninsula and evacuate his forces to Japan.

At this point, top Chinese military commanders in Beijing called for caution against proceeding further. 
Rejecting this advice, in late December 1950, Chairman Mao ordered his forces to cross the 38th parallel to expel the UN forces from Korea and reunify the Peninsula under the leadership of the communist north.  On December 31, 1950, Chinese and North Korean forces launched an attack on Seoul,
breaking through South Korean and American positions and threatening to encircle the whole UN defensive lines north and east of the city.  On January 4, 1951, UN forces, who were outnumbered 2:1 by the attackers, retreated from Seoul, which was captured by the Chinese and North Koreans, and marked the third time the city changed hands during the war.

(Taken from Korean War – Wars of the 20th Century – Twenty Wars in Asia)

East Asia.

Background
(Excerpts taken from Wars of the 20th
Century: Volume 5 – Twenty Wars in Asia)

During World War II, the Allied Powers met many times to decide the disposition of Japanese territorial
holdings after the Allies had achieved victory. 
With regards to Korea, at the Cairo Conference held in November 1943, the United States, Britain, and Nationalist China agreed that “in due course, Korea shall become free and independent”.  Then at the Yalta Conference of February 1945, the Soviet Union
promised to enter the war in the Asia-Pacific in two or three months after the European theater of World War II ended.

Then with the Soviet Army invading northern Korea on August 9, 1945, the United States became concerned that the Soviet Union might well occupy the whole Korean Peninsula.  The U.S. government, acting on a hastily prepared U.S. military plan to divide Korea at the 38th parallel, presented the proposal to the Soviet government, which the latter accepted.

The Soviet Army continued moving south and stopped at the 38th parallel on August 16, 1945.  U.S. forces soon arrived in southern Korea and advanced north, reaching the 38th parallel on September 8, 1945.  Then in official ceremonies, the U.S. and Soviet commands formally accepted the Japanese surrender in their respective zones of occupation. Thereafter, the American and Soviet commands established military rule in their occupation zones.

As both the U.S. and Soviet governments wanted to reunify Korea, in a conference in Moscow in December 1945, the Allied Powers agreed to form a four-power (United States, Soviet Union, Britain, and Nationalist China) five-year trusteeship over Korea.  During the five-year period, a U.S.-Soviet Joint Commission would work out the process of forming a Korean government.  But after a series of meetings in 1946-1947, the Joint Commission failed to achieve
anything.  In September 1947, the U.S. government referred the Korean question to the United Nations (UN).  The reasons for the U.S.-Soviet Joint Commission’s failure to agree to a mutually acceptable Korean government are three-fold and
to some extent all interrelated: intense opposition by Koreans to the proposed U.S.-Soviet trusteeship; the struggle for power among the various ideology-based political factions; and most important, the emerging Cold War confrontation between the United States
and the Soviet Union.

Historically, Korea for many centuries had been a politically and ethnically integrated state, although its independence often was interrupted by the invasions by its powerful neighbors, China and Japan.  Because of this protracted independence, in the immediate post-World War II period, Koreans aspired for self-rule, and viewed the Allied trusteeship plan as an insult to their capacity to run their own affairs.  However, at the same time, Korea’s political climate was anarchic, as different ideological persuasions, from right-wing, left-wing, communist, and near-center political groups, clashed with each other for political power.  As a result of Japan’s annexation of Korea in 1910, many Korean nationalist resistance groups had emerged.  Among these nationalist groups were the unrecognized “Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea” led by pro-West, U.S.-based Syngman Rhee; and a communist-allied anti-Japanese
partisan militia led by Kim Il-sung.  Both men would play major roles in the Korean War.  At the same time, tens of thousands of Koreans took part in the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945) and the Chinese Civil War, joining and fighting either for Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist forces, or for Mao Zedong’s Chinese Red Army.

The Korean anti-Japanese resistance movement, which operated mainly out of Manchuria, was divided along ideological lines.  Some groups advocated
Western-style capitalist democracy, while others espoused Soviet communism.  However, all were strongly anti-Japanese, and launched attacks on Japanese forces in Manchuria, China, and Korea.

On their arrival in the southern Korean zone in September 1948, U.S. forces imposed direct rule through the United States Army Military Government
In Korea (USAMGIK).  Earlier, members of the Korean Communist Party in Seoul (the southern capital) had sought to fill the power vacuum left by the defeated
Japanese forces, and set up “local people’s committees” throughout the Korean peninsula.  Then two days before U.S. forces arrived, Korean communists of the “Central People’s Committee”
proclaimed the “Korean People’s Republic”.

In October 1945, under the auspices of a U.S. military agent, Syngman Rhee, the former president of the “Provisional Government of the Republic
of Korea” arrived in Seoul.  The USAMGIK refused to recognize the communist Korean People’s Republic,
as well as the pro-West “Provisional Government”.  Instead, U.S. authorities wanted to form a political coalition of moderate rightist and leftist elements.  Thus, in December 1946, under U.S. sponsorship, moderate and right-wing politicians formed the South Korean Interim Legislative Assembly.  However,
this quasi-legislative body was opposed by the communists and other left-wing and right-wing groups.

In the wake of the U.S. authorities’ breaking up the communists’ “people’s committees” violence broke out in the southern zone during the last months of 1946.  Called the Autumn Uprising, the unrest was carried out by left-aligned workers,
farmers, and students, leading to many deaths through killings, violent confrontations, strikes, etc.  Although in many cases, the violence resulted from non-political motives (such as targeting Japanese collaborators or settling old scores), American authorities believed that the unrest was part of a communist plot.  They therefore declared martial law in the southern zone.  Following the U.S. military’s crackdown on leftist activities, the communist militants went into hiding and launched an armed insurgency in the southern zone, which would play a role in the coming war.

Meanwhile in the northern zone, Soviet commanders initially worked to form a local administration under a coalition of nationalists,
Marxists, and even Christian politicians.  But in October 1945, Kim Il-sung, the Korean resistance leader who also was a Soviet Red Army officer, quickly became favored by Soviet authorities.  In February 1946, the “Interim People’s Committee”, a transitional centralized government, was formed and led by Kim Il-sung who soon consolidated power (sidelining the nationalists and Christian leaders), and nationalized industries, and launched centrally planned economic and reconstruction programs based on the Soviet-model emphasizing heavy
industry.

By 1947, the Cold War had begun: the Soviet Union tightened its hold on the socialist countries of Eastern Europe, and the United States announced a new foreign policy, the Truman Doctrine, aimed at stopping the spread of communism.  The United States also implemented the Marshall Plan, an aid program for Europe’s post-World War II reconstruction, which was condemned by the Soviet Union as an American anti-communist plot aimed at
dividing Europe.  As a result, Europe became divided into the capitalist West and socialist East.

Reflecting these developments, in Korea by mid-1945, the United States became resigned to the likelihood that the temporary military partition of the Korean peninsula at the 38th parallel would become a permanent division along ideological grounds.  In September 1947, with U.S. Congress rejecting a proposed aid package to Korea, the U.S. government turned over the Korean issue to the UN.  In November 1947, the United Nations General
Assembly (UNGA) affirmed Korea’s sovereignty and called for elections throughout the Korean peninsula, which was to be overseen by a newly formed body, the United Nations Temporary Commission on Korea (UNTCOK).

However, the Soviet government rejected the UNGA resolution, stating that the UN had no jurisdiction over the Korean issue, and prevented
UNTCOK representatives from entering the Soviet-controlled northern zone.  As a result, in May 1948, elections were held only in the American-controlled southern zone, which even so, experienced widespread violence that caused some 600 deaths.  Elected was the Korean National Assembly, a
legislative body.  Two months later (in July 1948), the Korean National Assembly ratified a new national constitution which established a presidential form of government.  Syngman Rhee, whose party won the most number of legislative seats, was proclaimed as (the first) president.  Then on August 15, 1948, southerners proclaimed the birth of the Republic of Korea (soon more commonly known as South Korea), ostensibly with the state’s sovereignty covering the whole Korean Peninsula.

A consequence of the South Korean elections was the displacement of the political moderates, because of their opposition to both the elections and the division of Korea.  By contrast, the hard-line anti-communist Syngman Rhee was willing to allow the (temporary) partition of the peninsula.  Subsequently, the United States moved to support the Rhee regime, turning its back on the political moderates whom USAMGIK had backed initially.

Meanwhile in the Soviet-controlled northern zone, on August 25, 1948, parliamentary elections were held to the Supreme National Assembly.  Two weeks later (on September 9, 1948), the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (soon more commonly known as North Korea) was proclaimed, with Kim Il-Sung as (its first) Prime Minister.  As with South Korea, North Korea declared its sovereignty over the whole Korean peninsula

The formation of two opposing rival states in Korea, each determined to be the sole authority, now set the stage for the coming war.  In December 1948, acting on a report by UNTCOK, the UN declared that the Republic of Korea (South Korea) was the legitimate Korean polity, a decision that was rejected by both the Soviet Union and North Korea.  Also in December 1948, the Soviet Union withdrew its forces from North Korea. In June 1949, the United States
withdrew its forces from South Korea. However, Soviet and American military advisors remained, in the North and South, respectively.

In March 1949, on a visit to Moscow, Kim Il-sung asked Joseph Stalin, the Soviet leader, for military assistance for a North Korean planned invasion of South Korea.  Kim Il-sung explained that an invasion would be successful, since most South Koreans opposed the Rhee regime, and that the communist insurgency in the south had sufficiently weakened the South Korean military.  Stalin did not give his consent, as the Soviet government currently was pressed by other Cold War events in Europe.

However, by early 1950, the Cold War situation had been altered dramatically.  In September 1949,
the Soviet Union detonated its first atomic bomb, ending the United States’ monopoly on nuclear
weapons.  In October 1949, Chinese communists, led by Mao Zedong, defeated the West-aligned Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek in the Chinese Civil War, and proclaimed the People’s
Republic of China, a socialist state.  Then in 1950, Vietnamese communists (called Viet Minh) turned the First Indochina War from an anti-colonial war against France into a Cold War conflict involving the Soviet Union, China, and the United States.  In February 1950, the Soviet Union and China signed the Sino-Soviet Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance Treaty, where the Soviet government would provide military and financial aid to China.

Furthermore, the Soviet government, long wanting to gauge American strategic designs in Asia, was encouraged by two recent developments: First, the U.S. government did not intervene in the Chinese Civil War; and second, in January 1949, the United States announced that South Korea was not part of
the U.S. “defensive perimeter” in Asia, and U.S. Congress rejected an aid package to South Korea.  To Stalin, the United States was resigned to the whole northeast Asian mainland falling to communism.

In April 1950, the Soviet Union approved North Korea’s plan to invade South Korea, but subject to two crucial conditions: Soviet forces would not be involved in the fighting, and China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA, i.e. the Chinese armed forces) must agree to intervene in the war if necessary.  In May 1950, in a meeting between Kim Il-sung and Mao Zedong, the Chinese leader expressed concern that the United States might intervene if the North Koreans attacked South Korea.  In the end, Mao agreed to send Chinese forces if North Korea was invaded.  North Korea then hastened its invasion plan.

The North Korean armed forces (officially: the Korean People’s Army), having been organized into its present form concurrent with the rise of Kim Il-sung, had grown in strength with large Soviet support.  And in 1949-1950, with Kim Il-sung emphasizing a massive military buildup, by the eve of the invasion, North Korean forces boasted some 150,000–200,000 soldiers, 280 tanks, 200 artillery pieces, and 200 planes.

By contrast, the South Korean military (officially: Republic of Korea Armed Forces), which consisted
largely of police units, was unprepared for war.  The United States, not wanting a Korean war, held back from delivering weapons to South Korea, particularly since President Rhee had declared his intention to invade North Korea in order to reunify the peninsula.  By the time of the North Korean invasion, South Korean weapons, which the United States had limited to defensive strength, proved grossly inadequate.  South Korea had 100,000 soldiers (of whom only 65,000 were combat troops); it also had no tanks and possessed only small-caliber artillery pieces and an assortment of liaison and trainer aircraft.

North Korea had envisioned its invasion as a concentration of forces along the Ongjin Peninsula.  North Korean forces would make a swift assault on Seoul to surround and destroy the South Korean forces there.  Rhee’s government then would collapse, leading to the fall of South Korea.  Then on June 21, 1950, four days before the scheduled invasion, Kim Il-sung believed that South Korea had become aware of the invasion plan and had fortified its defenses.  He revised his plan for an offensive all across the 38th parallel.  In the months preceding the war, numerous border skirmishes had begun breaking out between the two sides.

December 29, 1962 – All remaining prisoners from the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion return to the United States

In December 1962, or twenty months after the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba, in an agreement between Cuba and the United States, Fidel Castro freed the Brigade 2506 prisoners and allowed them to return to the United States in exchange for the United States delivering $53 million worth of food and medicines to Cuba.  Some 60 wounded and ill prisoners had been returned to the United States a few months earlier, while five were executed in Cuba for past crimes.  By December 29, 1962, all surviving prisoners had returned to the United States.

Cuba showing location of Trinidad, which was the first proposed site of the CIA-sponsored Brigade 2506 invasion, and the Bay of Pigs, where the landings took place.

(Taken from Bay of Pigs Invasion – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 2)

Background  

The rise to power of Fidel Castro after his victory in the Cuban Revolution (previous article) caused great concern for the United States.  Castro formed a government that adopted a socialist state policy and opened diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union and other European communist countries.  After the Cuban government seized and nationalized American companies in Cuba, the United States imposed a trade embargo on the Castro regime and subsequently ended all economic and diplomatic
relations with the island country.

Then in July 1959, just seven months after the Cuban Revolution, U.S. president Dwight Eisenhower delegated the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) with the task of overthrowing Castro, who had by then gained absolute power as dictator.  The CIA devised a number of methods to try and kill the Cuban leader, including the use of guns-for-hire and assassins carrying poison-laced devices.  Other schemes to destabilize Cuba also were carried out, including
sending infiltrators to conduct terror and sabotage operations in the island, arming and funding anti-Castro insurgent groups that operated especially in the Escambray Mountains, and by being directly involved in attacking and sinking Cuban and foreign merchant vessels in Cuban waters and by launching air attacks in Cuba.  These CIA operations ultimately
failed to eliminate Castro or permanently destabilize his regime.

In March 1960, the CIA began to plan secretly for the invasion of Cuba, with the full support of the Eisenhower administration and the U.S. Armed Forces.  About 1,400 anti-Castro Cuban exiles in Miami were recruited to form the main invasion force, which came to be known as “Brigade 2506” (Brigade 2506 actually consisted of five infantry brigades and
one paratrooper brigade).  The majority of Brigade 2506 received training in conventional warfare in a U.S. base in Guatemala, while other members took specialized combat instructions in Puerto Rico and
various locations in the United States.

The CIA wanted to maintain utmost secrecy in order to conceal the U.S. government’s involvement in the invasion.  Through loose talk, however, the plan came to be widely known among the Miami Cubans, which eventually was picked up by the American media and then by the foreign press.  On January 10, 1961, a front-page news item in the New York Times read “U.S. helps train anti-Castro Force At Secret Guatemalan Air-Ground Base”.  Castro’s intelligence operatives in Latin America also learned of the plan; in October 1960, the Cuban foreign minister presented evidence of the existence of Brigade 2506 at a session of the United Nations General Assembly.

In January 1961, the CIA gave newly elected U.S. president, John F. Kennedy, together with his Cabinet, details of the Cuban invasion plan.  The State Department raised a number of objections, particularly with regards to the proposed landing site of Trinidad, which was a heavily populated town in south-central Cuba (Map 30).  Trinidad had the benefits of being a defensible landing site and was located adjacent to the Escambray Mountains, where many anti-Castro guerilla groups operated.  State officials were concerned, however, that Trinidad’s conspicuous location and large population would make American involvement difficult to conceal.

As a result, the CIA rejected Trinidad, and proposed a new landing site: the Bay of Pigs (Spanish: Bahia de Cochinos), a remote, sparsely inhabited narrow inlet west of Trinidad.  President Kennedy then gave his approval, and final preparations for the invasion were made.  (The “Cochinos” in Bahia de Cochinos, although translated into English as “pigs” does not refer to swine but to a species of fish, the orange-lined triggerfish, found in the coral waters around the area).

The general premise of the invasion was that most Cubans were discontented with Castro and wanted to see his government deposed.  The CIA believed that once Brigade 2506 began the invasion, Cubans would rise up against Castro, and the Cuban Army would defect to the side of the invaders.  Other anti-government guerilla groups then would join Brigade 2506 and incite a civil war that ultimately would overthrow Castro.  Thereafter, a provisional government, led by Cuban exiles in the United States,
would arrive in Cuba and lead the transition to democracy.

December 28, 1956 – Malayan Emergency: Chief Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman and rebel leader Chin Peng meet in Baling

By 1955, the Malayan National Liberation Army (MNLA) was on the decline, its combat strength weakened by combat deaths, desertions, and
surrenders, morale was low, and its popular support was greatly reduced.  In September 1955, some three months after his party won the general elections, Tunku Abdul Rahman, chief Minister of Malaya, offered amnesty to the MNLA.  Government representatives and the CPM leadership held negotiations in October and November 1955, paving the way for the Baling Peace Talks (held in Baling, in present-day northern Peninsular Malaysia) in December 1955, where CPM leader Chin Peng met with Chief Minister Tunku.  However, this meeting produced no settlement.  Subsequent offers by Chin
Peng to continue negotiations were spurned by Tunku, who insisted on unconditional surrender, i.e. that the MNLA must disarm and disband, and the CPM would not be granted official recognition.  In
February 1956, Tunku rescinded the amnesty offer.

The Malayan Emergency occurred in what is now Peninsular (West) Malaysia.

(Taken from Malayan Emergency – Wars of the 20th Century – Twenty Wars in Asia)

On June 12, 1948, three European plantation managers were killed by armed bands, forcing British authorities to declare a state of emergency throughout Malaya, which essentially was a declaration of war on the CPM.  The British called the conflict, which lasted 12 years (1948-1960), an “emergency” so that business establishments that suffered material losses as a result of the fighting, could make insurance claims, which the same would be refused by insurance companies if Malaya were placed under a state of war.

The state of emergency, which was applied first to Perak State (where the murders of the three plantation managers occurred) and then throughout Malaya in July 1948, gave the police authorization to arrest and hold anyone, without the need for the judicial process.  In this way, hundreds of CPM cadres were arrested and jailed, and the party itself was outlawed in July 1948.  The murders of the three plantation managers are disputed: British authorities blamed the CPM, while Chin Peng denied CPM
involvement, arguing that the CPM itself was caught by surprise by the events and was unprepared for war, and that he himself barely avoided arrest in the
intensive government crackdown that followed the killings.

The CPM retreated into the Malayan jungles where it reconstituted its military wing under a new name, first the Malayan Peoples’ Anti-British Army (MPABA), and then in February 1949 as the Malayan National Liberation Army (MNLA).  Combat units
were hastily re-formed (from the wartime MPAJA units) and buried weapons caches were recovered from the ground.  The MNLA combat strategy consisted of acquiring more weapons by raiding police stations and ambushing army and security patrols.  The guerillas also attacked civilian and public infrastructures to upset the Malayan economy, thereby undermining the British government.  Tin mine operations were disrupted, rubber plantations destroyed, and operations managers targeted for
assassinations.  As well, buses were ransacked, railway trains upturned, and public utilities sabotaged.  These indiscriminate attacks soon were having a detrimental effect on the local workers and ordinary people, which forced the MNLA to end this strategy.

The MNLA obtained its support mainly from the ethnic Chinese population, which provided the rebels with recruits, food, supplies, and information.  MNLA support particularly was strong among the so-called “squatter” population, the 600,000 people who lived in remote areas which typically were beyond the reach of British administrative and police control. 
Direct auxiliary support to the rebels was provided by ordinary civilians using the clandestine “Min Yuen” (Masses Movement) network.  “Min Yuen” functioned in many ways, including being a link between the MNLA and the general population, providing the MNLA with logistical support, and being a courier and communications system across Malaya, where messages (written in small slips of paper) were passed to and from the various rebel commands.  For about three years from the start of the Emergency (1948-1951), the communist rebels held the initiative against government forces; at its peak, the MNLA launched over 6,000 armed incidents in 1951.

At the start of the war, the undermanned British forces in Malaya were unable to confront the rapidly expanding communist insurgency.  Consequently,
British military and police units were brought in from outside of Malaya, while local recruitment to the Malayan police force and privately-organized militias (by plantation and mine owners) increased government and anti-insurgency security strength to over 250,000 personnel by the early 1950s. 
Furthermore, the arrival of army contingents from Australia, New Zealand and Fiji, as well as Gurkha troops in the British Army and security forces from British East African territories, soon allowed the British to seize the initiative from the communist rebels by 1952.

Initially, the British sent large military formations to “search and destroy” operations against MNLA camps which were located deep in the Malayan mountains.  British warplanes also launched thousands of bombing and strafing sorties.  By 1950, these large-scale offensives, cumbersome and ineffective against a concealed enemy, were abandoned.  Small-unit operations were adopted, which were better suited to the Malayan jungles. 
The British also saw that their air attack missions achieved only modest success, because of the dense forest cover, the absence of reliable maps, and
the difficult high-altitude weather conditions.

Maneuverability of British Army ground units also was handicapped by the jungle terrain and the elements, and the difficulty in locating the enemy.  British soldiers also were unable to distinguish between friend and foe, and therefore regarded all persons in remote settlements as potentially hostile.  As a result of these difficulties, the British committed a number of atrocities on the local population, the most notable being the Batang Kali Massacre in December 1948, where 24 villagers were killed and their houses burned.

The British also built fortified camps deep in the jungles in areas that were inhabited by the indigenous Orang Asli tribal population, who previously had supported the MNLA, but were won over by the British.  From these jungle camps, the British sent out
patrols to seek out and engage the rebels.  Members of the Orang Asli also were organized into local militias to defend their villages.

Early on in the war, the British saw that warfare alone could not win the war, because of the difficulty of penetrating the thick Malayan jungles and the refusal of the enemy to engage in open combat.  They therefore implemented a number of non-military approaches to confront the insurgency.  Shortly after the state of emergency was declared, the British jailed hundreds of ethnic Malay communists in order to keep the insurgency from spreading to other Malays (as well as  ethnic Indians), thereby reinforcing the perception that the MNLA was a mainly ethnic Chinese organization.  For the same reason, in Pahang State where an ethnic Malay-led MNLA unit operated, British authorities expelled the Malay
rebels and brought the region under their control.

Still unable to defeat the MNLA, the British turned to starving it into submission.  The 600,000
rural squatters from whom the rebels derived much of their support were uprooted from their homes and moved to “New Villages”, which were guarded
settlement camps where British authorities provided the new residents with basic necessities and public utilities, but also enforced strict restrictions on the residents’ personal movement, food allocations, and other civil rights.  A curfew was imposed and violators were subjected to severe punishment.  By the mid-1950s, some 450 “New Villages” had been built.  To win over the local population, the British launched a “hearts and minds” campaign, where the “New Villages” were provided with educational and health care services, and primary utilities such as
electricity and clean water.

British authorities also co-opted the large anti-communist ethnic Chinese population, forging friendly ties with the Malayan Chinese Association (MCA), which had been organized by moderate Chinese who sought to advance Malayan Chinese interests through peaceful, democratic means.  Intelligence gathering operations also were greatly expanded during the Emergency, with emphasis placed on recruiting Malays, Chinese and Indians as intelligence operatives with the task of gaining
information on the CPM’s organizational structure and courier and communications network.  Working through deep cover agents, captured or surrendered rebels, seized CMP documents, and other sources, the government gained a large body of information on the CMP.  British authorities also infiltrated the rebels’ courier and communications system, and thus succeeded in subverting MNLA and CPM operations.

The British also used psychological warfare, which were so effective in demoralizing the ranks of the MNLA.  Propaganda leaflets were air-dropped in the mountains and jungles, anti-communist rallies were organized in towns and cities, and uncovered rebel weapons caches were left in place but sabotaged, for example, with self-exploding bullets and grenades.

Furthermore, the herbicides 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T were first used during the Malayan Emergency, with British planes spraying them to defoliate the forests and deprive the rebels of cover.  Also targeted were the insurgents’ own crop fields located in jungle clearings, as well as the roadsides where the British
were most vulnerable to rebel attack.  A mixture of these two herbicides (called Agent Orange) was used extensively by U.S. forces during the Vietnam War.

The government’s multi-faceted approach to meet the Malayan Emergency was raised to a higher degree during the term of Gerald Templer as British High Commissioner in Malaya.  Templer had been given broad powers by the British government following his predecessor’s assassination by MNLA guerillas in October 1951.  Templer’s two-year tenure (1952-1954) did much to turn the tide of the war in favor of the British, even though upon his departure, the MNLA continued to be a threat.  Of all the counter-insurgency methods that the British employed, the most successful was preparing Malaya for independence, a process that was accelerated
under Templer’s tenure.  The British reasoned that handing Malaya its independence would nullify the CMP’s reason for existence, which was to end colonial rule.

As it turned out, however, Malaya’s road to independence involved a long, tedious process, primarily because Malaya’s three main racial groups (Malays, Chinese, and Indians) were not integrated and even mutually hostile to each other; this difficulty initially convinced the British that Malaya’s independence was virtually impossible to achieve.

Earlier in April 1946, the British organized the Malayan states into a single polity, the Malayan Union, where the powers of the Sultans were restricted, and the Chinese and Indians were to be granted citizenship.  However, Malay nationalists
led a series of protests against granting citizenship to non-Malays.  The British relented, and negotiations that followed led to a compromise – the Malayan Union was abolished and replaced in February 1948 with the Federation of Malaya.  In the new polity, the Malayan sultans’ powers were restored; in exchange, ethnic Chinese and Indians were granted citizenship, and equality of all races was guaranteed.  Furthermore, a Malay sultan would be the head of state, sovereignty over Malaya would rest with Malays, and Malay would be the official language.  Conversely, the Chinese and Indians would be
guaranteed representation at all levels of government and legislation, and their economic interests and social, cultural, and religious traditions would be protected.

In 1954, Malayan interracial integration was bolstered with the formation of the Alliance Party, a coalition of political parties comprising the three leading ethnic-based political parties, i.e. United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), Malayan Chinese Association (MCA), and Malayan Indian
Congress (MIC).  Then in general elections held in July 1955, the Alliance Party won decisively.  Two years later (on August 31, 1957), the Federation of Malaya became a fully sovereign, independent state  These political developments denigrated the legitimacy of the CPM’s armed struggle, particularly since the 1955 election and Malaya’s independence received overwhelming support from the general population.

By 1955, the MNLA was on the decline, its combat strength weakened by combat deaths, desertions, and surrenders, morale was low, and its
popular support was greatly reduced.  In September 1955, some three months after his party won the general elections, Tunku Abdul Rahman, chief Minister of Malaya, offered amnesty to the MNLA.  Government representatives and the CPM leadership held negotiations in October and November 1955, paving the way for the Baling Peace Talks (held in Baling, in present-day northern Peninsular Malaysia) in December 1955, where CPM leader Chin Peng met with Chief Minister Tunku.  However, this meeting produced no settlement.  Subsequent offers by Chin
Peng to continue negotiations were spurned by Tunku, who insisted on unconditional surrender, i.e. that the MNLA must disarm and disband, and the
CPM would not be granted official recognition. 
In February 1956, Tunku rescinded the amnesty offer.

December 27, 1978 – Spain becomes a democracy with King Juan Carlos I certifying the new constitution; 40 years of dictatorial rule ends

On December 27, 1978, King Juan Carlos I of Spain certified the new constitution, marking the country’s full transition to democracy. The constitution had been ratified on December 6, 1978 and came into force on December 29, 1978. This marked the end of Francoist-era authoritarian rule, since the new constitution repealed the “Fundamental Laws of the Realm” constitution of Francisco Franco.

On November 22, 1975, Juan Carlos became King of Spain after the death of Francisco Franco two days earlier. Franco had ruled Spain as a dictator since emerging victorious in the Spanish Civil War in the late 1930s. As his health declined, Franco appointed Prince Juan Carlos as his successor in 1969, which was approved by the Spanish parliament on July22, 1969. Juan Carlos also temporarily took over as the country’s head of state during periods of Franco’s incapacity in 1974 and 1975.

Franco had hoped that Juan Carlos would continue the government’s ultra-conservative and authoritarian policies. Instead, King Juan Carlos dismantled Franco’s totalitarian regime and transitioned Spain into democracy and a parliamentary monarchy. In June 1977, Spain held general elections, the first free elections since 1936 before the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. The following year, a new constitution was promulgated.

Taken from Spanish Civil War – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 3)

Aftermath

Following the war, General Franco established a right-wing, anti-communist dictatorial government centered on the Falange Party.  Socialists, communists, and anarchists, were outlawed, as were
free-party politics.  Political enemies were killed or jailed; perhaps as many as 200,000 lost their lives in prison or through executions.  The political autonomies of Basque and Catalonia were voided.  These regions’ culture, language, and identity were suppressed, and a single Spanish national identity
was enforced.

After World War II ended, Spain became politically and economically isolated from most of the international community because of General Franco’s affiliation with the defeated fascist regimes of Germany and Italy.  Then with increasing tensions in the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union, the U.S. government became drawn to Spain’s
staunchly anti-communist stance and strategic location at the western end of the Mediterranean Sea.

In September 1953, Spain and the United States
entered into a defense agreement known as the Pact of Madrid, where the U.S. government infused large amounts of military assistance to Spain’s defense.  As a result, Spain’s diplomatic isolation ended, and the country was admitted to the United Nations in 1955.

Its economy devastated by the civil war, Spain experienced phenomenal economic growth during the period from 1959 to 1974 (known as the “Spanish Miracle”) when the government passed reforms that opened up the financial and investment sectors.  Spain’s totalitarian regime ended with General Franco’s death in 1975; thereafter, the country transitioned to a democratic parliamentary monarchy which it is today.

December 26, 1972 – Vietnam War: American B-52 bombers attack Hanoi in Operation Linebacker II

On December 14, 1972, the U.S. government issued a 72-hour ultimatum to North Vietnam to return to negotiations.  On the same day, U.S.
planes air-dropped naval mines off the North Vietnamese waters, again sealing off the coast to sea traffic.  Then on President Nixon’s orders to use “maximum effort…maximum destruction”, on December 18-29, 1972, U.S. B-52 bombers and other aircraft under Operation Linebacker II, launched massive bombing attacks on targets in North Vietnam, including Hanoi and Haiphong, hitting airfields, air defense systems, naval bases, and other military facilities, industrial complexes and supply depots, and transport facilities.  As many of the
restrictions from previous air campaigns were lifted, the round-the-clock bombing attacks destroyed North Vietnam’s war-related logistical and support
capabilities.  Several B-52s were shot down in the first days of the operation, but changes to attack methods and the use of electronic and mechanical countermeasures greatly reduced air losses.  By the end of the bombing campaign, few targets of military value remained in North Vietnam, enemy anti-aircraft guns had been silenced, and North Vietnam was forced to return to negotiations.  On January 15, 1973, President Nixon ended the bombing operations.

One week later, on January 23, negotiations resumed, leading four days later, on January 27, 1973, to the signing by representatives from North Vietnam, South Vietnam, the Viet Cong/NLF through its Provisional Revolutionary Government (PRG), and the United States of the Paris Peace Accords (officially titled: “Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam”), which (ostensibly) marked the end of the war.  The Accords stipulated a ceasefire; the release and exchange of prisoners of war; the withdrawal of all American and other non-Vietnamese troops from Vietnam within 60 days; for South Vietnam: a political settlement between the government and the PRG to determine the country’s political future; and for Vietnam: a gradual, peaceful reunification of North Vietnam and South Vietnam.  As in the 1954 Geneva Accords (which ended the First Indochina War), the DMZ did not constitute a political/territorial border.  Furthermore, the 200,000 North Vietnamese troops occupying territories in South Vietnam were allowed to remain in place.

Southeast Asia.

(Taken from Vietnam War – Wars of the 20th Century – Twenty Wars in Asia)

To assuage South Vietnam’s concerns regarding the last two points, on March 15, 1973, President Nixon assured President Thieu of direct U.S. military air intervention in case North Vietnam violated the
Accords.  Furthermore, just before the Accords came into effect, the United States delivered a large amount of military hardware and financial assistance to South Vietnam.

By March 29, 1973, nearly all American and other allied troops had departed, and only a small contingent of U.S. Marines and advisors remained.  A peacekeeping force, called the International Commission of Control and Supervision (ICCS), arrived in South Vietnam to monitor and enforce the Accords’ provisions.  But as large-scale fighting restarted soon thereafter, the ICCS became powerless and failed to achieve its objectives.

For the United States, the Paris Peace Accords meant the end of the war, a view that was not shared by the other belligerents, as fighting resumed, with the ICCS recording 18,000 ceasefire violations between January-July 1973.  President Nixon had
also compelled President Thieu to agree to the Paris Peace Accords under threat that the United States would end all military and financial aid to South
Vietnam, and that the U.S. government would sign the Accords even without South Vietnam’s concurrence.  Ostensibly, President Nixon could fulfill his promise of continuing to provide military support to South Vietnam, as he had been re-elected in a landslide victory in the recently concluded November 1972 presidential election. However, U.S. Congress, which was now dominated by anti-war legislators, did not bode well for South Vietnam.  In June 1973, U.S. Congress passed legislation that prohibited U.S.
combat activities in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, without prior legislative approval.  Also that year, U.S. Congress cut military assistance to South Vietnam by 50%.  Despite the clear shift in U.S. policy, South
Vietnam continued to believe the U.S. government would keep its commitment to provide military assistance.

Then in October 1973, a four-fold increase in world oil prices led to a global recession following the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) imposing an oil embargo in response to U.S. support for Israel in the Yom Kippur War.  South Vietnam’s economy was already reeling because of the U.S. troop withdrawal (a vibrant local goods and services economy had existed in Saigon because of the presence of large numbers of American soldiers) and reduced U.S. assistance.  South Vietnam experienced soaring inflation, high unemployment, and a refugee problem, with hundreds of thousands
of people fleeing to the cities to escape the fighting in the countryside.

The economic downturn also destabilized the South Vietnamese forces, for although they possessed vast quantities of military hardware (for
example, having three times more artillery pieces and two times more tanks and armor than North Vietnam), budget cuts, lack of spare parts, and fuel shortages meant that much of this equipment could not be used.  Later, even the number of bullets allotted to soldiers was rationed.  Compounding
matters were the endemic corruption, favoritism, ineptitude, and lethargy prevalent in the South Vietnamese government and military.

In the post-Accords period, South Vietnam was determined to regain control of lost territory, and in a number of offensives in 1973-1974, it succeeded in seizing some communist-held areas, but paid a high price in personnel and weaponry.  At the same time, North Vietnam was intent on achieving a complete military victory.  But since the North Vietnamese forces had suffered extensive losses in the previous years, the Hanoi government concentrated on first rebuilding its forces for a planned full-scale offensive of South Vietnam, planned for 1976.

In March 1974, North Vietnam launched a series of “strategic raids” from the captured territories that it held in South Vietnam.  By November 1974, North Vietnam’s control had extended eastward from the north nearly to the south of the country.  As well, North Vietnamese forces now threatened a number of coastal centers, including Da Nang, Quang Ngai, and Qui Nhon, as well as Saigon.  Expanding its occupied areas in South Vietnam also allowed North Vietnam to shift its logistical system (the Ho Chi Minh Trail) from eastern Laos and Cambodia to inside South Vietnam itself.  By October 1974, with major road improvements completed, the Trail system was a fully truckable highway from north to south, and greater numbers of North Vietnamese units, weapons, and supplies were being transported each month to South Vietnam.

North Vietnam’s “strategic raids” also were meant to gauge U.S. military response.  None occurred, as at this time, the United States was reeling from the Watergate Scandal, which led to President Nixon resigning from office on August 9, 1974.  Vice-President Gerald Ford succeeded as President.

Encouraged by this success, in December 1974, North Vietnamese forces in eastern Cambodia
attacked Phuoc Long Province, taking its capital Phuoc Binh in early January 1975 and sending pandemonium in South Vietnam, but again producing no military response from the United States.  President Ford had asked U.S. Congress for military support for South Vietnam, but was refused.

December 25, 1978 – Vietnam invades Cambodia

On December 25, 1978, Vietnam launched its invasion of Cambodia.  Following a diversionary attack on Kratie in Cambodia’s northwest region, the main attack force of the 120,000-strong Vietnamese forces, supported by 20,000 KUFNS fighters and air, artillery, and armored units, launched a swift offensive into southern Cambodia through Takeo Province.  The Khmer Rouge had massed its forces in Svay Rieng Province, where the Pol Pot regime believed the Vietnamese would strike.  But Vietnamese forces outflanked Svay Rieng
Province.

With the fall of Takeo, the road to Phnom Penh lay open.  Vietnamese tanks now sped down the flat
countryside to the capital.  On January 7, 1979, the Vietnamese Army captured Phnom Penh, and overthrew the Khmer Rouge regime.  Pol Pot and his staff, together the bulk of the Khmer Rouge Army, made a strategic withdrawal to the jungle mountains of western Cambodia near the Thai border, where they set up a resistance government.

(Taken from Cambodian-Vietnamese War – Wars of the 20th Century – Twenty Wars in Asia)

Background

By the late 1950s, the Cambodian communist movement experienced a resurgence that was
spurred by a new generation of young, Paris-education communists who had returned to the country.  In September 1960, ICP veteran communists and the new batch of communists met and elected a Central Committee, and renamed the KPRP (Kampuchean People’s Revolutionary Party) as the Worker’s Party of Kampuchea (WPK).

In February 1963, following another government suppression that led to the arrest of communist leaders, the WPK soon came under the control of the younger communists, led by Saloth Sar (later known as Pol Pot), who sidelined the veteran communists whom they viewed as pro-Vietnamese.  In September 1966, the WPK was renamed the Kampuchean Communist Party (KCP).

The KCP and its members, as well its military wing, were called “Khmer Rouge” by the Sihanouk government.  In January 1968, the Khmer Rouge launched a revolutionary war against the Sihanouk regime, and after Sihanouk was overthrown in March 1970, against the new Cambodian government.  In April 1975, the Khmer Rouge triumphed and took over political power in Cambodia, which it renamed Democratic Kampuchea.

During its revolutionary struggle, the Khmer Rouge obtained support from North Vietnam,
particularly through the North Vietnamese Army’s capturing large sections of eastern Cambodia,
which it later turned over to its Khmer Rouge allies.  But the Khmer Rouge held strong anti-Vietnamese sentiment, and deemed its alliance with North Vietnam only as a temporary expedient to combat a common enemy – the United States in particular, Western capitalism in general.  The Cambodian communists’ hostility toward the Vietnamese resulted from the historical domination by Vietnam of Cambodia during the pre-colonial period, and the perception that modern-day Vietnam wanted to
dominate the whole Indochina region.

Soon after coming to power, the Khmer Rouge launched one of history’s most astounding social revolutions, forcibly emptying cities, towns, and all urban areas, and sending the entire Cambodian population to the countryside to become peasant workers in agrarian communes under a feudal-type
forced labor system.  All lands and properties were nationalized, banks, schools, hospitals, and most industries, were shut down.  Money was abolished.  Government officials and military officers of the previous regime, teachers, doctors, academics, businessmen, professionals, and all persons who had associated with the Western “imperialists”, or were
deemed “capitalist” or “counter-revolutionary” were jailed, tortured, and executed.  Some 1½ – 2½ million people, or 25% of the population, died under the Khmer Rouge regime (Cambodian Genocide, previous article).

In foreign relations, the Khmer Rouge government isolated itself from the international community, expelling all Western nationals, banning the entry of nearly all foreign media, and closing down all foreign embassies.  It did, however, later allow a number of foreign diplomatic missions (from communist countries) to reopen in Phnom Penh.  As well, it held a seat in the United Nations (UN).

The Khmer Rouge was fiercely nationalistic and xenophobic, and repressed ethnic minorities, including Chams, Chinese, Laotians, Thais, and
especially the Vietnamese.  Within a few months, it had expelled the remaining 200,000 ethnic Vietnamese from the country, adding to the 300,000 Vietnamese who had been deported by the previous
Cambodian regime.